Why the Demise of the Google/Meta Ad Duopoly Is Good News

Why the Demise of the Google/Meta Ad Duopoly Is Good News

by Tim Colucci Google Meta Walmart

Recently there’s been some considerable discussion about the demise of the so-called advertising duopoly. This refers to the speculation that Google’s and Meta’s dominance of the online advertising industry is fading as their share of online advertising shrinks. As reported widely, Google and Meta are expected to bring in less than half of all U.S. digital advertising in 2023 for the first time since 2014. Here’s what the number say:

  • Google and Meta will together capture 48.4 percent of all U.S. digital ad revenue in 2023 — 28.8 percent for Google and 19.6 percent for Meta — down from 54.7 percent at their peak in 2017, when Google’s ad revenues account 34.7 of the market, and Meta accounted for 20.0 percent. per data from Insider Intelligence.

But let’s not shed any tears for Google and Meta. They are doing just fine. Google generated an astounding $282 billion in advertising in 2022. And Meta, following a difficult 2022, is rebounding strongly as the business shifts its advertising model from tracking third-party cookies to first-party customer data.

No, the duopoly isn’t fading, exactly. But the online ad world is getting more crowded. For instance:

Amazon Ads is nearly a $40 billion business.

  • TikTok is expected to earn $8.6 billion in ad revenue in 2024 – assuming TikTok doesn’t get banned in the United States.
  • A host of retailers ranging from Walmart to Walgreens have entered the online advertising, business. They’re using Amazon Ad’s blueprint: tap into the consumer behavior data they collect from their own customers (known as first-party data) to develop targeted ad products. Retail media at the global level is forecast by WARC to be the fastest-growing marketing channel this year, reaching $122 billion in revenue.
  • Several companies outside of retail such as Airbnb and Uber are doing the same thing with their first-party data as retailers are: developing ad businesses. They’re smaller, but they are significant.

The growth of Walmart’s ad division, Walmart Connect, is an example of how varied the online advertising world has become. Recently Walmart said that Walmart Connect grew 41 percent year-over-year in the fourth quarter of 2022. Its ad operations were up 20 percent over the period and jumped nearly 30 percent in 2022, generating $2.7 billion for the full year.

Walmart enjoys a significant advantage: it operates a strong eCommerce business to complement its mammoth chain of retail stores. This gives the company a large audience online and offline to develop and deliver targeted ads. During the runup to Black Friday during the 2022 holiday season, Walmart even enjoyed stronger search traffic than Amazon did.

Walmart has developed several ad units. They include:

  • Search to make products found on Walmart’s digital sites such as Walmart.com.
  • Display on Walmart’s site and across the web.
  • In-store to make a brand visible on digital ads in Walmart stores, such as in self-checkout lanes, or as a “commercial” on in-store TVs adding to the number of replacements for linear TV.

A number of businesses, such as Kraft Heinz, report improvements in sales lift by working with Walmart on ad campaigns across Walmart properties.

The rise of alternatives to Google and Meta is good news for businesses for a few reasons:

  • More competition gives advertiser more choice. The rise of retail networks is a good example. Businesses can tap into more refined first-party data from each retailer to target different audiences. For instance, the Macy’s media network gives advertisers entrée to a more style conscious consumer.
  • More competition means that Google and Meta need to improve their own ad products. For instance, the popularity of TikTok has forced Meta to develop short-form video content, Reels, with ad products to go with them.

We suggest advertisers capitalize on the proliferation of ad platforms wisely. Focus on the platforms that provide the strongest ROI while experimenting with emerging platforms that are aligned with an audience you have been wanting to reach (e.g., TikTok for Gen Z) and channels that are untapped to you.

At True Interactive, we can help. We possess experience with both the established ad platforms and emerging ones. Learn about our services here.  Contact us to learn how we can help you.

Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash

Three Takeaways from the YouTube/NFL Streaming Deal

Three Takeaways from the YouTube/NFL Streaming Deal

by Tim Colucci YouTube

While all eyes were on Amazon’s streaming deal to broadcast NFL Thursday Night Football, YouTube waltzed in and pulled off an upset. YouTube signed a seven-year deal worth an average price of $2 billion a year to secure rights to the NFL Sunday Ticket franchise.

