Guest · Measurement and effectiveness
Edwin Wong
Global Head of Measurement, Uber Advertising
A career at the intersection of media research and marketing effectiveness, from Yahoo and Pinterest to BuzzFeed, Vox Media and now Uber Advertising.
About
Edwin Wong is Global Head of Measurement at Uber Advertising, where he leads how the platform proves effectiveness for advertisers. He is known for working at the intersection of media research and marketing effectiveness, and for arguing that context and consumer control matter more than raw data volume.
Wong began as a psychology major focused on understanding people, then joined Holland Partners, a consultancy he says was born out of the UK, where as the youngest person in Los Angeles he worked on brands and communications for the likes of Yahoo and eBay in the early 2000s. That led to roughly a decade at Yahoo looking after the search business from marketing and research perspectives, before he moved to Pinterest to build out its business analytics practice as the company began connecting with advertisers and considering how the digital space affects the physical one.
Over the following decade Wong worked at journalism companies BuzzFeed and Vox Media, where he became passionate about how content and information flow with consumers through podcasts, particularly in his last role at Vox Media. He now leads global measurement at Uber Advertising, a platform he describes as connective commerce, and where he says the ability to see the sale lets his team look at incrementality that other platforms cannot.
Career26 years
- 2025 to now Uber Advertising Head of Measurement Science
- 2019 to now Brand Velocity Group Accelerator
- 2015 to now Nielsen APAAC Board of Advisor / Chair
- 2022 to 2025 Advertising Research Foundation (ARF) ARF Board of Trustees
Show earlier roles: Vox Media, LLC., AACSB, Crossings TV, Tubular Labs, BuzzFeed, Pinterest, Yahoo, Veoh Networks, IAB, Hall & Partners
- 2019 to 2025 Vox Media, LLC. SVP Client Success, Insights, & Research
- 2023 to 2024 AACSB Innovations Committee Member
- 2021 to 2024 Crossings TV Member Of The Board Of Advisors
- 2020 to 2023 Tubular Labs Member Of The Board Of Advisors
- 2016 to 2019 BuzzFeed SVP of Research & Insights
- 2017 to 2018 BuzzFeed Executive Sponsor of D&I | A*POP & A*Fam
- 2015 to 2016 Pinterest Head of Partner Insights
- 2014 to 2015 Yahoo Senior Director | B2B Insights
- 2012 to 2013 Yahoo Senior Director | Media & Product Insights
- 2009 to 2012 Yahoo Senior Director | B2B Strategic Insights
- 2008 to 2009 Veoh Networks Senior Director | Consumer & Advertiser Research
- 2005 to 2008 Yahoo Director | Customer Insights Organization
- 2005 to 2007 IAB Chair | IAB Search Research Committee
- 2000 to 2005 Hall & Partners Senior Manager
How Edwin thinks3 convictions
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Context over fragmentation
Wong argues that the answer to fragmented media is not more metrics but sharper context. He points to Uber's everyday utility, hundreds of millions of monthly riders and billions of trips, as a source of signal marketers can trust. In his telling, source destination and real intent cut through the noise where reach alone cannot.
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Brand can be measured
Wong rejects the idea that brand impact is unmeasurable. Working with Adelaide and Kantar, he says Uber correlated attention with brand consideration to give chief marketing officers both an implicit and explicit read on the consumer. The real challenge, in his view, is breaking through rather than proving the effect.
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Expertise over easy tooling
Wong is wary of tools that flatten the craft of research. He warns of a potential loss of expertise and a growing need for curation, arguing that a strong base of knowledge and the ability to ask the right question still separate a researcher from an assistant. He favours smaller, constantly refreshed data over crawling the whole web.
