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Omnichannel TechBytes with Jeff Smith, CMO at LiveRamp

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Earlier this month, MarTech Series covered  LiveRamp unveiling their People-Based Search for fully-personalized omnichannel marketing. The leading provider of omnichannel identity resolution added targeting for people-based search to its IdentityLink™ platform.  Jeff Smith, CMO of LiveRamp,  explained to us the need to bring people-based targeting to search and identified the common challenges that omnichannel marketers face in audience targeting.

MTS: “Consumer intent is inherently expressed in the search.” How does the new People-based Search measure or identify the consumer intent?

Jeff Smith (Jeff): Consumer intent has always been expressed in a search query; for example, if I search for car reviews, you might assume I am in the market to buy a car, and if you are an automaker, having no additional context on who is performing the search, you would likely bid a very high amount to serve an ad to me. This has always been the case with search channels.

Bringing people based targeting to search, however, allows you to recognize if the consumer performing the search is a person you already know something about. If they are a customer of yours and you have information about them in your offline CRM system and apply that information in deciding what action to take when they do perform a search. Go back to the previous example.

via LiveRamp

Google Customer Match with IdentityLink

If you not only knew that I searched for car reviews but also knew I recently bought a car from you/am already a customer of yours (data that is in your offline CRM system), you may choose to do the exact opposite thing, and not serve an ad to me to buy a car as it would likely be wasted expenditure. Or choose to serve an ad but change the content (so instead of an ad enticing me to buy a new car, serve an ad offering a maintenance promotion). The key is that you were able to use IdentityLink to combine data from the offline and digital worlds to make a more contextually relevant decision.

Say you’re an international hotel brand and a very loyal customer, who prefers one specific brand within your hotel group searches for “Hotels in Chicago”. Without people-based search, the hotel brand’s advertising would respond to the keyword search by showing every brand within their group. But, by combining known preferences that the consumer has expressed to you, with the immediacy of the search for a specific city, the advertiser can customize the ads even further by offering rates/ads for the hotel chain that the searcher prefers.

The same can be said of a retailer who knows, based on loyalty cards or purchase history, that a customer prefers a specific brand of coffee, clothing, or other types of products.

MTS: What are the common challenges that omnichannel marketers face in audience targeting?

Jeff: There are two primary challenges that marketers face in targeting:

A] Consistency

When a customer tries to target a specific segment, they do so depending on a variety of attributes, those attributes can vary from CRM data, purchase history, a mobile or Cookie ID or anonymous browsing data, all of which is hard to tie together in a consistent way. Let’s say you have one segment that you’re trying to reach across video, display, and search. Your video targets may be matched to a mobile ID, your display matched to a Cookie ID and search tied to keywords. How do you know who within your segment has been matched and if you’ve reached all of them across all your channels? That’s where an identity resolution platform like IdentityLink can help. Since we focus on tying all of those IDs together to one, privacy safe IdentityLink, we’re able to more consistently match across all your advertising channels.

B] Efficiency

Efficiency is the other big factor in omnichannel marketing. There are often large teams, within marketing departments dedicated to a specific channel. They are focused on uploading lists to each platform and often have to upload different lists manually to each channel. Google gets one list, the DMP gets another, the DSP gets another. Each list has to be built, and rebuilt over and over again, by different teams in different platforms. Imagine if all of the data could be sent at one time to all of those destinations! Marketers would have time to do more testing, measurement, and iteration.

MTS: Marketers using Google Customer Match get special added benefits. What are these benefits, and what do other marketers need to do to enjoy the same features?

Jeff: The benefits can be seen in the illustration we created. IdentityLink’s data append feature can help you connect more of your CRM data to GCM (up to six times more), and apply more context to your interaction with the consumer – this can improve click through rates by 2-3X. We are excited to see what the future of people-based search could be and are actively looking to work with the other search vendors on similar functionality.

MTS:  LiveRamp’s has committed to privacy and security as an Acxiom SafeHaven® environment. What does this have to do with data fraud and bot identification management?

Jeff:  This is focused on consumer privacy. We take privacy and safety of our customer’s data seriously. As a SafeHaven, we employ technical, operational, and personnel controls designed to ensure the ethical use of data and closely monitor data governance and consumer privacy legislation as it develops at the local, state, and national levels, adapting our privacy policy to ensure compliance.

MTS: How do you see AI within LiveRamp helping marketers in generating more ROI from their campaign investments?

Jeff: As more and more digital channels proliferate, with complexities, like data hygiene and identifiers, introduced at the data layer, and the real-time desires of consumers, machine learning, and artificial intelligence are going to be necessary to help marketers adapt. Campaign automation (from programmatic advertising, to nurture campaigns and beyond) are really the first step.

Marketers are going to have to think more and more strategically about all the different paths a customer can take during their relationship with a brand, and be able to build programs to respond as quickly as possible. In the front end, I’m really looking forward to a future where smart devices respond to a consumer’s needs and allow advertisers to personalize an experience in real time.

MTS: How do you see marketers shifting their focus from omnichannel campaigns to Mobile- Only and Video Marketing by 2020?

Jeff: The opposite is actually happening – marketers are shifting their focus from the single channel only campaigns (like mobile and video) to campaigns that are coordinated across all of the channels in which consumers ingest media. Note that consumers don’t think about what “channel” they are in when interacting with media or a brand. Marketers, however, have had to think about channels because without identity resolution there are technical barriers that prevent seamless experiences across channels. Even when marketers are operating in individual channels, they still need to bring as much context to bear as possible to each consumer interaction, which requires applying what you have learned from interactions in other channels – which requires omnichannel identity resolution.

Marketers, however, have had to think about channels because without identity resolution there are technical barriers that prevent seamless experiences across channels. Even when marketers are operating in individual channels, they still need to bring as much context to bear as possible to each consumer interaction, which requires applying what you have learned from interactions in other channels – which requires omnichannel identity resolution.

MTS: How do you see campaign automation evolving in next 3-5 years? Will SMBs and start-ups be able to adopt the new technologies with their limited budgets?