This is a big move for YouTube. Sunday Ticket is a subscription-only package that allows customers access to all Sunday afternoon games for out-of-market teams. DirecTV currently pays the NFL an average fee of $1.5 billion per season for both residential and commercial rights. Its deal expires after the current season.

Sunday games represent peak prime football. NFL Thursday Night Football (TNF), by contrast, typically features subpar games largely because the Thursday timing does not give teams enough time to prepare after their previous Sunday games. Amazon’s ratings for TNF broadcasts have been spotty although four games rank among the Top 100 most viewed telecasts of 2022 according to Nielsen.

YouTube reportedly bested Amazon, Apple, and ESPN to secure the rights. YouTube will offer Sunday Ticket as an add-on to YouTube TV (a subscription streaming service that lets you watch live TV from major broadcast and popular cable networks) and in the video platform’s main app through a service called Primetime Channels that allows viewers to subscribe to individual channels.

Here are some takeaways from the agreement:

  • The deal is another sign that connected TV (CTV) is the future. For the first time, streaming viewership topped cable in 2022, and this trend is not going to reverse course as cord cutting continues. As reported in Axios recently, traditional television companies and major media firms are bracing for further declines in the ad market and yet another increase in cord-cutting this year. “The migration of the country’s biggest sports rights packages from linear TV networks to streaming will expedite the inevitable collapse of the cable bundle,” Axios noted. At True Interactive, we believe it’s important that businesses understand the growth of advertising on streaming platforms in context of the rise of connected TV. If you’ve not done so already, take a closer look at why connected TV is growing and how it could expand your audience. (True Interactive can help you with that.) Connected TV is enjoying 60-percent growth, driven by a public’s appetite for streaming that continues unabated. Connected advertising is similar to linear TV advertising because both formats rely obviously on video. But connected TV is different in many important ways. For one thing, advertisers need to understand how to create video content that will reach viewers across a variety of viewing devices in addition to TV screens, and connected TV ads are competing with multiple content streams. You can watch Amazon’s TNF on a laptop, mobile phone, or gaming console with multiple screens open. The same will hold true for watching NFL Sunday Ticket via YouTube TV. YouTube offers a number of connected TV ad units including its Masthead ad format. YouTube has added more CTV formats recently and will certainly offer more as its competitors such as Amazon do the same.

  • This a victory for first-party data, which is the information that businesses collect directly from their customers. YouTube will use first-party data to sell targeted ads to help drive revenue for the games. Right now, third-party audience data is withering away thanks to Apple’s and Google’s privacy measures. Businesses that figure out how to monetize first-party data enjoy an enormous advantage. YouTube is the second-most popular search platform in the world (behind Google). The company will be well positioned to us first-party data to sell targeted ads to NFL viewers.

The 2023-24 NFL season seems a long way off. YouTube still needs to deliver on investor expectations for parent company Alphabet between now and then. Look for YouTube to expand even more into the lucrative live sports field, which is still up for grabs among streaming platforms. Meanwhile, Alphabet’s next earnings announcement is February 7, 2023. Let’s see how YouTube’s advertising revenue delivers.

Contact True Interactive

True Interactive can help you navigate the connected TV landscape. Our services range from media strategy and planning to automated performance reporting. Learn more about our services here, and contact us to learn more.

An Explanation of the 30 Percent Apple/Google Tax

An Explanation of the 30 Percent Apple/Google Tax

by Tim Colucci Apple Google

Twitter’s well publicized spat with Apple has highlighted an unpleasant reality for any business that operates an app: Apple and Google both enjoy a costly app duopoly.

The 30 Percent Tax

Twitter owner Elon Musk recently accused Apple of trying to destroy Twitter partly by putting Apple’s Twitter advertising on pause and partly by threatening to remove Twitter from the Apple app store.

Both parties apparently resolved their building tensions. Apple is advertising on Twitter, and Twitter remains on the App Store. Perhaps all is well between Apple and Twitter now. But not all is well for any organization, including Twitter, that needs the App Store to do business on Apple’s iOS operating system, which, of course, includes iPhone users.

