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Facebook users said no to tracking, and now advertisers are panicking

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Re: Facebook users said no to tracking, and now advertisers are panicking

#261

Post by b3morales »

JKCalhoun wrote: post #168
aviraldg wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As soon as ad supported free services start shutting down because of ad blocking and lowered clickthrough rates on ads because of targeting being blocked, most people will probably start changing their minds. (The alternative being maintaining 10-20+ paid subscriptions.) For now, all this change means is that users who are opted-in to tracking are subsidising those who aren't.

I don't know. I think when ad supported free services start shutting down people will move on with their lives. We'll find out instead how really unimportant Facebook, etc. was in people's lives. Put another way, how on earth did people get along without Facebook before there was a Facebook? I'm reminded of a comment from the guy that created the TV-B-Gone. He would turn off TV's in public places like self-service la…

This might just be me, but I've always found that TVs in public have this weird pull to them. Even if I have no feelings at all about what's on the screen (a soap opera I've never seen?) my gaze is still repeatedly drawn to it. If there's one around I generally try to position myself so it's not in my peripheral vision or I have to spend some effort ignoring it. It feels like whatever it is that keeps kids, as we say, "glued to the screen" doesn't always go away in adulthood.

I would definitely find it relieving if someone showed up with a TV-B-Gone and clicked it off.

Re: Facebook users said no to tracking, and now advertisers are panicking

#262

Post by maybelsyrup »

fairity wrote: post #260

Be careful what you wish for. If ad publishers like Facebook generate less revenue per ad impression (which is what these tracking changes do), publishers will inevitably end up showing users more ads not less (to make up for the lost revenue).

Great! Maybe that'll drive people away from these platforms and we can have our brains back.

Re: Facebook users said no to tracking, and now advertisers are panicking

#263

Post by tonyedgecombe »

devb wrote: post #238
artursapek wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On Twitter, I've been blocking every account that pushes ads. Slowly I think I've gotten most of them lol. I don't see as many now.

I've been doing this for several years, and it doesn't seem to reduce the number of ads I get. I just start getting absurdly irrelevant ads. A memorable one was for @7Up_Nigeria. I live near NYC.

>I just start getting absurdly irrelevant ads.

I'd count that as progress as they are easier to ignore. The ones I don't want are those that are relevant enough that they might prompt a change in my behaviour.

Re: Facebook users said no to tracking, and now advertisers are panicking

#264

Post by samizdis »

cfjgvjh wrote: post #236
samizdis wrote: post #202

[Eric] Seufert [a mobile analyst who writes the Mobile Dev Memo trade blog] estimated that in the first full quarter users see the prompt, the iOS changes could cut Facebook’s revenue by 7% if roughly 20% of users agree to be tracked. If just 10% of users grant Facebook tracking permission, revenue could be down as much as 13.6%, according to his models. If those figures are even near the ballpark, this would surely…

> If widely circulated, this could be wielded to some effect in a campaign by FB detractors/rivals. But who are the FB ads rivals that aren't affected in a similar manner by this change? Since the tracking permission isn't specific to FB, wouldn't other players with a similar business model also be negatively impacted?

I should have been clearer, sorry. I wasn't considering those competing against FB for ads in the same medium. I was thinking more of rivals for ad spend generally. Perhaps some of it would revert to print titles, or broadcast, as a result. I'd like to think that sometimes an advert can be effective even if you can't measure its impact precisely.

Perhaps I am unduly influenced by the sorts of ads that I like, which tend to be posters, billboards or, just occasionally, TV/cinema/online pre-rolls. My favourite example would be the success of a Levi's ad from the '80s, see [1]: ‘It was a piece of magic’: How Levi’s ‘Laundrette’ ad led to an 800% sales boost

Yes, I realise that no small company can afford such advertising as that, but in a previous life, when I spent about a year in advertising sales for a local newspaper, I was wined and dined about a dozen times by local firms who'd let me come up with ad copy for them, and sometimes a campaign, who (rightly or wrongly) attributed a sales boost to my efforts.

Anyhow, you make a good point nonetheless.

[1] https://www.marketingweek.com/levis-laundrette-sales-boost/

Re: Facebook users said no to tracking, and now advertisers are panicking

#265

Post by villasv »

janpot wrote: post #165

Often I hear the argument, people saying "I prefer ads that are relevant for me over random ads". But the result of the tracking is not only that you get "relevant" ads, it's that your timelines and your feeds and your news gets tweaked in ways that makes you engage with ads as much as possible. Not only do you get manipulated in buying stuff you didn't ask for (ads in general). You're also getting spoonfed content t…

> I prefer ads that are relevant for me over random ads

I froze up the first time someone said this to me. Of course I prefer random ads, cause this way they're less likely to push the right buttons on my vulnerable monkey-ass brain. Do people think tailored ads are good for them instead of consumerism triggers? Messed up worldview.