Jeff: Consumer habits will likely dictate how campaign automation evolves in the next few years. Consumers are accustomed to disjointed marketing experiences and irrelevant advertising, but they appreciate and respond positively to interactions that feel more integrated. In fact, they’re demanding those types of experiences now. As such, marketing teams and technologies are going to follow suit. Technically, it’s hard to connect all the different channels, devices, and IDs today, so identity resolution will play a bigger role in MarTech in the coming years.

Best-in- Class vendors will need to focus on improving their integrations across partners, while closed- stack vendors will need to focus on stronger integrations across their product suites. This will allow marketers to ensure consistency of messaging across the various touch points, in a way that makes it far quicker and easier to implement than what’s possible right now.

As for marketing teams, while the customer journey has been front and center for a while, LiveRamp is still set up to focus on just acquisition or retention or a specific channel. In the next 3-5 years, our goal is to evolve and truly address a consumer’s needs from a holistic perspective. We need to be able to adapt more quickly and take something that’s working here and figure out how to make it work over there in real time.

In some ways, SMBs and start-ups often find themselves in a better situation to adopt new technologies and new ways of doing things, because they don’t have a choice. Without the headcount to do something the way it’s always been done, you’re more likely to look to offload work in an automated way, freeing up your focus for more important projects. There are some really innovative B2C companies, BirchBox and Blue Apron come to mind, that are pushing the limits on how to grow using both new technologies and limited budgets. It’s all about how you prioritize.

MTS: Thank you, Jeff, for answering all our questions. We look forward to having you very soon at MarTech Series for more insights.

Stay tuned for more business insights on video ad tech, programmatic. social media, marketing automation and AI technology market.

To participate in our Tech Bytes program, email us at news@martechseries.com




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Britain charges Barclays, ex-bosses over "unlawful" Qatari deal

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LONDON Barclays (BARC.L) and four former top executives were charged with fraud on Tuesday over undisclosed payments to Qatari investors as part of a 12 billion pound ($15 billion) emergency fundraising during the financial crisis in 2008.

Britain’s Serious Fraud Office (SFO) charged Barclays Plc, former chief executive John Varley, Roger Jenkins, Tom Kalaris and Richard Boath with conspiracy to commit fraud and unlawful financial assistance in its first criminal prosecution of a bank and senior managers over events during the credit crisis.

Barclays said it was considering its position and awaiting further information about the charges, which follow a five-year inquiry into how it avoided the fate of Lloyds (LLOY.L) and RBS (RBS.L) by averting a state bailout.

The SFO charged Varley, Jenkins, the ex-chairman of its Middle East investment banking arm, Kalaris, a former CEO of the bank’s wealth division and Boath, a former European head of financial institutions, after investigating a two-part fundraising that included a $3 billion loan to Qatar.

A lawyer for Jenkins said he would « vigorously defend » himself, adding his client had received both internal and external legal advice at the time.

Boath said he had no case to answer as he had repeatedly raised concerns about decisions taken by the bank at the time with both senior management and senior lawyers and had been reassured the decisions were lawful.

« The SFO’s decision to charge me is based on a false understanding of my role and the facts. I was not a decision-maker and had no control over what the bank did in 2008, » he said in a statement.

« The evidence I have supplied is very clear: there is no case for me to answer. »

A lawyer representing Varley, who resigned as a Rio Tinto (RIO.L) senior independent director with immediate effect following the SFO charges, declined to comment. A lawyer for Kalaris could not immediately be reached for comment.

Each offence of fraud by false representation carries a maximum jail sentence of 10 years. Barclays faces a fine.

The men have been told to appear before Westminster Magistrates’ Court on July 3.

CHARGED

The case centers on agreements between Barclays and Qatari investors during two fundraisings in June and October 2008.

Qatar Holding, part of the Qatar Investment Authority sovereign wealth fund, and Challenger, an investment vehicle of former Qatari prime minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabr al-Thani, invested around 5.3 billion pounds in Barclays.

Authorities have examined whether payments from Barclays to Qatar at the same time, such as around 322 million pounds in « advisory services agreements » (ASA), alongside the $3 billion loan, were honest and properly disclosed.

Varley and Jenkins have been charged with conspiracy to commit fraud by false representation during the June 2008 capital raising as well as the November 2008 fundraising. They also face a charge of unlawful financial assistance.

Kalaris and Boath have been charged with conspiracy to commit fraud by false representation during the June capital raising, the SFO said.

Qatar, which is a major UK investor, has not been accused of wrongdoing.

The criminal charge is a reputational blow to Barclays, which is grappling with a string of other legal problems.

In a separate case, it is contesting a $1.0 billion civil lawsuit from businesswoman Amanda Staveley, who arranged an investment in Barclays from Abu Dhabi investors during the financial crisis.

In 2013 the Financial Conduct Authority proposed a 50 million pound fine over how Barclays made disclosures about its dealings with Qatar in an investigation that has been on hold pending the outcome of the SFO’s probe.

« We are pleased that this matter, which led to the stay of our own case, is now in the public domain. We welcome a fair and transparent hearing on the basis of the charges set out today by the SFO, » it said in a statement.

Away from Qatar, Barclays current CEO Jes Staley, who joined the bank in late 2015, is under investigation for attempting to unmask an internal whistleblower.

Qatar, meanwhile, has made a healthy profit from its investment and remains Barclays’ biggest shareholder, with a stake of around six percent, according to Thomson Reuters data.

Barclays shares eased 0.5 percent to 205.6 pence by 1330 GMT, broadly in line with the STOXX European bank index .SX7P.

($1 = 0.7876 pounds)

(Reporting by Kirstin Ridley and Lawrence White, additional reporting by Andrew MacAskill and Tom Finn in Qatar, editing by Susan Fenton and Alexander Smith)

The Finance 202: Finance industry favors Handel in Georgia’s special election today

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THE TICKER

Republican candidate Karen Handel and Democratic candidate Jon Ossoff exchange words moments before Georgia’s 6th Congressional District special election debate on June 6, 2017. The race will be decided today and will have national consequences. (REUTERS/Chris Aluka Berry)

All eyes are on the northern Atlanta suburbs today as voters in Georgia’s 6th Congressional district decide a nip-and-tuck race that’s shattered records for the most expensive in U.S. history. Finance industry interests helped tip those scales past $50 million, with the industry demonstrating a clear preference for Republican Karen Handel, a former Georgia secretary of state facing off against Democrat Jon Ossoff, a 30-year-old first-time candidate. 

