Nine passes left to attend the Digiday Publishing Summit

Google’s navigation app Waze helps drivers get to their destinations quickly. Simultaneously, it sells ads that try to convince drivers to alter their routes. Branded pins, for example, could highlight a nearby restaurant or retail store.
Waze recently partnered with WPP to help grow its ad business. “The goal is to deliver a better experience for drivers and a better experience for brands — more contextual, better targeted — than what is available today through traditional mediums such as radio and billboards,” said Sanja Partalo, svp, corporate strategy and digital development at WPP.
Digiday obtained a recent pitch deck by a sales representative at Waze from a source at a U.S. ad agency. The deck describes Waze’s audience in the U.S. — 29 million monthly active users who spend 10.5 hours per month on the app, on average — and shares examples of previous Waze campaigns from brands such as Outback Steakhouse, McDonald’s and 99 Cents Only Stores.
Ad buyers, with clients in retail and food, said they see Waze as an effective and inexpensive option. Ads on Waze start at $2 per day for a business advertising one location, according to a pitch deck Digiday obtained last May, and are sold at cost-per-impression. But buyers recently have asked about more personalization and targeting options. Google and Waze don’t share data with each other, so advertisers cannot target Waze users based on their Google data — at least for now.
Google doesn’t break out how much revenue Waze makes in its earnings, but the audience is evidently much smaller than Google overall. Waze has 115 million monthly active users in total, as of the WPP partnership announcement in February.
More in Marketing

‘Consumers are dying to get out of their houses’: How Cinemark’s CMO is getting people back to the movies
A look at how consumer demand looks in the movie industry and what other retailers can learn from Cinemark’s loyalty and membership programs.

Platform and agency execs recommended must-reads to unwind during busy periods
Senior execs from the likes of TikTok, Snap, OMD USA, Publicis London and more let us in on their favorite page-turners to unwind.

In Graphic Detail: AI adoption increases, but U.S. consumers are still wary
Digiday has charted the rise of generative AI, big tech’s investment into AI as well as agencies’ top use cases and consumer sentiment.