The enterprising columnist Kara Swisher has done terrific work analyzing the now scuttled Google/Yahoo alliance. She has reported that Google’s lobbying office in Washington, D.C. actually tried to convince top company officials to not pursue the deal. The Google D.C. lobbyists correctly understood that the company is now under the “radar” of a growing number of regulators and privacy advocates from around the world. The failure of the company to heed this sound advice illustrates how its top management is out of touch with the realities of its own market and societal impact.
Here’s an excerpt from a recent Kara “Boomtown” column: “Early on, that was also a big worry of Google’s own operatives in D.C., who expressed concern–largely ignored at HQ, where execs really do see themselves as not even slightly evil–about its growing image as a scary behemoth.”
Category: European Commission
Online Ad Privacy Watch: Google Adding DoubleClick to its AdSense System
Policymakers will need to closely examine the role DoubleClick will play in collecting, analyzing, and helping profile consumers (whether they are online, seeing a video, or using a mobile device, for example). Here’s an email Google is reported sending out this week. My bold:
“We understand that the recent economic turmoil has created a lot of uncertainty in the lives of AdSense publishers. During these difficult times, we’re continuing to invest in innovations that improve publisher monetization and advertiser value in the content network.
We’re focusing on further developing our product offerings and boosting ad performance for publishers. We recently announced advancements in AdSense for search and experiments to make ads more effective. We’re bringing DoubleClick technologies to AdSense publishers, and we’ll continue to launch new products and features. We’re also continuing to improve our offerings for AdWords advertisers, making it easier for them to target the Google content network. Features for advertisers, such as the new display ad builder, are designed to improve ad performance on AdSense publisher sites.
We’ll keep driving technological progress, but our best asset will always be our publisher partners. The strength of AdSense lies in the value of the content you bring to users and the quality of the sites you bring to advertisers. Our success is tied to yours. We look forward to partnering with you for the long term, and remain dedicated to helping you succeed.”
Google Using Brain Research to Hone its Online Ads
Google has joined the stampede of advertisers who have embraced the tools of neuroscience to help them create the emerging generation of interactive ads. In the new model for marketing, the goal is to bypass our conscious, more rational, decision-making. They want to reach deeply into our emotional, unconscious, self. Hence, the gaggle of companies helping marketers with brain research. Google, by the way, is using the same company that recently tested how junk food ads affected consumer brains during the recent Olympic games. Neurofocus, the Berkeley-based company partnering with Google, won a major ad award for its help harnessing neuroscience to sell Frito-Lay chips. The growing role of neuroscience research for advertising (especially digital marketing) must be addressed by policymakers, health professionals, and other responsible parties. Here’s the Mediaweek excerpt:
“Google is so confident that its InVideo Ads product—those semi-transparent/animated overlay ads it launched on YouTube last year—are game changers that the company is turning to brain wave researchers to prove their effectiveness.
The search giant–in conjunction with MediaVest–has partnered with NeuroFocus, a researcher that specializes in biometrics, to gauge both how users respond to InVideo ads and how well those ads complement traditional banner ads. NeuroFocus specializes in measuring individuals’ brain response—by literally placing sensors on their heads—as well as other factors like pupil dilation and skin response.
“We were really interested in looking at what we think of as a pretty innovative ad unit,†explained Leah Spalding, advertising research manager, Google, who emphasized that since InVideo ads are designed to be non-intrusive, they warrant an evaluation that goes beyond traditional measures like click-through rates. “Standard metrics don’t tell the whole story…Specifically, after fielding a study among 40 participants last May, InVideo ads scored above average on a scale of one to 10 for measures like “attention†(8.5), “emotional engagement†(7.3) and “effectiveness†(6.6). According to officials, a 6.6 score is considered strong.”
source: “Google, MediaVest Tap Biometrics for InVideo Ads Play.” Mike Shields. Mediaweek. October 23, 2008.
and more on the research via Mediapost: “…the NeuroFocus research conducted in May looked at the reactions of 40 people to YouTube InVideo overlay and companion banner ads from a cross-section of MediaVest advertising clients.
The firm used biometric measures such as brainwave activity, eye-tracking and skin response to gauge the impact of ads. Based on criteria including attention level, emotional engagement and memory retention, it then comes up with an overall “effectiveness” score for ads.”
“Google: This is your brain on advertising.” Mark Walsh. Mediapost. Oct. 23, 2008
PS: Google has been holding research discussions on such topics as “The Neuroscience of Emotions [Sept. 16, 2008]. Here’s the link to a presentation via YouTube.