That appears to have little to do with where the candidates stand on financial regulation: If the subject has even surfaced in the race, I couldn’t find evidence of it. Instead, the special election to replace Tom Price, now serving as secretary of Health and Human Services, has attracted national attention and wads of outside spending since becoming a referendum of sorts on President Trump’s broader agenda. 

A loss by Handel in a district that Price carried by 23 points just seven months ago could sever Trump’s already-fragile grip on his Republican foot-soldiers in Congress, further clouding prospects for a tax overhaul and the rest of his agenda. “We’ll all likely assume that there will be no legislative action for the rest of this Congress,” one bank executive tells me. “The president already lacks a mandate for anyone to follow his lead. But if we lose Georgia, he’ll have no ability to command votes.”

Trump himself nodded to the race’s significance for his standing in a series of tweets, the latest of which was early Tuesday morning:

The size of Wall Street’s investment in the race is tough to pinpoint. That’s in part because only a fraction of the spending for Handel has come from the hard dollars she’s raised for her official campaign account. Instead, super PACs and other outside groups have picked up the tab for most of it, more than $18 million. But a scan of federal election reports shows Handel has gathered backing in the last several weeks from an array of financial institutions and their trade groups. Among those that cut checks: the American Bankers Association, the National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies, Regions Financial, SunTrust Bank, and Transamerica. 

It was not immediately clear why these groups favored Handel, but the giving would be consistent with business interests’ desire to keep Republicans in power and to press their tax-cutting, deregulatory agenda. A search of campaign finance data also revealed that Handel also got contributions from the political action committees of General Electric, General Dynamics, Caterpillar, FedEx, KPMG, Koch Industries, Marathon Oil, Pfizer, and Coca-Cola.

As the race has worn on, Ossoff has presented more as a conciliator and less as an anti-Trump agitator. That, and the wealthy, suburban profile of the district, suggest if successful he’d be a good fit with the New Democrats, who favor a lighter touch with the industry. But while the Democrat has attracted no organized support from financial interests, New York City itself has been a rich vein of the smaller-dollar contributions that propelled his bid. Indeed, two of the top five most generous zip codes to his campaign sit on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, one of the most liberal warrens in the country. 

Finally, Ossoff is not even one degree removed from Kevin Bacon — the actor donated $1,000 to the Democrat on June 11.
 

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). (Zach Gibson/Getty Images)

Most immediately, the very public process playing out in Georgia could go a long way toward determining the fate of what has been an unusually private one up on Capitol Hill: The effort by Senate Republican leaders and some handpicked lieutenants to craft a health-care overhaul behind closed doors. The House bill they’re trying to match has met with resoundingly negative response from voters in Price’s old district. An Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll earlier this month showed only one-in-four respondents approve of that package, and more than 80 percent of them said the issue is top of mind as they make their decision. 
 

House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wisc.). (AFP PHOTO / Brendan Smialowski)

— House Speaker Paul Ryan heads to the National Association of Manufacturers this afternoon to deliver a pitch for a tax code overhaul that’s lately been struggling (read my write up about why here). According to Ryan’s office, he won’t “litigate the issues currently being resolved between the House, Senate, and administration, but he will describe the important components of any reform.”

Those include making sure the package is permanent; moving to a territorial system, and fixing the incentive for American companies to move abroad. Notably on the last point, though, the speaker will acknowledge “that the particular mechanism must be sorted out with the administration” — a signal he’s not wedded to the border adjustment tax his original blueprint championed. Here’s a sneak peek of the speech, which the speaker will give at 12:45 at the Grand Hyatt at 1000 H St., NW. Watch the livestream here:

« We are actually unique in the world in the way we discourage capital from coming back to America and how we incentivize off-shoring jobs. This is not the kind of exceptionalism we should aspire to…We must think differently, so that once again we make things here and export them around the world…
 
We are going to get this done in 2017. We need to get this done in 2017. We cannot let this once-in-a-generation moment slip  . . . Transformational tax reform can be done, and we are moving forward. Full speed ahead.”

— The administration, for its part, hasn’t been very specific about what it would like a tax overhaul to look like. But Trump officials have consistently advocated scrapping the deduction for state and local taxes. Now, according to the Wall Street Journal, seven House Republicans from blue states that’d be hit particularly hard by that repeal are joining with dozens of Democratic colleagues to oppose the plan. The provision would generate more than $1 trillion over a decade that could go to lowering rates. It would also prove painful for taxpayers in California, New Jersey, New York, all states with healthy Republican delegations. 

Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein. 

— Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein weighed in on the state of play in Washington in a Monday interview with CNBC’s Jim Cramer.

On how the Trump administration is doing so far:

You know, I can’t say that I’m on all fours in line with the administration, you know, across the board… But as far as the economy’s going, as far as market’s are going– they represented stimulus– in the form of lower taxes. Spending on infrastructure. Taking away, maybe, some of the layers and layers and layers and redundant regulations. And that’s basically good, certainly good for the market. But generally I think good for the economy.

On the market’s performance relative to expectations for action from Washington: 

I’d say the market now is not what he wants to do, but whether he’ll be effective in accomplishing it…The market was discounting, in terms of the alternative to Trump, was discounting higher taxes, potentially more regulation… So already there had to be an adjustment just to get back to neutral. And then, of course, the market is he won’t accomplish very much versus he might accomplish a lot. And it’s somewhere in between. And that’s the variability in the market.

On why he’s tweeting, including criticism of the president: 

This is how I think of it: I don’t use that platform for Lloyd Blankfein’s personal point of view, because I know I’m interesting to people because my role at Goldman…  And the reason why I do it, it has to fall in my mind, in one of a couple of categories. Either it’s something that is kind of in our wheelhouse of expertise, like for – so I comment that it would be very, very bad to let U.S. government default… The other thing I’ll comment on is when things really affect the ability of our people to be who they are and to do their job and to be effective as professionals. And that’s got the LGBT, the immigrant ban, so that people couldn’t move around with their spouses when they have had a passport for another country. So I commented on those issues because, really, I kind of have to be the champion of our people. And I owe it, I kind of owe it to the body politic to comment where I have expertise.

