Tl;Dr
--too many guys with laptops means way too many sites /blogs
--Google and Facebook are gobbling all growth in ads. That new ad dollar is being increasingly spent on Goog and FB.
There’s a Digital Media Crash, But No One Will Say It
21–30 of 102 posts
Re: There’s a Digital Media Crash, But No One Will Say It
#22There are plenty of extremely profitable and growing ad-supported digital media businesses. It's just not the Vices and the Buzzfeeds of the world. Spending a ton of money up front to generate a huge volume of largely undifferentiated visitors and then selling their ad impressions at very low CPMs is not a winning strategy. And building it on top of the whims of Facebook's algorithm was worse.
Do you have any examples of those profitable businesses?
Re: There’s a Digital Media Crash, But No One Will Say It
#23There is a perception in right wing circles that this is also related to trumpism, after all this crash is happening with the stock market at an all time high. A lot of these publications are at the 'progressive' end of the spectrum and they may have misread the market, even for their core readers. Specifically the media (and in particular digital media's) response seems to have been one of all out activism against h…
I don’t know why you’re getting downvoted. I made a conscious effort to not consume media sources which engage in blatant and one-sided activism. I just want the facts, and all the facts, not just the subset that fits a narrative. And I don’t need the commentary at all. In investigative journalism I want them to tear into both sides of the political spectrum equally, not suppress/ignore one side. I struggle to name a single media outlet that would do that, so I mostly just read tech blogs these days. And then only the subset that don’t insist on shoving their politics down my throat. The Verge is out.
Re: There’s a Digital Media Crash, But No One Will Say It
#24I agree, but my question is, why hasn't the crash happened yet? Doesn't everyone know most clicks are by bots?
How did you determine that most clicks are bots?
Savvy marketers aren't measuring clicks, they're measuring conversions and they tie their marketing spend to sales leads and to revenue generated. Ads that generate clicks but no sales don't last long.
Re: There’s a Digital Media Crash, But No One Will Say It
#25I agree, but my question is, why hasn't the crash happened yet? Doesn't everyone know most clicks are by bots?
This is anecdotal but I feel it's much more common than we talk about: when I was in ad tech, I saw first hand how advertisers would spend money on impressions for the sole purpose of being able to report to their higher-ups how many impressions and click they got. Particularly for brands where conversion attribution was difficult to impossible. The media agencies spending on be half of the brand also have virtually…
There's definitely some truth in that. For all sorts of promotional spending (think things like tradeshows as well) there is a whole system that depends on the belief that spending money on whatever activity is a good idea. "Events are a waste of marketing dollars. We shouldn't ever sponsor them." said no event manager at a company ever.
Re: There’s a Digital Media Crash, But No One Will Say It
#26There is a perception in right wing circles that this is also related to trumpism, after all this crash is happening with the stock market at an all time high. A lot of these publications are at the 'progressive' end of the spectrum and they may have misread the market, even for their core readers. Specifically the media (and in particular digital media's) response seems to have been one of all out activism against h…
Perhaps one of the reasons that a lot of the struggling media outlets are on the progressive end of the spectrum is that they mostly need to be profitable through advertising whereas the conservative side can be run at a loss while their backers recoup their investments through deregulation and tax cuts. If someone could figure out a similar way to profit from Democratic government, that could solve most of the fundi…
> they mostly need to be profitable through advertising whereas the conservative side can be run at a loss while their backers recoup their investments through deregulation and tax cuts
This is insane. Show me one conservative-leaning media startup that was saved (or turned profitable!) through "deregulation and tax cuts" without reliance on other streams of revenue.
Unless you somehow mean that a better, faster-growing economy via deregulation and tax cuts results in better business outcomes overall, regardless of political leanings, which I would agree with enthusiastically.
Re: There’s a Digital Media Crash, But No One Will Say It
#27The "pivot to video" would explain why every third article I click from outside my usual haunts has an auto-play video at the top that follows me as I scroll down the page.
I've reached my limit; I've started blocking video CDNs with my adblocker. If there's a video I really want to watch, I'll use a different browser.
Re: There’s a Digital Media Crash, But No One Will Say It
#28I agree, but my question is, why hasn't the crash happened yet? Doesn't everyone know most clicks are by bots?
How did you determine that most clicks are bots? Savvy marketers aren't measuring clicks, they're measuring conversions and they tie their marketing spend to sales leads and to revenue generated. Ads that generate clicks but no sales don't last long.
You're coming at this from a SaaS point of view. Imagine if you're a rather large brand like Fedex. You can't tie your digital ads directly to a conversion because the conversion happens offline. But their advertising department is supposed to make it seem like they're spending money and driving "brand awareness". So getting fake clicks, fake ad video views -- all of that can get reported up so they can make themselves seem successful.
Re: There’s a Digital Media Crash, But No One Will Say It
#29Is there a chance that any of this plays out in favor of small advertisers? Seems like not, if current ad pricing is in part subsidized by VCs funding money-losing media platforms and hoping to "make up for it in volume" as is explained here. Will a "crash" result in less competition and therefore even higher rates for Adwords/Facebook for small businesses?
Re: There’s a Digital Media Crash, But No One Will Say It
#30Relevant... I got told a few days ago that: "Buzzfeed writers have to generate at least 1 article per day. There is no minimum limit on words on the article, and the topic can be anything (within reason)." Once I knew this, the prevalence of low-quality Buzzfeed links all over the web suddenly made sense.
That's how it is for the average writer in digital media. Small daily articles keep the lights on and fund bigger investigative articles and feature content.