The App Store provides access to more than 1.5 billion devices. It’s a top way for people to get the Twitter app and any app. What many journalists accurately reported in their coverage of the Twitter/Apple skirmish is that businesses on the App Store must pay Apple a 30 percent commission on all transactions processed via Apple, known as in-app purchases. As The New York Times noted,

Mr. Musk’s App Store allegation resurrects a potent charge against Apple: that it has used access to millions of iPhone and iPad devices as a cudgel to extract more money from app makers. A key part of Mr. Musk’s plans for Twitter is collecting more revenue from subscriptions — but under Apple’s policies, up to 30 percent of those sales from iPhone users would go to Apple itself.

The commission applies to all app developers who make more than $1 million through the ‌App Store‌ on an annual basis. For small developers who make less than the $1 million threshold, Apple has cut its fees to 15 percent through the Small Business Developer Program.

The commission also applies to “sales of ‘boosts’ for posts in a social media app,” meaning boosted content (i.e., posts that becomes amplified for a fee) on Facebook and Instagram.

Apple is not alone. Google also offers its own in-app billing system that charges a 30 percent commission or service fee for any payment made for an app or in-app payments or subscriptions. In 2021, Google began to enforce this requirement. After withering backlash, Google said it would cut the fee to 15 percent earned by a developer through their app on Play Store in a year and the 30 percent commission will apply for the revenue earned beyond $1 million.

Apple and Google effectively hold a duopoly. No business can bypass that duopoly; trying to process payments outside the App Store or Google Play would result in being kicked off both. (However, it should be noted that reportedly Elon Musk is figuring out how to design a closed payments system for Twitter.)

In the United Kingdom, the Competition and Markets Authority is launching an investigation that is taking aim at this duopoly. In the United States, reportedly the Justice Department is investigating Apple, and Epic Games has gone so far as to fight Apple legally.

But the wheels of justice may turn too slowly for the businesses that are operating under the thumb of Apple and Google. What steps can they take? Here are a few suggestions:

  • As with any tax, it’s important to budget accordingly. If you have not done so already, adjust you advertising and marketing plans to take into account the 30 percent commission. (We can help you with that.)
  • Boost your advertising and marketing to attract more sales. (We can help you with that, too.)
  • Make your voice known, as Twitter, Coinbase, and Spotify are doing. True, few businesses have the reach and visibility of those companies, but going on record leaves electronic breadcrumbs that increase the pressure on the duopoly, however slightly. Remember, backlash caused Google to back down on its fees as noted above.

Meanwhile, True Interactive continues to work with our clients to maximize the value of every dollar they spend via mobile advertising. Contact us to learn how we can help you.

Photo by Rami Al-zayat on Unsplash

An Early Take on the Netflix Advertising Tier

An Early Take on the Netflix Advertising Tier

by Tim Colucci Connected TV

Netflix disclosed the details of its highly anticipated ad tier at a time when the streaming industry faces intensified competition and economic headwinds. Under pressure to shore up revenue and a loss of subscribers, the company has fast-tracked the roll-out of its ad tier in partnership with Microsoft. Known as Basic with Ads, this lesser priced option will cost $6.99 a month in the United States and launch on November 3 at 9:00 am PT. Here’s how the ad-free Netflix stacks up against the competition:

Netflix Ad Tier

(Image courtesy of The Wall Street Journal)

In one sense, the launch is well timed. Inflation continues to be a problem affecting consumer sentiment, making a less expensive option more appealing.

Here are more details:

  • If you like your current Netflix’s ad-free tier, nothing will change for you. Basic with Ads complements Netflix’s ad-free Basic, Standard, and Premium plans.
  • There will be an average of 4 to 5 minutes of ads per hour.
  • At launch, ads will be 15 or 30 seconds in length, which will play before and during shows and films.
  • Advertisers will be able to target ads by by country and genre (e.g., action, drama, romance, sci-fi). Advertisers will also be able to prevent their ads from appearing on content that they find unsuitable for their brand.
  • To enable advertisers to understand how Netflix can reach their target audience, Nielsen will use its Digital Ad Ratings (DAR) in the United States. This will become available sometime in 2023 and eventually be reported through Nielsen ONE Ads.

My Take

This approach looks to be pretty standard and in line with other streaming services that include ads in programming.