On talking to Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn, his former Goldman colleagues, now that they’ve joined the administration: 

Well, the fact is, and it’s sad for me, in a way, that I talk to them – barely talk to them. Talk to them a lot less. And look, you’re a little bit sensitive to not wanting to go – and, again, the fact of the matter is I always, in my – anybody in my job would always talk from time to time to the Treasury secretary, the national economic advisor. We’re one of the biggest underwriters of government debt. So of course you would. But I’m a little, you know, you get apprehensive about it. You know, this is a kind of a punishing for us.

 

Democrat Archie Parnell faces Republican Ralph Norman today in the special election to fill the House seat for South Carolina’s 5th congressional district.

— Elsewhere, two other Goldman alums, both Democrats, are running for office to oppose Trump. Archie Parnell, the firm’s former global head of tax policy, is trailing Republican Ralph Norman in a special election that voters in South Carolina’s 5th congressional district will decide today. But Phil Murphy, the Democratic nominee for New Jersey governor, is in strong position to replace outgoing Gov. Chris Christie, Bloomberg’s Max Abelson reports. 

David Malpass. (Bloomberg)

— The Senate today will take a half-step toward stocking the senior ranks of a still largely leaderless Treasury Department. The chamber is set to votes to end debate on the nomination of Sigal Mandelker, who’s nominated to serve as under secretary for terrorism and financial crimes. And later this week, it’s expected to do the same for Marshall Billingslea, up for assistant secretary for terrorist financing. But a clutch of top Treasury nominees likewise ready for floor action remain stuck in limbo, as Democrats slow-walk otherwise uncontroversial picks in protest of the GOP’s closed-door approach to health care. They are: David Malpass, tapped to be undersecretary for international affairs; Andrew Maloney, assistant secretary for legislative affairs; Brent McIntosh, general counsel; and Heath Tarbert, assistant secretary for international markets and development. 

One source close to the process tells me — given the backlog across the executive branch, the Senate’s pace, and the days left in session — it could be September before these officials are in place. That’s unwelcome news for a department trying to juggle a tax-code revamp, a debt-ceiling hike, and a financial-regulatory overhaul, among other priorities.

Former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

— SCANDAL WATCH: House Democrats want answers, in the form of details and documents, from former National Security Adviser Mike Flynn about two trips he took to the Middle East in 2015 they say he failed to disclose on security forms, my colleague Karoun Demirjian reports.

This sounds bad: « According to the ranking Democrats on the House Oversight and House Foreign Affairs committees — Elijah E. Cummings (Md.) and Eliot L. Engel (N.Y.), respectively — Flynn’s security forms and interviews revealed a previously unreported, six-day trip he made to Saudi Arabia in October 2015, in which he claimed to have stayed at a hotel that does not appear to exist, have traveled with a friend who was never named, and have spoken at a conference that none of his handling bureaus were aware of. »

Ryan speaks during his weekly press conference. (REUTERS/Yuri Gripas)

Today

  • House Speaker Paul D. Ryan is set to deliver a major speech on tax reform at the National Association of Manufacturers summit and will answer questions following his address. Vice President Pence is also scheduled to speak today and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy will speak at the summit on Wednesday. 
  • The Brookings Institution is holding an event on “why economic policy so often so often comes up short » with former Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.)

Coming Up

  • The Ninth Annual Congressional Women’s Softball Game will take place on Wednesday.

  • The Senate Finance Committee will hold a hearing on Wednesday with U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer on the trade policy agenda and the 2018 budget request.

  • The House Small Business Committee will hold a hearing on Wednesday on the trade promotion coordinating committee.                                                           

  • The Financial Services Roundtable is holding a panel discussion on Wednesday that includes Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-Mo.) on what to expect from the Trump administration and congress.

  • The IRS and Urban-Brookings Tax Policy will host a joint research conference on Wednesday.

  • The House Appropriations’ Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government will hold a budget hearing with OMB Director Mick Mulvaney on Wednesday.
  • The Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on the Legislative Branch will hold a hearing on the budget requests for the Government Accountability Office and the Congressional Budget Office on Wednesday.
  • House Financial Services Committee will continue marking up a bill on Wednesday to reauthorize the National Flood Insurance Program.
  • The Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs will have a hearing on “Fostering Economic Growth: Regulator Perspective” on Thursday.
  • The House Ways and Means Committee will hold a hearing on US trade policy agenda with USTR Lighthizer on Thursday.
  • The SEC’s Investor Advisory Committee will hold a meeting on Thursday.

  • The Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry will hold a hearing on the nomination of  J. Christopher Giancarlo to be chairman of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission on Thursday.

  • The American Banking Association will hold a forum on payments on Thursday with remarks from Rep. Randy Hultgren (R-Il.), who co-chairs the House Fintech and Payments caucus.

  • The Global Business Dialogue will host a discussion on trade with North America and with the European Union on Friday.

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Watch Stephen Colbert show you what it will be like when Amazon takes over Whole Foods:

Otto Warmbier’s Death Dims Chances of Improved US Relations With North Korea

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Jae H. Ku, director of the U.S.-Korea Institute at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, agreed that moves toward diplomacy would be delayed. “I think it’s going to be slowed down. There is going to be a lot of anger and venting of frustrations,” he said.

Otto Warmbier Dies Days After Release From North Korea

Mr. Warmbier, the U.S. student held by North Korea for 17 months, was released in a coma to the United States on June 13. He died on June 19. He was 22 years old.


By BARBARA MARCOLINI and CHRIS CIRILLO on June 19, 2017.


Photo by Kim Kwang Hyon/Associated Press.

Watch in Times Video »

But other analysts said that however horrific the case might be, the Trump administration was unlikely to let it upset the momentum toward dialogue it has built in recent months. They said that Mr. Yun’s trip was the first fruit of those efforts and that North Korea may have freed Mr. Warmbier to open up space for diplomacy with Washington, even if they anticipated the anger that his condition would provoke in the United States.

A statement on Monday from Mr. Trump about Mr. Warmbier condemned the North for its “brutality,” but he and Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson both stopped short of announcing fresh sanctions in response.