Here’s another on computational neuroscience by a researcher who works on online advertising.
Privacy Threats from Google/Yahoo Deal: “True Behavioral Targeting”
Via a interview in B to B magazine [excerpt, my bold]: “It seems that Yahoo is out to get two main things from a deal with Google: a proven alternative to its failing search-monetization effort and access to more data that enable better behavioral targeting, complementing its technological and differentiating assets… A Yahoo-Google joint venture would produce the only entity on the Internet with access to a critical mass to enable true behavioral targeting. That’s a lot of private information in one place and a significant limitation for others to compete in behavioral targeting and personalization of the Web.”
source: “What a Google-Yahoo advertising deal means. Christopher Hosford. B to B. October 22, 2008
Facebook ad targeting system is using the “keywords in people’s status messages”–Tales of Behavioral Targeting
Fresh proof that Congress has to prohibit behavioral targeting unless consumers opt-in appears in the new issue of Brandweek. Facebook is “experimenting” with the targeting by “keywords in people’s status messages,” according to “Tim Kendall, director of monetization at Facebook.” Here are some other choice excerpts from the article:
“Advertisers are extremely interested in all new developments in the behavioral targeting space,” said Emily Riley, senior analyst at Forrester Research, Cambridge, Mass. “We’re seeing a big uptick in the use of [these] tactics.” According to Forrester data, 24% of advertisers used behavioral targeting in 2008. Last year it was only 16%…Almost half of advertisers say, ‘Even if I didn’t use behavioral last year, I definitely want to this coming year…”…
“…said Jeff Berman, president of sales and marketing at MySpace. “… the more data you have, the smarter you can be with your media… but if you want to focus on . . . 25-40-year-old mom Nascar fans who love romantic comedies and live in 12 specific zip codes, we can do that.”
…”as BT becomes more invasive at social networking sites, the technology should improve and thus serve up more relevant ads based on our true site behavior…Revenue Science, one of the biggest independent BT networks, is using forward-to-friend behavior to allow advertisers to target virally oriented people. Bebo, the social networking site AOL bought earlier this year, works with Elkridge, Md.-based Lotame, an agency that helps brand advertisers target unique users, such as new moms, who spend a lot of time on social sites.”
source: Behavioral Targeting: A Tricky Issue for Marketers. Becky Ebenkamp. Brandweek. Oct. 21, 2008
Google, the Global Youth Obesity Crisis & its “Branded Entertainment” Division Deals with Pepsi and Burger King
Google’s top executives and corporate-responsibility concerned investors should consider the consequences of the online ad company’s major promotion of Burger King and Pepsi. Google is broadly distributing two new online programming series backed by either Burger King and Pepsi via its “branded entertainment” division. A new Pepsi-backed show called Poptub, notes paidcontent.org, “resides on its own YouTube channel and is distributed through Google AdSense (via “Gadgets” or widgets), increasing the number of eyeballs for potential advertisers. Ad revenue will be split between Google, Pepsi-backed Embassy Row, and the website that hosted the clip.” CNET reports that Poptub features “perky hosts, amusing videos, promotional interviews, and a prominent Pepsi sponsorship.”
Google’s Burger King backed “Seth MacFarlane’s Cavalcade of Cartoon Comedy” is a huge online hit, Mediaweek reports. The YouTube based series “generated 14 million total views since their Sept. 9 debut across various syndication partners…One short, Super Mario Rescues The Princess, has amassed over 6 million views on YouTube alone…the Cavalcade channel was YouTube’s most popular during the week ending Sept. 12, generating millions of views in less than 48 hours… The first 10 of the MacFarlane-produced shorts are being sponsored by Burger King. The fast food company’s branded channel, youtube.com/bk, is now the second most popular sponsored channel of all time on YouTube.”
Hollywood Reporter explains that “Over at Burger King’s YouTube channel, a new application allows consumers to dub their voices in over the animation of select “Cavalcade†videos.”
Google role as a facilitator of unhealthy food products will become part of the global youth obesity and public health debate.
MySpace, Social Networks, Massive Data-Mining, Privacy & Interactive Advertising
Policymakers–including state attorneys-general, the FTC and EU officials– are failing to examine how social networks such as MySpace are utilizing advanced data mining techniques to track, analyze, and target millions of unsuspecting users (including, likely, adolescents). For example, MySpace (and other Fox Interactive Media properties, FIM) are using data warehouse and parallel computing techniques that “is enabling a new set of applications and services that previously were simply neither possible nor practical at this scale.”
