Disney+ Is Essential; TV Ad Spending Continues Decline: Wednesday's First Things First

Welcome to First Things First, Adweek’s new daily resource for marketers. We’ll be publishing the content to First Things First on Adweek.com each morning (like this post), but if you prefer that it come straight to your inbox, you can sign up for the email here. Disney+ Establishes Itself as an Essential Streaming Platform Even through it suffered issues Tuesday morning, Disney+ has still managed to one-up its rivals (looking at you Apple+ ) at its debut. According to our TV/media editor Jason Lynch, the streaming service has proven itself to be an essential platform for anyone who is a fan of the company and its many brands, and is already offering a killer feature. As for its other original content, eh. The big seller, as we all know, is Disney+'s endless library of content. If you're wondering what those titles are, the Adweek staff took to Twitter to read them aloud, Ferris Bueller-style. Read more: Why you should be prepared to add Disney+ to your streaming services. U.S. TV Ad Spending May Never Return to Its 2018 High TV ad spending has certainly seen better days. According to a new report, the golden era is dimming as U.S. TV ad spending is projected to drop 3%, to $70.3 billion. Linear audiences have been shrinking for years, and it seems TV advertising dollars are following suit. Much of the blame could be the rise in streaming services as Americans continue cutting the cord. However, could we see a bump come election time? Read more: Why TV advertising dollars will continue falling. The Marketing Arm Takes the Lead on State Farm’s $615 Million Creative Account State Farm has cut back on its relationship with longtime agency partner DDB, the agency that developed the iconic "Jake From State Farm" character and inescapable the "Like a Good Neighbor" jingle. DDB will still work on the account, but The Marketing Arm will take the lead. TMA has made Adweek headlines for a variety of reasons: Jay Z's producer scored a role as a chief music strategist; the agency hosted a speed dating event between NFL prospects and brands; and Cheetos opened a restaurant called The Spotted Cheetah. Read more: State Farm explains why it made the switch to The Marketing Arm. Why Olympics Branding Is Such a Challenge Designing a logo for a global event that also pays homage to the event's home country is a monumental task that will surely generate a reaction larger than America's medal count. Spoiler alert: designers didn't aren't thrilled with it. Read more: Joe Stewart, design partner and co-founder of Work & Co, the independent agency that counts Apple, Epic Games, Ikea, Google and Mercedes among its clients, spoke with Adweek about what it takes to design something like the Olympic logo. Best of the Rest: Today's Top News and Insight Kimberly-Clark Sends Creative on Childcare Brands to Droga5 and Accenture Hyatt Joins IHG, Hilton and Marriott in Eliminating Miniature Toiletries What SEO Means on Amazon and How Brands Can Make the Most of It JetBlue Joins the Basic Economy Movement With Basic Blue Ad of the Day: Oscar Winner Michel Gondry Creates a Holiday Wonderland Free of Phones for HP [kickout id="1"] Even if a world entirely engrossed in electronic devices sounds like the beginnings of a zombie-riddled nightmare, it’s a little hard to view the latest short from HP and creative agency Goodby Silverstein & Partners (GS&P), “Print the Holidays,” and not get a little caught up in the wonder. When Your Team Is Stuck, How Do You Brainstorm? Dan Brown, executive creative director, World Famous Great ideas start when someone says, "I don’t know if this is gonna work, but what if..." Our process at World Famous is to nurture that question and then stress test everything, drawing on our experience in making. Through prototyping, designing, editing, or other forms of visualization, we can find out just how crazy or viable that idea really is. Happy accidents happen, and wild ideas uncover new ways of problem solving that were previously unseen. You don’t discover champagne on purpose. Mae Karwowski, founder and CEO, Obviously This year, we shifted our organizational structure to smaller pods that consist of team members from different departments within the company. We’ve found that this helps us prevent siloing and fosters constant communication across departments and client accounts. When one pod is facing a harder challenge or needs to come up with an idea that wows, it’s become essential to pull in members of other pods to talk through what they’re learning from their campaigns.