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Mr. Warmbier was visiting North Korea as part of a tour group when he was detained at the Pyongyang airport in January 2016. Two months later, he was sentenced to 15 years of hard labor for the “hostile act” of trying to steal a propaganda poster off the wall of his hotel.

In a series of low-key communications with the North Koreans in recent months, the Trump administration pushed for the release of Mr. Warmbier and the three other Americans as a first step toward improving ties, according to South Korean officials and others familiar with the process, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.

When Mr. Yun held a secret meeting with Choe Son-hui, a senior negotiator from the North Korean Foreign Ministry, in Oslo last month, the North Koreans agreed to look into the matter, these people said. But this month, the North Koreans came back with shocking news: They said Mr. Warmbier had been in a coma for more than a year and told the Americans to take him home.

North Korea has said it released Mr. Warmbier on “humanitarian grounds” but did not explain his medical condition. It has told American officials that Mr. Warmbier fell into a coma after contracting botulism, according to his family.

The Yanggakdo International Hotel in Pyongyang, where Mr. Warmbier was said to have removed a poster from staff quarters. The tour agency that took him to Pyongyang said this week that it would stop taking Americans to North Korea.


Ed Jones/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

American doctors found “extensive” brain damage but could not say what had caused the injury. They found no evidence of botulism, or that Mr. Warmbier had been beaten, as one American official had asserted.

“Perhaps his condition deteriorated and the authorities decided it was better to release him in a coma than as a corpse,” said John Delury, a North Korea expert at Yonsei University in Seoul. “North Koreans might have feelers out to see if there is a deal to be made with the Trump administration, and releasing Mr. Warmbier is a way to move that process along, while also removing what could be an obstacle down the road.”

Mr. Warmbier’s death comes at a delicate time in international diplomacy surrounding North Korea. Senior Chinese and American officials are due to meet in Washington this week, and United States officials planned to press their counterparts to do more to rein in Pyongyang’s nuclear pursuits.

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China, North Korea’s main ally, is a strong advocate for negotiations over the North’s nuclear program, and Mr. Warmbier’s death seemed unlikely to change that. At a daily news briefing in Beijing, a Foreign Ministry spokesman, Geng Shuang, called the death “really a tragedy” but stopped short of reprimanding North Korea for its treatment of Mr. Warmbier.

Shi Yinhong, a professor of international relations at Renmin University in Beijing, said that China would not punish North Korea over a human rights issue. “What makes China take steps is a missile or nuclear test, not the death of an American student,” he said.

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Another Chinese analyst, Cheng Xiaohe, an associate professor of international relations at Renmin University, said Mr. Warmbier’s death illustrated the “failure of North Korea’s hostage diplomacy” because it would strengthen “hard-liners” in the Trump administration. He said there could be retaliation from the United States unless Pyongyang took a step like freeing the three remaining American captives.

Kim Jong-un, the leader of North Korea, inspecting the test-firing of the Pukguksong-2, a ballistic missile, in an undated photograph released by the North’s official Korean Central News Agency in May.


Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

“I believe the U.S. will not let the issue slip away quietly and will take retaliatory actions soon if North Korea fails to make a conciliatory move regarding the detainees,” he said.

Mr. Warmbier’s case has drawn new attention to the other three American prisoners in North Korea, who Mr. Yun was allowed to meet when he visited Pyongyang.

They are Tony Kim, a volunteer accounting teacher in his mid-50s who had taught at the Pyongyang University of Science and Technology, arrested in April for unknown reasons; Kim Hak-song, who also worked for the same university and did agricultural work, also arrested for unknown reasons, in early May; and Kim Dong-chul, 63, a businessman who has been serving a 10-year sentence of hard labor since April 2016, on spying charges.

Six South Koreans and a Korean-Canadian also remain in North Korean captivity on various criminal charges. South Korea’s president, Moon Jae-in, said on Tuesday that his government would redouble efforts to free the South Koreans from the North. He also sent a message of condolences to the Warmbier family, saying it was “deeply deplorable that North Korea does not respect the universal standards and values of human rights,” according to his office.

Mr. Moon, who took office in May, is more open to dialogue with North Korea than any of his recent predecessors. He is scheduled to meet with Mr. Trump in Washington this month and is expected to urge the president to talk to Pyongyang, saying that sanctions alone have failed to change the North’s behavior. But South Korean officials feared that idea would be a harder sell after Mr. Warmbier’s death.

Still, there was cautious hope here that if North Korea and the United States negotiated the release of the other three Americans, it could eventually pave the way for far more complicated talks over how to contain or dismantle North Korea’s nuclear weapons programs.

“Over the years, South Koreans have grown weary as tensions kept rising and the North’s nuclear program kept advancing,” said Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies in Seoul. “There is a growing sense that we needed change, a breakthrough.”

Rick Gladstone contributed reporting from New York, and Jane Perlez from Beijing.


Continue reading the main story

PM Lee Hsien Loong’s video apology lauded by PR professionals

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News of Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s dispute with his siblings, Lee Wei Ling and Lee Hsien Yang, over the 38 Oxley Road house, has made headlines globally.

The drama first began last Wednesday, 14 June when the siblings released a statement questioning the leadership of their brother. This has now led to a video apology being released by the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO), with PM Lee saying that he “deeply regret[s]” that the family feud has impacted Singapore’s reputation, and its citizens’ confidence in the government.

“These allegations go beyond private and personal matters, and extend to the conduct of my office and the integrity of the government,” he said. Prime Minister Lee added that as much as he would like to put an end to the dispute, the “baseless accusations against the government cannot be left unanswered” and they “will be dealt with openly and refuted”.

The PM said he will deliver a ministerial statement to refute the charges when Parliament sits on 3 July 2017. He urged all members of parliament to “raise questions for themselves and their constituents”, and urged them to “examine the issues thoroughly”.

“I hope that this full, public airing in Parliament will dispel any doubts that have been planted and strengthen confidence in our institutions and our system of government,” he said.

The video statement was also posted on PM Lee’s Facebook page. At the point of writing, it generated over 10,517 shares and over 2,000 comments. Many of these statements from members of the public lauded the PM’s courage, transparency and choice of words.

PR professionals Marketing spoke to also commended the move by the PM. Tarun Deo, managing director Singapore and Southeast Asia at Golin said the PM has done the right thing by being forthcoming.

