It’s been a busy few weeks in the wide world of digital marketing. Here are a few of the things that have folks talking at Dixon Schwabl:
That stat takes a minute to sink in. At first, it seems only natural. These tech giants have been on a marketing tear, while traditional media like print and broadcast have been in steady decline. Then you start to think about what that really means. This is two companies in a relatively new space now grossing more ad revenue than three major media categories that have been around for decades. Keep in mind that there are more than 15,000 radio stations, 7,300 magazines and 1,300 daily newspapers in the US alone. Google will make nearly $81 billion selling ads this year. That’s more than the GDP of most countries. Facebook will bring in more than $36 billion, and these two together are getting roughly 83% of all new ad dollars worldwide. Their growth is far from over.
Amazon buys Whole Foods for $13.7 billion.
This one is a big deal for a lot of reasons. First off, unlike some of its peers, Amazon isn’t known for massive acquisitions (Zappos.com was its second-largest at $1.2 billion). That tells us that Amazon sees a really big play here. Will it incorporate Amazon Go technology in these stores? Will it use Amazon Fresh to deliver Whole Foods goods to your doorstep? In any case, it’s clear that your groceries will come with a healthy side of data in the not-too-distant future. Amazon evidently sees the grocery business as ripe for disruption, and it’s probably a safe bet that the way we buy food is about to change forever.
Facebook now has 2 billion monthly users.
This really speaks for itself. Roughly 28% of all people on the planet use Facebook at least once a month. Nearly 80% of these users live outside of the US. This may be the global village Marshall McLuhan never could have imagined.
Google got an unprecedented fine in the EU.
Adding to its ongoing problems in Europe, Google just got slapped with a record-shattering $2.7 billion fine for favoring its own shopping services in search results over those of rivals. That is not a typo: billion with a b. How Google responds to this will say much about its future posture with government bodies around the world who seem to be increasingly uncomfortable with its market dominance.
Snapchat has dramatically expanded its advertising capabilities, joining the likes of Google and Facebook in rolling out a self-serve ad platform.
Like those larger players, Snapchat will no longer require a minimum buy, and you can pay with a credit card, making it instantly accessible to tens of thousands of small businesses. The social app is also rolling out a publisher platform to help marketers convert existing brand assets into Snapchat formats and a certified partners program that will allow ad tech companies to buy tools for optimizing Snapchat ads. These platform investments seem to be a reaction to disappointing ad revenue since Snapchat went public earlier this year. It will be very interesting to see how this impacts advertiser adoption.
Note: The DS Digital High Five is a periodic distillation of digital marketing news and trends that are impacting our industry and shaping the way we Make It Happen here at Dixon Schwabl.
The Answer: This VP of digital media and Jeopardy aficionado uses digital media tools and tactics to help companies get the word out about what they do to the people who are most likely to act. The Question: Who is Scott Ensign?