Rising online ad prices mean customer acquisition costs have spiked for D2C businesses, which already had a higher marketing spend base than offline equivalents.
At the same time, the data used to target and measure online advertising—the key channel to find and convert customers—is being eroded.
There will be consolidation in the crowded D2C landscape, providing scale benefits. Sellers will also have to refocus their marketing attention on increasing customer lifetime value.
The EU’s GDPR enforcers have ruled that IAB Europe’s framework for collecting user consent, a standard used by about 80% of sites on the continent, is in violation of the regulations
This is one of the clearest signs yet that regulation is starting to catch up with Apple and Google’s privacy push, as support for cookies and mobile ad IDs is due to end over the next few years
Publishers must prepare now by treating privacy as a core part of user experience and adopting a reader-first revenue model that also supports advertising in a trusted environment
Meta presented mixed results against low expectations, with its ad business a concern in the age of privacy.
Reels is at the core of the company’s strategy to win users given heightened competition, but its monetisation challenge persists.
Meta spent $3.7 billion on its metaverse gamble in the quarter. A higher-end device will help address strengthening enterprise demand for VR headsets, but the route to profitability remains unclear.
The UK government is on the cusp of introducing legislation that will force online platforms to monitor and mitigate the presence and spread of harmful and illegal content, in a regulatory first for big tech.
Affected companies should take note: they will need to prepare for a higher level of transparency and communication with regulators, and larger service providers will require expanded moderation, user verification and research capabilities.
Users should be protected as platforms balance complex competing duties. News publisher content has a carveout, but publishers may experience butterfly effects as the online environment is reshaped.
TikTok has reached a billion users worldwide just four years after its global launch, much quicker than social media rivals, though its ban in India is a drag on growth.
TikTok’s popularity with under-25s has contributed to a hollowing-out of Meta’s active userbase. During the pandemic, TikTok also expanded its reach among older demographics, cementing its position within the mainstream and posing a further threat to Meta.
TikTok could earn twice as much revenue as Snap in 2022, making it the first app to break out of the mid-league in years, with a huge runway for growth backed up by ByteDance’s remarkable success in China.
Ongoing supply difficulties for PlayStation and Xbox through 2022 and beyond will result in the install base for the generation being permanently impacted. It raises the question: if you can’t buy a console are they even relevant?
VR will stage a comeback this year, as Quest 2 has its highest sales ever, the category will find new appeal from game (and metaverse) developers. If a rumoured Apple VR/AR headset eventuates, expect white-hot interest
Netflix will make strides in its games service―but mostly behind the scenes to deliver a once in a decade transformation of the industry. Don’t rule out a critical and exclusive mobile hit
Facebook is winning the battle for eyeballs and advertising in the internet display arena, with revenues projected to reach $5.3 billion in 2012
By comparison, we expect Google to achieve revenue of $2.5 billion, after traffic acquisition costs, though it remains the king of internet advertising, due to its dominance of search
Increasing advertiser demand for scale and performance will make many publishers increasingly reliant on one or both of the internet giants for audience and revenue growth
This presentation analyses the social games market in the UK. UK consumer spending on games software, like other recession-battered markets, has been flat for the last two years. At the same time, however, there has been rapid growth in PC-based social gaming, fuelled by the free to play nature of most games and viral marketing capabilities of social networks particularly Facebook. By 2015, we estimate that social gaming across PC, mobile and tablet devices could be worth up to £400 million, though much of this is likely to be driven by adding ‘social’ layers to existing games franchises.
Internet advertising grew 15% YoY to €17.7 billion across Western and Central & Eastern Europe in 2010, according to provisional figures from IAB Europe
As in the US, growth in display, increasingly powered by social media, outpaced that of search, with display accounting for 33% of spend (up 3 ppts YoY)
We have updated our forecasts for 5 key markets – UK, Germany, France, Italy and Spain – and now project aggregated growth of 10% in 2011 and 13% in 2012
Facebook's audience and consumption growth is now generating substantial and rising display advertising revenue, with consensus estimates of $2 billion in 2010, up 160% YoY, and it will overtake Google on this count this year
The social network's growing position as the centre of the internet experience is enabling it to become a platform for other services, such as e-commerce, making it an increasing strategic threat to Google, as well as other players in the digital media
More importantly, like Google before it, Facebook’s scale and function has the power to disrupt the digital e-commerce and marketing models built over the past decade