“In his official capacity as the PM of Singapore, because he clearly feels that this episode is an unsavoury one, apologising is the right thing to do. I will give him high marks for that,” Deo said.

“When you look at the other initiatives he has taken such as lifting the PAP whip, and issuing an official statement on 3 July 2017,  this moves the conversation into transparency,” he added.

“Clearly this issue is something that you would have best like to keep managed within the family and privately, but now that it is out in the open, the PM has done the right thing,” Deo said. But whether or not the apology will win back the public’s trust, Deo said it might be too soon to tell.

But what is clear is that the PM has separated the personal and professional side.

“He is now moving the discussion forward and trying to make it as transparent as possible,” Deo added. Echoing Deo’s sentiment is Wesley Gunter, PR director at Right Hook Communications. He said:

I think the move is a positive step forward in clearing the air, so people can hear his side of the story.

He added that this move, however, may also open up another can of worms, “depending on how people interpret the response given, which may end up with more back and forth between the PM and his siblings”.

And while the apology will win back the public’s trust “to some extent”, Gunter adds that at least the public can be rest assured that PM Lee’s priority is still to focus on the more important issues at hand.

Ginny-Ann Oh, director at Asia PR Werkz said the “delivery of the ministerial statement in Parliament is a good move”.

“It is, in effect, akin to Singaporeans raising questions and seeking clarification and it is important that they are able to do so,” she added.

Oh described the dispute as a “trying time” for Singapore and said, it has in fact, caused a certain impact on “Brand Singapore” and investors’ confidence in the nation. She said:

Leaders must be able to say sorry when it is necessary.

JSA Announces the Addition of its Digital Advertising & SEO Services to its Marketing and PR Portfolio

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/EINPresswire.com/ — MIDDLEBROOK, VA–(Marketwired – Jun 20, 2017) – Jaymie Scotto Associates (JSA), the premier provider of PR, Marketing and Event Planning services to the tech and telecom industries, announces its new Digital Marketing SEO Specialist, Blerim Mehmeti, as the newest addition to the JSA team. With this new hire, JSA launches its new SEO and Digital Advertising Services, as a complementary extension to its WalkOut videos, JSA TV and JSA Radio interviews, digital marketing, social media, and public relations.

Blerim is responsible for the optimization and management of JSA’s digital marketing assets, including the company website, the Telecom Exchange website and the JSA TV YouTube page. Blerim also spearheads the efforts of JSA clients who are interested in enhancing their SEO and digital advertising reach. By utilizing the top social media tools and resources available today, Blerim delivers proven results, leveraging each ad dollar to drive click-throughs and engagement. He also recommends, deploys and reports on both organic and inorganic tactics to increase the clients’ search engine ranking and marketing.

« We welcome Blerim and his SEO and digital ad expertise to the JSA family, » states Jaymie Scotto Cutaia, CEO of JSA. « Blerim is an established YouTuber in his own right. With his own, highly successful tech channel, High Tech Point, many of his videos receive well over 100K views each. We look forward to leveraging his experience to further drive views and engagement to our client and community video interviews, WalkOuts and lead generation campaigns. »

Based out of Toronto, Blerim is also a member of the growing JSA Canada team. The JSA Canada objective is to service the growing tech and telecom Canadian companies with valued and proven digital and in-print marketing, PR and event planning.

« I am honored to be part of the JSA family, spearheading the JSA SEO and digital marketing efforts, as well as representing JSA Canada in the growing tech sector of Toronto, » continues Mr. Mehmeti. « I look forward to driving website optimization, video editing, graphics, AdWord and LinkedIn management, search engine marketing, social analysis and more for JSA and its valued telecom and tech clients. »

For more information on JSA’s digital advertising and/or SEO services, email pr@jaymiescotto.com or visit www.jaymiescotto.com.

About JSA

Celebrating more than 12 years of success, Jaymie Scotto Associates (JSA) is the preeminent provider of Public Relations, Marketing and Event Planning services to the tech and telecom industries. Awarded ‘Most Outstanding Telecoms PR Agency’ by LiveWire for 2015 2016, our success is attributed to our skilled JSA team, innovative tools, and established media and industry relationships, allowing us to deliver the finest outreach and brand awareness services available — with measurable return on investment. Our clients enjoy ‘insider access’ to the top journalists, bloggers, analysts and thought leaders shaping tech and telecom — as well as critical networking opportunities, including JSA’s own industry networking event, Telecom Exchange
(TEX).

We also feature client and marketplace news via JSA WalkOuts (new, 3D-like interactive video for lead generation), JSA TV (our video newsroom on YouTube), JSA Radio (our podcast channel on iHeartRadio), Virtual CEO Roundtables (our monthly panel discussions with top industry thought leaders), Tech Telecom News Trends (our newsletter) and Tech and
Telecom News Now (our industry blog).

To learn more about how JSA can elevate your brand, visit www.jaymiescotto.com.
Join the conversation: Follow JSA on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Officials: 17-year-old Muslim girl assaulted and killed after leaving Virginia mosque

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Police said Monday they are not investigating the murder of a Virginia teenager who they say was assaulted and then disappeared overnight after leaving a mosque in the Sterling area as a hate crime.

On Sunday, police found the girl’s remains and a 22-year-old man has been charged with murder in connection with the case.

The mosque, the All Dulles Area Muslim Society (ADAMS) in Sterling, and relatives identified the girl as 17-year-old Nabra Hassanen of Reston.

Fairfax County police identified the man charged with murder in her death as Darwin Martinez Torres of Sterling. On Monday, they did not release any explanation as to why they weren’t investigating the murder as a hate crime.

According to accounts from police and a mosque official, a group of four or five teens were walking back from breakfast at IHOP early Sunday when they were confronted by a motorist. All but one of the teens ran to the mosque, where the group reported that the girl had been left behind, according to Deputy Aleksandra Kowalski, a spokeswoman for the Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office.

Relatives identified the slain teen as Nabra Hassanen, 17, right, of Reston, seen in a social media post with a filter. (All Dulles Area Muslim Society Center)

“Immediately thereafter, the ADAMS’ personnel notified both Loudoun County and Fairfax County authorities who immediately began an extensive search to locate the missing girl,” the mosque said in a statement.