I was a little surprised to see 4-5 minutes of ads per hour, though. I didn’t think Netflix would come out of the gate with that many minutes devoted to advertising. I also was thinking they would only serve ads before a show started to try and differentiate themselves from someplace like Fubo Tv Online, an American streaming television service serving customers in the United States, Canada, and Spain that focuses primarily on channels that distribute live sports.

To put the volume of ad minutes in perspective: The Stranger Things Season 4 finale was 2 hours and 20 minutes in length. This means a viewer might see upwards of 10 minutes of ads throughout the show. This amount feels like it could detract from a person’s binging experience.

The fact that measurement is coming to Netflix via Nielsen should bring more clarity to just how well Netflix programming performs. For years, Netflix was tight-lipped about reporting performance data. Only recently did the company begin to report on its most popular shows. Third-party data from Nielsen will provide a much-needed lens.

Netflix probably needed to lay down its pipes quickly because its competitors are moving fast. The ad-supported tier of Disney+ launches in November, and Apple is rumored to be launching an Apple TV+ option with advertising in 2023.

The big picture is just as important as the specifics of Netflix’s tier: It’s important that businesses understand the growth of advertising on streaming platforms in context of the rise of connected TV. If you’ve not done so already, take a closer look at why connected TV is growing and how it could expand your audience. (True Interactive can help you with that.) Connected TV is enjoying 60-percent growth, driven by a public’s appetite for streaming that continues unabated.

Meanwhile, the Netflix tier has attracted the interest of roughly half of Netflix subscribers who would consider switching; and if the program succeeds, Netflix will gain more subscribers. For another perspective, here are the results of a poll that Ad Age conducted recently on LinkedIn:

Poll

Bottom line: the movers and shakers of the streaming world are paving the way for something much bigger: connected TV advertising.

Contact True Interactive

True Interactive can help you navigate the connected TV landscape. Our services range from media strategy and planning to automated performance reporting. Learn more about our services here, and contact us to learn more.

 

 

Why Walmart Connect Expanded Its Advertising Partnerships

Why Walmart Connect Expanded Its Advertising Partnerships

by Tim Colucci Walmart

As the 2022 holiday season kicks into high gear, retail analysts are watching closely how much consumers will spend during a time of inflation. But it’s equally fascinating to understand how people shop. Walmart Connect, Walmart’s fast-growing advertising arm, believes that holiday shopping online – indeed all shopping online — will increasingly happen via social media, television commerce (t-commerce), and livestreaming. That’s one reason that Walmart Connect has expanded its advertising partner program to encompass social apps such as TikTok and streaming platforms such as TalkShopLive.

What Is the Walmart Advertising Partner Program?

Walmart Connect wants to help businesses advertise across the digital world beyond Walmart.com. To do that, Walmart Connect’s partnership program works with platforms to help brands scale, automate, and optimize their Walmart Connect advertising. These include partners that make it possible for Walmart Connect to expand self-service advertising through an application programming interface (API). Those API partners can be found here.

The partnership program is becoming more important to Walmart as it positions itself as a strong retailer-based ad platform alternative to Amazon Ads. And Walmart says the program is increasingly delivering value. For example, when BirdRock Brands turned to Pacvue (an enterprise software suite for eCommerce advertising) to scale its manual Walmart Sponsored Products campaigns, BirdRock was able to help design a campaign that ultimately experienced a return on ad spend 11 percent greater than its target, and an 83 percent increase in sales quarter over quarter.

What Did Walmart Announce About Its Advertising Partner Program?

Walmart has added a slew of advertising partners known as innovation partners. According to Walmart, these innovation partners will provide test-and-learn opportunities with formats such as social, entertainment, and live streaming throughout the entire holiday season. The newly expanded offering includes additional touchpoints and channels to reach customers wherever they are with new ad formats:

