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The Social Ladder
These days, fraudsters seem to prefer social media as their venue of choice.
In 2021, Americans lost $800 million to social scams compared to $700 million in reported losses to phone scammers.
Last year, phone fraudsters scammed people out of $800 million, but social scam losses also ticked up, reaching $1.23 billion, according to FTC data.
And the FTC is ready to hold the big social nets to account. It sent orders to eight of the largest platforms seeking information on how they screen for misleading ads for scams and fraudulent and counterfeit products.
YouTube, TikTok, Snap, Twitter, Pinterest, Meta and Instagram were all on the receiving end.
One of the areas that the commission says it plans to audit is whether these platforms apply the same rigor for fraud detection when it comes to ads in English vs. Spanish. Sometimes the auto-detection tech for spotting fraud is refined based on the default language, leaving minorities or non-native speakers as easier prey.
The FTC will also give particular scrutiny to ads and sellers in categories that target potentially desperate customers, “such as those intended to treat, prevent or cure substance use disorders and tout income opportunities.”
Mourning Brew
Is the Morning Brew model crumbling?
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Daily Roundup
That’s the question posed by media reporter Simon Owens on his Substack.
The Brew is known for providing newsletter-based editorial, organic social engagement and vertical news aggregation and analysis served up by a small team. And over the past few years, it’s become fashionable for scrappy B2B media startups to frame themselves as “Morning Brew for X.”
But Morning Brew recently underwent multiple rounds of layoffs. (Although, to be fair, so have ad-reliant publishers of all shapes and sizes.)
Owens highlights what he sees as one of Morning Brew’s main problems: The aggregation trap.
Early digital media standouts such as BuzzFeed, Huffington Post, Upworthy and Mic embraced aggregation and free distribution. Now their audiences expect free content and simply won’t subscribe. VCs bet big on this previous generation of upstarts, but they stalled and eventually crashed under the weight of their own valuations.
Morning Brew and theSkimm, another newsletter-based media startup, both got cash infusions. Brew sold to Axel Springer in 2020, and theSkimm has raised more than $28 million from VCs. Both have also added apps, new verticals and new formats.
Yet, a handful of years and a recession later, these investments have become unbearable costs.
But on the plus side for all the “Brews for X” out there, consider Betteridge’s Law, which states that “any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no.”
Appetite For Risk
Is Google Analytics really illegal in Europe?
I know I just cited Betteridge’s Law, but we may have an exception on our hands.
Google Analytics exists in a legal gray zone in Europe. Based on the strict letter of the law, Google Analytics is illegal, and EU data protection authorities have been issuing rulings that say the same.
GA4 will soon replace Universal Analytics (the previous version of Google Analytics), and it includes built-in privacy mechanisms, such as a block on IP data. Data will also be collected using local servers so that it isn’t held on American soil (a potentially important legal defense of the product).
But nobody knows if EU legislators and regulators will be swayed by those changes. And nearly every Google Analytics competitor is now fanning the flames of panic among publishers and advertisers that rely on GA, which has become the de facto analytics provider for so many companies thanks to the fact that it’s free.
“So, what do you do now?” asks Siobhan Solberg, founder and CEO of marketing measurement and data consultancy Raze, in her newsletter. “Stick with Google Analytics and hope that the US-EU issues figure themselves out?”
Good questions with no easy answer.
Solberg’s advice is for companies to take a look in the mirror.
“It really comes down to what your business requires and your appetite for risk,” she writes.
But Wait, There’s More!
Dotdash Meredith inks a Pinterest partnership, joining Condé Nast and Tastemade. [Adweek]
Google releases its March 2023 broad core update. [Search Engine Land]
BuzzFeed encourages reporters to write more stories in an effort to turn a profit. [WSJ]
Comscore launches a new business division for programmatic targeting. [NextTV]
Meta tests a new process for authenticating accounts via missed calls to save money on SMS and call costs. [Social Media Today]
You’re Hired!
Smartly.io announces executive promotions and additions, including the appointment of former Publicis Groupe top executive Laura Desmond as CEO. [release]
Fetch appoints ad tech vet Meredith Guerriero as COO. [release]
