Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Amazon Sets Its Sights on the $88B Online Ad Market

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

181–190 of 239 posts

Re: Amazon Sets Its Sights on the $88B Online Ad Market

#181

Post by onion2k »

hartator wrote: post #6
scarface74 wrote: post #2

This is my bear case for Google. Google offers the least precise targeting compared to Facebook and Amazon. Facebook knows more about its users because users tell it about themselves and Amazon knows more about purchasing habits of its users because of thier purchase and search history. If I’m searching for something with the intention on buying it, I am going to go to the specific site - like Priceline, hotels.com,…

I don't know. Google is still way ahead. > Google’s U.S. ad revenue is expected to rise $5 billion this year to $39.9 billion, while Facebook could rise $3 billion this year to $21 billion, according to eMarketer. Adwords is just so effective to find your customers. You won't beat `buy new headphones` type traffic on Amazon or Facebook.

Arguing that an incumbent business is impossible to disrupt in a large market seems like an odd thing to do on the forum of YC, an accelerator that pretty much specialises in supporting startups that disrupt large markets and topple incumbent businesses.

Not that Amazon is a startup exactly, but they certainly act like one a lot of the time.

Re: Amazon Sets Its Sights on the $88B Online Ad Market

#182

Post by manigandham »

throwawayperson wrote: post #169
manigandham wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because Google has better results? What app has managed to take any serious amount of search queries from Google?

You are being naive here, the edge is data size, what made Amazon stuck out is they have shopping specific data, that's what matters, so too will those specific apps.

I've been in adtech for 10+ years so I'll take my experience and connections over your anonymous comments.

Nobody cares about some app that gets 0.001% of the usage and probably doesn't even have any strong identity link. "Shopping data" isn't magical nor is it of interest to every advertiser. Purchase data is also already processed by specific companies with their own properties or in aggregate by many ad networks. And, in case you missed my first comment, Google recently closed a deal to get purchase data directly from Mastercard which is far more than any single retailer could provide.

If you actually have an example of a specific app that is delivering much greater ad performance then perhaps you should share it.

Re: Amazon Sets Its Sights on the $88B Online Ad Market

#183

Post by adventured »

scoggs wrote: post #93
cm2012 wrote: post #9

Amazon ad revenue alone ($2.2 billion) for Q2 was already around 15% of Facebook's total Q2 revenue ($13 billion). That is nuts, if they have any room to grow that further, since ads isn't even Amazon's specialty. For reference, Snapchat did $290 million in the same timeframe, Twitter $660 million.

If it wasn't obvious already: > For reference, Snapchat did $290 million in the same timeframe, Twitter $660 million. Just goes to show how much potential Amazon has in the Ad Market. Does anyone else think Amazon could overtake one or both of Amazon's biggest competitors in the market (Facebook or Google)?

An analyst with Piper Jaffray recently projected their ad business will rapidly exceed AWS when it comes to being their profit center. By 2021 sometime they're forecasting $16b in operating income just for ads. That would make Amazon's ad business one of the few dozen most profitable businesses anywhere.

> The analyst estimates Amazon's ad business operating income will grow to $16 billion in 2021 versus $15 billion for Amazon Web Services that year. He believes Amazon already has product search market share "well above" 50 percent. Olson noted the "Other" segment, where Amazon's ad business resides, grew sales 72 percent in the second quarter.

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/08/13/amazons-advertising-profits-...

Re: Amazon Sets Its Sights on the $88B Online Ad Market

#184

Post by manigandham »

scarface74 wrote: post #175
manigandham wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because Google has better results? What app has managed to take any serious amount of search queries from Google?

It’s not about taking general search from Google. It’s about picking off high value search. Your random searches are not that valuable from a monetization standpoint. Searches that lead people to buy things are. Those searches are easy to pick off on a category by category basis. I had no idea that Google actually took up most of the screen on mobile with ads for products for sell until this thread. I’ve had Ad block…

So easy that it still hasn't been done yet? What's everyone waiting for then with 10s of billions in profit available?

In fact it's the opposite happening with Google now pushing into searches for flights and hotels with far better UX, even though those verticals were dominated by other vendors.

Re: Amazon Sets Its Sights on the $88B Online Ad Market

#185

Post by Scoundreller »

Retric wrote: post #123
qeternity wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also people tend to forget that advertising on Google’s own properties represents the vast majority of its ad revenue.

A significant chunk of that ~4 Billion or ~5% of total global online advertising is because Google also owns YouTube, which captures a large chunk total advertising spending independent of search.

Which is almost all revenue that Google has to share with YT publishers. 50% anyway.

Re: Amazon Sets Its Sights on the $88B Online Ad Market

#186

Post by bobsoap »

rohan1024 wrote: post #172
user5994461 wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>> Facebook knows where people like to eat because people check in. Google knows where you eat because when you leave the restaurant it offers you to review it for google map.

Also, if you own Android, no need for Google maps. They are already tracking your mobile location. Scanning WiFi in the background. They know you are having dinner at some hotel because WiFi found its network while scanning. It doesn't matter if your WiFi is off.

You can switch background scanning off in Android. If Google respects that setting is another question altogether though.

Re: Amazon Sets Its Sights on the $88B Online Ad Market

#188

Post by manigandham »

scarface74 wrote: post #178
manigandham wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're stuck on Google Maps and checkins but that is not the only thing that people use, nor is GPS necessary. Anyone sitting down at a restaurant and using the internet on their device via any app or website will shed location details that Google and other networks can pickup.

How does Google pick up location data on an iOS device using Safari browsing Facebook? Can a site with Google analytics gather the logged in Google account name? The upcoming iOS 12 version of Safari is going to make it even harder to do browser fingerprinting.

Networks have locations. Cell towers, wifi hotspots, corporate routers, etc. Not hard to get a location as long as there is network traffic.

Google analytics does know the same user across sites and devices but this is of course not exposed to the site, it's used by Google for ad targeting.

Browser fingerprinting is not necessary because people log in (to apps and sites) and will never be possible to fully reduce unless Apple can somehow make identical computer chips down to the atom.

Apple's cookie war also only helps Facebook and Google who maintain active 1st party cookies with every user, and meanwhile hurts all the independent networks and publishers who have to get people to keep logging in. This is why it helps to actually have some adtech expertise and industry cooperation instead of creating silly browser rules and turning Safari into the new IE.

Re: Amazon Sets Its Sights on the $88B Online Ad Market

#190

Post by logiclabs »

josephjrobison wrote: post #97
scoggs wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it wasn't obvious already: > For reference, Snapchat did $290 million in the same timeframe, Twitter $660 million. Just goes to show how much potential Amazon has in the Ad Market. Does anyone else think Amazon could overtake one or both of Amazon's biggest competitors in the market (Facebook or Google)?

Amazon is most like Facebook in that the ads are only displayed on its own property rather than all across the whole internet on any site that displays 3rd party ads. That, combined with the fact that Amazon also has a ton of data on its users just like Facebook makes them very alike (not that Google doesn't as well). What separates Google from Amazon is that their paid ads can be displayed on any 3rd party site that…

We've been displaying Amazon CPM display ads on a site for over 2 years now. This is an ad network for affiliates, but paid by CPM. It's mostly a mix of large brand adverts and Amazon remarketing ads (normally for products you've looked at).

The service is about to be shutdown though at the end of this month, and their suggestion is that we apply to their larger header bidding network (Unified Ad Marketplace), but not sure we'll qualify for that.

Post reply on HN