What’s going on in the world of digital advertising and how it could affect us.
What’s going on…
Last month Google received a second ruling declaring its digital ad tech was a monopoly – both its ad servers and ad exchanges. This is on top of Google’s online search monopoly ruling at the end of last year. Lastly Google recently announced they were abandoning efforts to eliminate/minimize use of third-party cookies in their Chrome browser.
What Compass’s Team is saying:
This is actually good news for advertisers and publishers (like us and our clients). Why? Because Google had too much control — they owned:
- The place where ads were bought.
- The system where ads were served.
- And the platform where you purchased ads.That means they could manipulate the entire process — and maximize their own profits — without being transparent about how pricing or performance worked. We didn’t always notice because it was just “how things were.”
Now that Google’s being challenged legally, it could open up the ad market — making it:
- More transparent
- More competitive
- Possibly even better priced for advertisers over time
As for cookies staying around longer:
With the threat of cookies going away, advertisers realized the amount of first party data that they typically underutilize (your own customer lists, loyalty programs, emails, etc.), which is who currently uses your product or service, thus being the place to start and build seed audiences or look-a-like audiences.
So even if cookies stick around, the industry is healthier now. Plus, if keeping cookies means fewer annoying “accept cookies” popups on websites, that’s another win for user experience.
Bottom Line:
- Google is losing some unchecked power — good for competition and advertisers.
- The industry is now smarter and more privacy-focused — whether cookies exist or not.
