With the sun out, the Performance Marketing Awards on the horizon and a flurry of hot topics flooding our news stream, it has been a great week for the world of digital marketing.

In the wake of Ad Week Europe, Paul Lyonette, country manager of video ad firm YuMe, spoke to PerformanceIN to discuss the potential of video advertising, how mobile devices are driving the market and what “premium content” really means.

ADARA’s Elizabeth Harz took part in a Q&A to discuss why brands must embrace the weight of their data and why the industry is getting so excited about data extracted within the travel industry.

And in a refreshing and thought-provoking piece, PI columnist Sandra McDill asks why women aren’t getting to the senior positions in the industry and why confidence and passion should always overrule gender.

Embracing change

Also this week, Communicator’s Jenna Tiffany looked at how companies can apply an ROI angle to their email marketing, including adding a personal touch, the benefits of measurability and embracing change.

In our latest interview PerformanceIN caught up with Guy Yalif, global VP of marketing at programmatic video outfit BrightRoll, to see what changes have taken place since Yahoo acquired the company in November of last year.

Confused by programmatic nomenclature but afraid to ask? You wouldn’t be alone. Thankfully TubeMogul’s Nick Reid has provided a straightforward guide to busting the jargon on programmatic TV, from DSP to Dovetail.

Updates and opportunity

With Rakuten in talks with US celebrity gossip site PopSugar, in what could be the latest in a series of stateside acquisitions, we ask whether the Japanese outfit is taking steps to ‘break America’.

In other news, we spoke to Affiliate Window’s Sophie Cook to find out more about its Opportunity Marketplace, an easy-to-use directory for hosting on-site offers, and how this can benefit advertisers and publishers.

And with ‘Mobilegeddon’ looming ahead on April 21, Polaris’s Amo Sokhi dives into what Google’s new mobile-friendly update has in store, and what these changes mean for the publisher world.