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Welcome to The Brief by Kuro House, your daily dose of marketing intelligence. Today, we’re diving into leadership moves at OpenAI, the future of advertising on Substack, the latest in cable news viewership, Philips’ approach to global ecommerce, and how Prime Video’s Black Friday sports push is rewriting the playbook for advertisers. Let’s get straight to the stories shaping the marketing world right now.

First up, a major leadership change in the AI sector. According to Adweek, OpenAI has hired Denise Dresser, the CEO of Slack, as its new Chief Revenue Officer. Dresser will oversee OpenAI’s rapidly growing enterprise unit as the company seeks to transform its headline-grabbing product, ChatGPT, into a sustainable business. She starts next week and will report directly to COO Brad Lightcap. This hire comes at a crucial time: OpenAI generated $4.3 billion in revenue in the first half of 2025, up 16% from all of 2024, but it also burned through $2.5 billion in the same period—mainly due to the high costs of model development and running ChatGPT. The company’s financial challenges are mounting, with forecasts suggesting $74 billion in operating losses by 2028, which is nearly three-quarters of its projected revenue. OpenAI’s spending is more than 14 times that of competitor Anthropic, and CEO Sam Altman recently disclosed up to $1.4 trillion in commitments over eight years. With this context, Dresser’s experience—spanning over 14 years in Salesforce’s enterprise sales and her recent leadership at Slack—will be pivotal as OpenAI looks to diversify its revenue streams. This could mean ads, tiered subscriptions, and new commercial packages are on the horizon. As Fidji Simo, CEO of applications at OpenAI, put it: “Denise has led that kind of shift before, and her experience will help us make AI useful, reliable, and accessible for businesses everywhere.” Meanwhile, Slack’s chief product officer Rob Seaman will step in as interim CEO.

Next, a big shift for the creator economy: Substack is testing sponsorship ads in newsletters. As reported by Adweek, Substack—long known for its ad-free, subscription-first ethos—has launched a limited beta allowing a select group of writers to insert paid sponsorships directly into their newsletters. This move formalizes what some creators have already been doing independently: lining up brand sponsors alongside their subscription businesses. The pilot is “creator-first” and opt-in, ensuring writers maintain editorial control and keep paid subscriptions at the core of their business. Substack cofounder Hamish McKenzie emphasized that this is about helping creators earn more revenue without compromising the platform’s values. While it’s a small test for now, it signals that even the most ad-resistant platforms are recognizing the financial realities—and opportunities—of advertising.

Now, let’s turn to the latest cable news ratings, courtesy of Adweek. November 2025 saw MSNBC—now rebranded as MS NOW—and CNN both post month-to-month gains in total viewers and the key Adults 25-54 demo during primetime and total day. This uptick was driven by off-year election coverage, though numbers are still down compared to last November’s Trump election win. Fox News, while still in first place among total viewers, was the only network to post declines across the board from October: down 13% in primetime viewers and 19% in the demo. Year-over-year, Fox is down 36% in total viewers and 61% in the demo during primetime. MS NOW, meanwhile, grew 16% in total viewers and 21% in the demo month-over-month, while CNN was up 10% and 30% respectively. On the programming front, Fox’s “The Five” remains the most-watched show, with 3.6 million viewers and 293,000 in the key demo. MS NOW’s “The Rachel Maddow Show” led its network, and CNN’s top performer was “The Arena with Kasie Hunt.” The business news landscape also saw Fox Business outperform CNBC in total viewers during market hours, while CNBC led in the 25-54 demo. The numbers show a dynamic, shifting landscape where news brands are still jockeying for audience attention—especially in turbulent political seasons.

Switching gears to the world of ecommerce, Adweek’s Brave Commerce podcast featured Laura Briggs, head of ecommerce excellence at Philips. Briggs shared how her team drives category growth across Philips’ consumer goods portfolio—including Sonicare, Avent, and Grooming & Beauty—by focusing on universal objectives and analyzing core drivers of consumer demand. She stressed that ecommerce is a “team sport,” requiring cross-functional alignment around shared KPIs and a relentless focus on the digital shelf: content, availability, and visibility. One of her biggest challenges is achieving scale and consistency globally, especially when designing solutions for diverse personas, from super users to executives. Briggs’ “blue sky” vision for Philips is a commercial model that erases the divide between sales and marketing, unifying growth leadership and making category growth the single, non-negotiable goal. Her approach underscores the importance of empathy and collaboration in driving adoption and consistency across global teams—a lesson for any business looking to scale ecommerce effectively.

Finally, let’s talk about how Prime Video’s Black Friday sports strategy is paying off for advertisers. According to Adweek, Prime Video’s Black Friday lineup—which featured an NFL game, a Skins Golf match, and an NBA doubleheader—delivered impressive engagement numbers for brands. Advertisers running interactive video ads across multiple sports properties saw a 24% higher interactivity rate compared to those in a single event. Retail Drop-In ads, a new format, drove 39% higher engagement than average interactive ads, and Black Friday football advertisers saw a 15% lift in engagement over previous Thursday Night Football games. NBA interactive ads were nearly three times more engaging than the average. Measurement firm EDO reported that viewers were 18% more likely to engage with Black Friday NFL ads compared to average Thanksgiving NFL games, and Skins Golf viewers were 35% more likely to search for advertised brands than viewers of other golf programming. Kevin Krimm, EDO’s CEO, highlighted that Retail Drop-In Ads were 112% more likely to drive brand engagement than the average TV ad, meaning an advertiser would need to buy 107 typical TV spots to match the impact. With a 40% increase in advertisers for the 2025 Black Friday event—including non-endemic brands and major players like Google, Poppi, Meta, LEGO, and Oral-B—Prime Video is proving that interactive, multi-sport programming can be a goldmine for brands looking to cut through the clutter.

That wraps up today’s episode of The Brief. From seismic shifts in AI leadership and the evolution of ad models on Substack, to the ever-changing cable news landscape, Philips’ lessons in ecommerce, and the new frontier of sports advertising on streaming, it’s clear that adaptability and creative thinking are the name of the game. Thanks for tuning in—stay sharp, stay curious, and we’ll catch you tomorrow with more insights from the frontlines of marketing.