  • TikTok: this partnership provides an opportunity for advertisers to connect with potential shoppers on the red-hot TikTok platform. As Walmart noted, more than 50 percent of TikTok users say they watch ads on their feed instead of scrolling past them. The first-to-market pilot between TikTok and Walmart Connect will provide advertisers with the opportunity to serve in-feed ads on TikTok. This will leverage TikTok’s sound-on full screen video format together with Walmart Connect’s targeting and measurement.
  • Snap: the partnership with Snap enables advertisers to buy ad units including augmented reality, Collection Ads and Snap Ads through Walmart Connect and take advantage of the Walmart Connect’s geo-based measurement. This is the first time advertisers can buy Snap ad units through Walmart Connect and get in front of the unique Snapchat audience (75 percent of 13-34 year-olds in the U.S.), who hold over $1.9 trillion in spending power.
  • Firework: this partnership enables supplier-funded shoppable livestreams and short shoppable videos on Walmart.com/live. Walmart Connect is testing how brands can leverage Firework’s capabilities to create premium, engaging, mobile-first video experiences and, to start, has partnered with Johnson & Johnson and Procter & Gamble.
  • TalkShopLive: Walmart Connect is expanding its relationship with TalkShopLive to partnership enable supplier-funded shoppable livestreams on Walmart.com/live, TalkShopLive’s platform, brand and publisher sites, as well as across the web. Walmart Connect is testing how brands can amplify their content and connect with shoppers at scale. To start, it has already executed livestreams with Johnson & Johnson, Procter & Gamble, and Samsung, among others.
  • Roku: Walmart wants to help make TV streaming the next e-commerce shopping destination. Walmart touts Roku as America’s Number One TV streaming platform (citing Hypothesis Group research). So, Walmart has become the exclusive retailer to enable streamers on Roku to purchase featured products and have the transactions fulfilled by the chain. Walmart Connect will connect brands to customers through the Roku platform, and checkout will be seamless for customers, while advertisers receive insights on effectiveness via Walmart Connect measurement.

In announcing these partnerships, Walmart discussed how online search and shopping has become more diversified especially in the post-pandemic age. Seth Dallaire, Executive Vice President and Chief Revenue Officer, Walmart U.S., wrote in a blog post:

Consumers who turned to online shopping during the pandemic have chosen to stay there, with those returning to in-store relying on online research to guide their decisions. Consumers realized the importance of “connection” and were forced to adapt and connect in new ways including social feeds, livestreaming, mobile and more, specifically across video and connected TV. In fact, the predicted growth of social commerce from 10% of all e-commerce to 17% by 2025 will be driven by Gen Z and millennial consumers and nearly two-thirds (64%) of social media users — an estimated 2 billion social buyers — said they made a purchase on social media in the past year.

Now, Walmart Connect intends to do its part in connecting social media discovery to actual sales. So far, Walmart Connect’s partnerships have been hands-on in nature. Brands get custom reporting about their campaigns, based on activations on Walmart.com’s live shopping, TikTok, Snap, and Roku. But Seth Dallaire told Advertising Age that the partnership program expanding to the point where it would be more automated and widely available within Walmart Connect, so that brands could better target ads on social media and connected TV.

Contact True Interactive

To succeed with online advertising, contact True Interactive. Read about some of our client work here and our Walmart Connect expertise here.

For Further Insight

“Why Walmart Connect Is Winning,” Tim Colucci, February 25, 2022.

“Why Retailers Are Launching Ad Businesses,” Tim Colucci, January 11, 2022.

“Walgreens Doubles Down on Its Advertising Business,” Tim Colucci, May 19, 2021.

“Amazon Unveils New Ad Units Across Its Ecosystem,” Kurt Anagnostopoulos, May 4, 2021.

“Why Macy’s Launched an Advertising Platform,” Tim Colucci, March 3, 2021.

“Walmart Asserts Its Leadership in Advertising,” Tim Colucci, February 8, 2021.

Why the NFL on Amazon Prime Is a Victory for Connected TV

Why the NFL on Amazon Prime Is a Victory for Connected TV

by Tim Colucci Amazon

For decades, watching NFL games on television has meant gathering in front of a TV set and watching a game on one of the major networks. NFL games have been events that vanquish the competition. Featured programming such as Sunday Night Football, Thursday Night Football, and Monday Night Football have dominated viewer ratings. All of this is still the case. But how we watch football is changing.