MySpace and other FIM entities are engaged in daily “real-time” analysis of massive data sets from its 190 million active users. Such data analysis is driving FIM’s “advanced targeted advertising systems.” So all the MySpace “user-generated content” becomes fodder for the analytical ad-targeting. Such data collection must be under the full control of the user–they need to know how and what is being collected, how its used, what inferences are made, the range of ad and marketing targeting linked to the data, etc. It’s time social media marketing, as the industry calls it, draws the attention of policymakers, including the U.S., Canada, and in the EU.
Embedding Brands in Videogames
The growth of in-game marketing should be on the public policy radar. It’s something we have been following with food and beverage marketing targeting children and adolescents. Read this excerpt from a Double Fusion ad for a regional sales manager. Then ask yourself: does this business model raise consumer protection and public welfare concerns.
excerpt: “Want to place brands in games? Double Fusion’s Core Games Group is looking for a passionate gamer with the desire to sell marketers on the sexy allure of the gaming console as a means to reach the increasingly allusive 18-34 Male demographic. The Regional Sales Manager, Core Games Group will be responsible for using Double Fusion’s multi-platform approach (static in-game advertising, dynamic in-game advertising, gaming tournaments, downloadable content, co-marketing partnerships, etc) to in-game advertising to meet marketers’ campaign objectives in the most engaging ways imaginable.
…Double Fusion connects brands with audiences through the immersive medium of games…our integrated marketing solutions continue to inspire Fortune 500 companies to get in the game with groundbreaking advertising campaigns…Chance to make media history in a “rising star†category – interactive entertainment is one of the fastest growing categories across female audiences and advertisers are just beginning to realize this huge market potential…Our unique media capabilities across 2D and 3D games allow advertisers to benefit from a level of interaction that’s simply not possible with traditional advertising. In fact, research from Nielsen has shown the superior recall and purchase preference results that 3D programs deliver. The best of both worlds – we’re well-funded with financial backing from top-tier venture capital firms plus media giants such as Time Warner and Hearst…”
Two years after CDD & USPIRG warn about online advertising & media consolidation, a call to “monitor the state of competition”
Yesterday, Sen. Herb Kohl, the chair of the Senate Antitrust Committee, sent a letter to the Department of Justice about the proposed Google/Yahoo alliance. Two years ago next month, in its initial complaint filed at the Federal Trade Commission calling for an investigation into behavioral online ad targeting, CDD and USPIRG also petitioned the agency to open up an antitrust investigation. It was clear two years ago–as one surveyed the dizzying global shopping spree by Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, Time Warner/AOL–that a tiny handful would soon dominate the online ad market. Given that online ad revenues are the key to the funding of almost all interactive and online content, we were disturbed by the trend then towards consolidation. Of course, fewer companies controlling all that consumer data also raised fundamental privacy concerns.
Two years later, of course, we have even fewer independent companies left standing. Google swallowed DoubleClick (and is poised to partially operate Yahoo); Yahoo acquired Blue Lithium and Right Media; Microsoft acquired giant aQuantive; Time Warner bought Tacoda and Third Screen Media. Etc.
Regulators on both sides of the Atlantic have been asleep at the digital switch. They have failed to both protect competition and privacy. However, there is a growing awareness that there are serious problems looming. As we know, the same deregulatory philosophy which helped wreck our economy is also the foundation for communications and media policy. It is accompanied, of course, by a `golden’ revolving door between government and private industry that has left consumers and citizens vulnerable to a wholesale set of unfair practices. Addressing these issues will be the focus of much work over the next several years.
Interactive Ad Bureau to Congress and Public: If Your Privacy is Protected, The Internet Will Fail Like Wall Street!
It’s too disquieting a time in the U.S. to dismiss what a lobbyist for the Interactive Advertising Bureau said as merely silly. The IAB lobbyist is quoted in today’s Washington Post saying: “If Congress required ‘opt in’ today, Congress would be back in tomorrow writing an Internet bailout bill. Every advertising platform and business model would be put at risk.” [reg. required]
Why is the IAB afraid of honest consumer disclosure and consumer control? If online ad leaders can’t imagine a world where the industry still makes lots of money–while simultaneously respecting consumer privacy–perhaps they should choose another profession (say investment banking!).
Seriously, online ad leaders need to acknowledge that reasonable federal rules are required that safeguard consumers (with meaningful policies especially protecting children and adolescents, as well as adult financial, health, and political data). The industry doesn’t need a bail-out. But its leaders should `opt-in’ to a responsible position for online consumer privacy protection.