In the shadow of Khaby Lame’s deal, marketers face hard questions about influence and value

Anyone in marketing gawking at the near-billion price tag attached to TikTok creator Khaby Lame and his deal with Rich Sparkle Holdings isn’t really looking at innovation. They’re witnessing faith. Faith in what this industry has collectively agreed to let numbers represent. 

Because that $975 million valuation doesn’t seem to be rooted in the nuts and bolts of Lame’s company Step Distinctive Limited’s financials so much as the gravitational pull of his audience. 

The release made that all too clear: it talked up Khaby Lame as a “global-tier traffic entrance”. His company was framed as the “once-in-a-generation traffic gateway” to some 360 million followers. Moreover, those same fans could generate more than $4 billion in annual sales.  

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Inside NBCUniversal’s test to use AI agents to sell ads against a live NFL game

Traditional TV — let alone a live NFL playoff game — might be the last ad inventory type you’d think to test trying out AI agents against. And yet that’s exactly what NBCUniversal did last month.

The media conglomerate ran a test with ad agency RPA, marketing analytics firm Newton Research and Comcast-owned ad tech firm FreeWheel to have AI agents participate in buying an ad against a live NFL playoff game. But did it work?

“It works. It is a functioning technical proof-of-concept that accurately represents what the buyer wants to buy and what the seller has to sell,” said Ryan McConville, chief product officer and evp of ad products and solutions at NBCUniversal on the latest Digiday Podcast.

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