On September 15, the NFL officially entered a new era of television broadcasting when the Kansas City Chiefs and Los Angeles Chargers took the field for Thursday Night Football. Instead of televising the game on an established linear TV network, the NFL streamed the match-up on Amazon Prime as part of a $13 billion, 11-year deal with Amazon.

The game marked the NFL’s official embrace of streaming. It also meant that to watch TNF going forward, football fans would need to sign up for Amazon Prime, which is Amazon’s premium service costing $139 annually. And so far, it looks like fans are willing to pony up. According to an internal Amazon memo, the September 15 broadcast drew a record number of Prime sign-ups for a year-hour period.

Given the popularity of the NFL – easily the most dominant brand on TV based on viewer ratings – the streaming agreement has significant ramifications for advertisers. Notably, this is a victory for connected TV, which means watching TV content through a device such as Roku or Amazon Fire. Many people refer to connected TV as over-the-top (OTT) TV, which refers to streaming content directly over the internet instead of cable, broadcast, and satellite television platforms. Although technically the two terms differ – with connected TV referring specifically to the device people use to stream content – for all intents and purposes, they are the same. Whatever you want to call it, connected TV has arrived: streaming is now more popular than cable. It’s no longer optional for businesses to have an OTT advertising strategy.

Connected advertising is similar to linear TV advertising because both formats rely obviously on video. But connected TV is different in many important ways. For one thing, advertisers need to understand how to create video content that will reach viewers across a variety of viewing devices in addition to TV screens, and connected TV ads are competing with multiple content streams. (You can watch TNF on a laptop, mobile phone, or gaming console with multiple screens open.)

And each streaming service and connected TV device (ranging from Amazon Fire to Roku) offer their own ad units. For example, Amazon Ads, which is Amazon’s fast-growing advertising business, offers ad units such as inline ads (which appear as selectable rows in each major browsing section of Fire TV) and feature rotator (a carousel-like ad placement appearing above the fold of the screen).

Ahead of the launch of TNF on Amazon Prime, Danielle Carney, Amazon Ads’ Head of NFL Sales, said:

We’re offering myriad opportunities to get involved with TNF, catering to brands’ range of needs. Our premier sponsorships give advertisers the ability to elevate their brands during the pre-game, pre-kick, halftime, and post-game shows. But that’s not all. We’re continuing to innovate and explore other potential sponsorships and packages that will enable brands tell their stories in unique ways through our surround, alternate feeds, and ancillary programming. Our newly built creative sports team will help customize the experience for our partners.

Outside of sponsorships, brands can use Streaming TV ads to reach fans throughout games on Prime Video and Twitch. Like our sponsorships, these video ads are backed by Amazon’s first-party insights, bringing more value and insight into campaign performance for brands.

To succeed, though, Amazon Prime needs to deliver viewing numbers to advertisers. Reportedly, Amazon has told advertisers that it expects to see nightly viewership of about 12.5 million people for its inaugural season of TNF. We’ll soon see. Amazon agreed for Nielsen to track ratings for TNF, and ratings for the September broadcast are still forthcoming.

Amazon Prime also needs to deliver a desirable experience. Amazon promises alternative ways to watch TNF, including Dude Perfect, a popular trick-shot comedy group. Amazon Fire TV and Alexa are bringing new features to NFL fans as well, such as trivia and real-time access to statistics (which should appeal to Fantasy Football devotees). Early fan reactions to the September 15 broadcast were mixed, and it looks like Amazon has some technical issues with content buffering to fix. Of course, no one can predict the quality of an actual NFL game, but Amazon can certainly deliver on the overall experience. Let’s see how Amazon adapts.

The broadcast is also significant for another reason: a victory for first-party data, which is the information that businesses collect directly from their customers. Amazon will use first-party data to sell targeted ads to help drive revenue for the games. This is huge. Right now, third-party audience data is withering away thanks to Apple’s and Google’s privacy measures. Businesses that figure out how to monetize first-party data enjoy an enormous advantage. Amazon has already become the third biggest ad platform in the world (behind Google and Meta) by using first-party data to sell targeted ads. The ascendance of first-party data is one reason why retailer-based ad networks have become so popular.

Bottom line: what is your advertising game plan for connected TV?

Contact True Interactive

To succeed with connected TV advertising, contact True Interactive. We have deep experience with this format.