Loudoun and Fairfax police jointly conducted an hours-long search around Dranesville Road and Woodson Drive in Herndon, which is in Fairfax. Remains thought to be the girl’s were found about 3 p.m. Sunday in a pond in the 21500 block of Ridgetop Circle in Sterling. During the search, an officer spotted a motorist driving suspiciously in the area and arrested Torres, police said.

Police said they collected several articles of evidence but declined to provide further details.

The girl’s mother said detectives told her that Nabra was struck with a metal bat.

“I can’t think of a worse instance to occur than the loss of a 17-year-old on Father’s Day, as the father of a 17-year-old myself,” Loudoun County Sheriff Michael L. Chapman said.

Detectives think the remains are those of the girl, but the chief medical examiner’s office will confirm the identity and manner of death, Fairfax police spokeswoman Tawny Wright said.

Shoyeb Hassan, the co-chair of ADAMS, said that during the last 10 days of Ramadan, the mosque has extra prayers at midnight and 2 a.m., and members frequently go to McDonald’s or the 24-hour IHOP to eat before they start their fast at sunrise, as Nabra and her friends were doing.

Darwin Martinez Torres, 22, of Sterling, has been charged in the teen’s death. (Fairfax County Police)

The killing rattled a Muslim community in the midst of celebrating Ramadan, a month of religious observance in which adherents fast from sunrise to sunset for 30 days. The period culminates in the feast-like celebration Eid al-Fitr, which is expected to fall next weekend.

“We are devastated and heartbroken as our community undergoes and processes this traumatic event,” Rizwan Jaka, chairman of ADAMS, said in a statement. “It is a time for us to come together to pray and care for our youth.”

ADAMS is Northern Virginia’s largest mosque and, with 11 chapters around the District and Northern Virginia, is among the nation’s most well-known congregations. According to ADAMS’s website, the Sterling location is 25,000 square feet and can accommodate more than 700 people. It includes a youth weekend school, a gymnasium and multipurpose hall, the site says.

Arsalan Iftikhar, an international human rights lawyer and commentator, said that he and his wife were at the mosque for evening prayers, which ended about 12:30 a.m. Sunday. As they were pulling out of the parking lot, he said, he saw a group of teenagers congregating and talking loudly about going out to eat. The girls, he said, were wearing the abaya, a full-length dress many Muslim women wear.

[Van strikes crowd near mosque in London; one person is arrested]

Police said Monday they aren’t investigating the death as a hate crime, but the issue was on the minds of many Muslims on Sunday.

Last month, two men on a Portland train were stabbed and killed after they intervened to protect two girls who were being harassed with anti-Muslim threats, according to authorities.

Sunday night, a van struck a crowd of pedestrians, including worshipers leaving a pair of mosques in London. Witnesses said the pedestrians were struck as they departed late-night prayers.

The ADAMS Center has a paid armed security guard at the Sterling site, according to Iftikhar. He said many mosques have increased security since six Muslim worshipers were killed at a mosque in Quebec earlier this year.

[‘Brave and selfless’ Oregon stabbing victims hailed as heroes for standing up to racist rants

Nabra’s slaying sent a chill through the community when news spread Sunday.

“People are petrified, especially people who have young Muslim daughters,” Iftikhar said.

Virginia officials condemned the killing Sunday night and expressed condolences to Nabra’s family.

Rep. Barbara Comstock (R-Va.) said she visited ADAMS Sunday and met with leadership and law enforcement officials.

“We are heartbroken and horrified by the news of the brutal murder of a beautiful 17-year old girl,” Comstock said in a statement.

The congresswoman represents Virginia’s 10th District, where the mosque is located. “We know there is no greater pain for any parent and Chip and I extend our prayers to her family and loved ones at this difficult time and the entire ADAMS Center community,” she said. “We commend the Fairfax County Police Department and the Loudoun County Sheriff’s office for their diligent work in apprehending the perpetrator. This case should be investigated and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.”

Virginia Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam (D) said he and his wife, Pam, were “deeply disturbed” by the assault and killing.

“There is absolutely no place for this kind of violence in our Commonwealth,” Northam said in a statement. “Every Virginian should feel safe and welcome in our communities, and no parent should ever have to experience such a heartbreaking tragedy. As the police investigation continues, I urge all Virginians to keep Nabra’s friends and family in their hearts.”

Virginia Attorney General Mark R. Herring (D) echoed Northam, urging Virginians to show compassion and kindness.

“The ADAMS Center has always welcomed me and so many in Northern Virginia like family,” Herring said. “This unspeakable attack feels like an assault on our entire community. Words fail at a time like this, so we’ll all have to do the best we can to surround them with the love and support they’ve always shown each of us.”

On a crowdfunding page to support Nabra’s family, donations surged Sunday night, jumping from $10,000 to nearly $18,000 in less than an hour. Shortly before 10 p.m., the fundraising page had met its $25,000 goal.

In a neighborhood full of Muslim immigrant families, the Hassanens’ modest Reston apartment was the one overflowing with friends and laughter most days, friends said Sunday.

“It’s a family where if you’re feeling down and you need to laugh, this is where you go,” said Samar Ali, 26, who grew up in the Hassanens’ apartment complex.

On Sunday night, that apartment normally filled with laughter was crammed with more than 30 women in traditional Muslim garb, sobbing and comforting one another. At the center of the crowded, dimly lit living room was Nabra’s mother, Sawsan Gazzar.

“Please pray for me, please pray for me,” Gazzar sobbed in Arabic. Her phone rang constantly. To her brother and sister in her native Egypt, she said, “Pray for me that I can handle this . . . I lost my daughter, my first reason for happiness.”

The night before, Gazzar had cooked a feast for Nabra, the oldest of her four daughters, who wanted to host a big iftar break-the-fast dinner for all her friends from ADAMS and South Lakes High School, where she just finished 10th grade.

The iftar was packed — Nabra was always popular and sociable. And when it ended, a friend’s mom drove some of the teens to ADAMS for the midnight prayers that mark the last 10 days of Ramadan. Nabra wasn’t ordinarily religiously observant — she was more excited about fashion and makeup, including recently her nose ring — but she frequented the mosque during Ramadan, when it became a social hub for teens.