Re: Facebook users said no to tracking, and now advertisers are panicking

#266

Post by wcarron »

_Understated_ wrote: post #43

> [Disruptive Digita] is also looking into technology that would let Facebook deliver personalized ads based on targeting data stored on the user’s device, meaning Facebook wouldn’t need to access it. Anyone know how this would work? My spidey-sense is tingling here at the thought of apps scanning data on my phone!

My idea? FB app stores data locally, uses this local data to pull ads onto your phone to be served/rendered. Don't need to send user data out. Just identify the ads this phone should be targeted by and render them as needed.

Good point about the scanning, though. These scumbags certainly would try to pull something like that off.

Re: Facebook users said no to tracking, and now advertisers are panicking

#267

Post by throwawayboise »

mariusor wrote: post #73

For the past year I've had this ritual of clicking on every advertising tile as soon as it appears and mark it as irrelevant and that I don't want to see any more from that company. Currently this happens for a couple of days at the start of some months. So far I feel like this strategy has worked fine, 90% of the time I don't get served any unwanted content and I can view a decent timeline.

Why not just install a good ad blocker in your browser?

Re: Facebook users said no to tracking, and now advertisers are panicking

#268

Post by derwiki »

artursapek wrote: post #148
mariusor wrote: post #73

For the past year I've had this ritual of clicking on every advertising tile as soon as it appears and mark it as irrelevant and that I don't want to see any more from that company. Currently this happens for a couple of days at the start of some months. So far I feel like this strategy has worked fine, 90% of the time I don't get served any unwanted content and I can view a decent timeline.

On Twitter, I've been blocking every account that pushes ads. Slowly I think I've gotten most of them lol. I don't see as many now.

Is that a list that can be easily exported/imported?

Re: Facebook users said no to tracking, and now advertisers are panicking

#269

Post by stormbrew »

samizdis wrote: post #264
cfjgvjh wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If widely circulated, this could be wielded to some effect in a campaign by FB detractors/rivals. But who are the FB ads rivals that aren't affected in a similar manner by this change? Since the tracking permission isn't specific to FB, wouldn't other players with a similar business model also be negatively impacted?

I should have been clearer, sorry. I wasn't considering those competing against FB for ads in the same medium. I was thinking more of rivals for ad spend generally. Perhaps some of it would revert to print titles, or broadcast, as a result. I'd like to think that sometimes an advert can be effective even if you can't measure its impact precisely. Perhaps I am unduly influenced by the sorts of ads that I like, which t…

I mean it doesn't have to move to dead venues like print or tv broadcast in order to just get away from targeting. It's not like internet advertising requires narrow demographic and individual history targeting for some reason, it's just that it made that more convenient.

> Yes, I realise that no small company can afford such advertising as that, but in a previous life, when I spent about a year in advertising sales for a local newspaper, I was wined and dined about a dozen times by local firms who'd let me come up with ad copy for them, and sometimes a campaign, who (rightly or wrongly) attributed a sales boost to my efforts.

I mean, the fact that this isn't really a thing anymore is almost certainly part of what kills local media nowadays, and by a kind of vicious cycle also helps kill local businesses. It used to be that small, local businesses weren't competing on the same playing field as large (inter)national businesses. They'd get local eyes on local ads in local venues. That would keep local media alive, and the ads would keep local businesses competitive.

Now they fight with national brands for ad space on national platforms where they're outspent for more narrowly targeted ads than were ever possible in the old days. Local media dies to national media, local businesses die to national businesses, meanwhile the national media gets bigger and richer every day.

Re: Facebook users said no to tracking, and now advertisers are panicking

#270

Post by renewiltord »

masswerk wrote: post #255
renewiltord wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

* There is a pervasive belief on HN that marketing teams are making easy errors, i.e. there is low hanging fruit * Consultancies that improve marketing campaign efficacy make lots of money * HN users are making small fractions of that money and constantly complaining about it * Any HN user capable of picking this low hanging fruit could do this for two years and retire for life * They are not * Conclusion: Either the…

Maybe, there's a biased view in ad business and some of the perceived benefits and effects are rather tautological? (This is why we have studies.) You could also conclude from your remarks that there is a pervasive idea around ad teams that former generations (in the times of media analysis) were just delivering complete failures. However, this model had delivered for more than a century. How could this model perform…

The best thing about startups is that they test questions like that in a way that these studies can't. Because the participants have a very real and strong incentive to succeed they will perform that continuous search and hypothesis adjustment till they hit gold or die. If you truly have a Thiel hypothesis, you're going to get very rich.

In software, we call this "talk is cheap; show me the code", but of course here you don't need to show me the code. It's just that you're letting this golden opportunity go to waste. Up to you, I guess.

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