How Apple Will Grow Its Advertising Business

How Apple Will Grow Its Advertising Business

by Tim Colucci Apple

Apple changed the advertising industry when the company launched an important privacy control in 2021, Application Tracking Transparency (ATT).  ATT asks iPhone users to decide whether apps can track them across other applications and websites. After the introduction of ATT, 62 percent of iPhone users opted out.

This has created a problem for advertisers and ad tech platforms such as Meta that rely on the ability to track user behavior across the web in order to serve up targeted ads to them. Without tracking user behavior via third-party cookies, their ads are less personalized. Meta said that ATT would cost the firm $10 billion in revenue in 2022. Apple, for its part, justified the new privacy control as taking a stand for consumer privacy.

Well, we now know Apple had something else in mind with ATT: taking a stand for Apple’s advertising business.

As Bloomberg reported recently, Apple is now earning $4 billion in revenue annually by selling ads on its devices, and the company plans to grow that amount aggressively. Granted, $4 billion is a far cry from the $209 billion that Google pulled down from advertising in 2021, but Apple’s newfound focus on ads sure casts its consumer privacy push in a different light.

How Does Apple Earn Ad Revenue?

Apple makes money selling ads on spaces that people see all the time on their iPhones and connected TVs as they navigate their screens to download apps, read the news, and watch content. Those include:

  • The App Store, as shown here:

Apple Ads

  • Apple’s own News and Stocks apps.

The additional ad revenue will come from:

  • The Today tab (the home page of the home page of the App Store, which includes content ranging from App of the Day to Game of the Day).
  • The You Might Also Like section of the App Store (this is found at the bottom of the App Store).
  • Third-party app download pages.

Does ATT Apply to Apple?

How will Apple sell targeted ads? By collecting first-party data, meaning the information that users of Apple devices cough up to Apple whenever they use the App Store, News and Stock apps, and so on. And, by the way, Apple will not make it easy for users to opt out of having their data tracked. You can disable the ad personalization feature, but you have to look for it under Apple Advertising in the settings app’s Privacy & Security menu. There is no pop-up menu asking you if you’d like to have tracking disabled as is the case with ATT, as shown below:privacy noticeBut shouldn’t ATT also apply to Apple? Not in Apple’s view. According to Bloomberg:

You may ask then, why don’t Apple apps have to ask permission to track users via a pop-up message? That’s what happens with other apps under ATT.

The reason, Apple says, is that the system “does not follow you across apps and websites owned by other companies.” That’s what ATT is designed to prevent. If a third-party app doesn’t track across outside apps and websites, it also doesn’t need to show a pop-up.

The “we are exempt from our own policy” rationale is how Google justifies its plans to kill third-party cookies on the Chrome browser. Google apps such as YouTube are exempt because technically they collect first-party data, not third-party data.

It’s easy to connect the dots and see what’s going on here: by attacking third-party cookie tracking, Apple bolsters its own ad program, which relies on first-party data collection.

Apple’s ad business is far too small to threaten the lead enjoyed by Amazon, Google, and Meta. But Apple has the muscle and money to grow its business quickly. ATT was a declaration of war.

What Advertisers Should Do

  • Understand the big picture. There is no going back: tech firms such as Apple and Google are undercutting the value of third-party cookies. Accept the reality that as third-party cookies crumble and technology companies enact privacy controls, your ads will be less targeted than they were. This does not mean you should stop advertising online. Online advertising remains the most efficient and cost-effective way to reach your audience. At the same time, first-party data is more valuable than ever to advertisers as a means to creating targeted ads. Consider ad platforms such as Amazon Advertising and Walmart Connect, which give businesses entrée to a vast base of customers who search and shop on Amazon and Walmart. True Interactive offers services on both platforms in addition to our longstanding work on Google, Bing, and other platforms. Learn more about our services with Amazon Ads here and Walmart here. Apple and Google cannot undercut what these companies are doing.

True Interactive can help you navigate the ever changing world of consumer privacy and advertising.

Contact True Interactive

To succeed with online advertising, contact True Interactive. Read about some of our client work here.

Lead image source: https://pixabay.com/photos/apple-inc-mac-apple-store-store-508812/