Gazzar said she thought Nabra and her friends would eat at the mosque after the prayers, and she would have forbidden her from walking to IHOP in the middle of the night. But she also wasn’t surprised that the girl went out; she and other teens had done it safely last year.

Other mothers in the apartment Sunday night echoed the same thought repeatedly — they and their children had always felt safe taking the sidewalk path to IHOP or McDonald’s for a fun meal on those final Ramadan nights.

Gazzar loaned her daughter an abaya to wear to the mosque Saturday night, since Nabra didn’t typically wear traditional Muslim clothes. She heard from a detective that when the man in the car started shouting at the teens, Nabra tripped over the long garment and fell to the ground, just before she was struck.

“I think it had to do with the way she was dressed and the fact that she’s Muslim,” Gazzar said. “Why would you kill a kid? What did my daughter do to deserve this?”

Nabra was a diligent student, so much so that although she was extremely proud to get her first job ever at a McDonald’s, she quit when her manager didn’t understand that studying for a school exam took priority over a work shift.

All four Hassanen girls were born in the United States — the younger ones are 11, 10 and 3. Ali described Nabra as a “daddy’s girl” who was close with her father, a bus-and-limo driver. Her father spent Sunday at the mosque, Ali said, beside himself with worry all day.

Gazzar’s phone rang yet again, and this time she didn’t answer. She turned instead to the hundreds of photos stored on it, scrolling through them until she landed on one of Nabra visiting her parents’ homeland in Egypt, laughing as she embraced two of the teen’s little sisters.

“They’d all be laughing. They used to be really happy.”

She gazed into the girls’ eyes, and cried harder.

Correction: An earlier version of this report incorrectly stated the number of Muslim girls who were being harassed in Portland. One of the two girls identifies as Muslim.

Russia threatens to treat US coalition aircraft as targets over Syria

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MOSCOW — Russia on Monday angrily condemned the downing of a Syrian aircraft by a U.S. fighter as a “flagrant violation of international law,” and said its forces will treat U.S.-led coalition aircraft and drones as targets if they are operating in Syrian airspace west of the Euphrates while Russian aviation is on combat missions.

The Russian Defense Ministry also said it is suspending an agreement to minimize the risk of in-flight incidents between Russian and U.S.-led coalition aircraft operating over Syria.

Russia, which has provided military support to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad since 2015, was reacting to U.S. military confirmation that a U.S. F-18 Super Hornet shot down a Syrian Su-22 fighter-bomber on Sunday. The Syrian jet had just dropped bombs near members of the Syrian Democratic Forces, a militia aligned with the U.S. military in the campaign against the Islamic State.

[U.S. aircraft shoots down a Syrian government jet, Pentagon says]

Meanwhile, U.S.-backed opposition fighters said Assad’s forces have been attacking their positions in Raqqa province in northern Syria. The fighters warned that they would take action if the attacks continue.

On Monday, the Russian Defense Ministry said its warplanes had been operating in the area of the encounter between the U.S. and Syrian jets. It said the coalition had not used the deconflicting hotline to warn the Russian jet.

“Multiple military actions of U.S. aviation under the guise of fighting terrorism against the legal military of a state that is a member of the United Nations are a flagrant violation of international law and constitute de facto military aggression against the Syrian Arab Republic,” the ministry said.

“We view these actions by the American command as a conscious failure to uphold their responsibilities within the memorandum,” the ministry said.

Russia briefly suspended the 2015 memorandum of understanding on the air operations after U.S. forces fired Tomahawk missiles at a Syrian air base in April.

[Russia condemns U.S. missile strike on Syria, suspends key agreement]

 Also on Monday, a senior Russian diplomat warned that the downing of the Syrian jet was “yet another step in a direct and dangerous escalation.” 

“We are warning Washington not to take such actions in the future,” Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told the Interfax news agency.

The confrontation took place late Sunday near the central city of Tabqa, hours after Syrian government forces harassed a U.S.-backed local ground force with airstrikes. 

It was the first time that the American military has shot down a Syrian warplane during the six-year conflict. The incident followed a series of U.S. airstrikes against Iran-backed forces advancing on partner forces in a strategically prized swath of land along the Iraqi border. 

Outside observers said Sunday’s strike underscored a growing willingness on the part of Assad’s forces to confront the U.S.-led coalition as they jostle to roll back Islamic State militants from eastern Syria. 

That effort has been bolstered by the freeing up of thousands of Shiite militiamen who had fought in a campaign across the border to capture the city of Mosul from Islamic State militants.

“The wild card here is the logic of an Assad regime which has decided that it no longer wants to be constrained to a Western Syria-based statelet,” said Nicholas A. Heras, a fellow at the Washington-based Center for a New American Security.

That shift has been driven by an assessment that the Trump administration could use the territory its forces capture as a bargaining chip with which to push Assad into a political transition or Syria into a decentralized political system, Heras added.  

In Moscow, officials argued that Sunday’s shoot-down was intended as a message aimed squarely at them.

Franz Klintsevich, deputy head of the defense and security committee of the Russian upper house of parliament, called the incident “an aggression and a provocation” directed at Russia. 

“It looks like Donald Trump’s United States is a source of a brand-new danger both in the Middle East and the world at large,” Klintsevich wrote on his Facebook page. 

Another member of the upper house, Alexei Pushkov, tweeted that the incident was “a new act of war” against the Syrian government. 

The upper house, the Federation Council, is a largely toothless body that essentially carries out Putin’s policies with little opposition.

The reaction of Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, was more muted. Russia’s top diplomat said the United States should respect Syria’s territorial integrity and that any actions on the ground “should be coordinated with Damascus.”

“We call on the United States and all others who have their forces or their advisers ‘on the ground’ to ensure coordination in our work,” the official Russian Tass news agency quoted Lavrov as saying at a meeting with the foreign ministers of Brazil, India and China in Beijing.

Putin said last week that Syria has proven to be a useful testing ground for advanced Russian weapons systems. 

“It has done enormous good for our defense industry,” Putin told Russians in his annual televised call-in show. “I can say that the experience our armed forces have gained under combat conditions, especially with the use of cutting-edge weapons, is invaluable.” 

 

Loveluck reported from Beirut.

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