In a dramatic week in which Rihanna donned a papal-inspired headdress to the Met Gala, it was suggested all millennials should get a £10,000 loan when they turn 25, and President Trump caused controversy yet again, what were the major digital marketing updates?
We outline the main marketing stories of last week below:
Facebook Is Conducting A Major Internal Reorganisation
Facebook hasn’t had the best press recently as a result of the Cambridge Analytica scandal, so it will not come as a surprise to many that the organisation has decided to have an internal reshuffle.
Reports reveal that its product and engineering efforts will now be sorted into three areas, so there will be separate teams for apps, new platforms and infrastructure, and central product services. Facebook believes this will improve communication and ensure there is greater dedication to user privacy.
Online Ad Complaints Overtook TV For The First Time In 2017
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has revealed it amended or withdrawn more than 7000 ads in 2017 – 47 per cent more than the previous year.
In total the ASA received 27,138 complaints about 19,398 ads, 17 per cent of which were regarding misleading ads. Ten thousand, nine hundred and thirty-two of these complaints were made about 9951 online ads, while 9466 complaints were about 4666 TV ads, meaning online ad complaints have overtaken TV for the first time.
So, does this mean advertising standards are falling? ASA’s Chief Executive, Guy Parker, said:
“One of our objectives is to raise awareness of the ASA system because we know that correlates to people having a bit more faith in advertising, so from a brand perspective it’s a good thing for the ASA to be more well-known. But of course one of the consequences is that it involves more people complaining.
So an increase in the number of complaints to the ASA is a function of our wider awareness, not worse standards. But all sorts of other things can have an impact on whether people complain, seemingly unrelated or only peripherally-related issues or events like Cambridge Analytica, concerns about privacy and so on.”
Google Bans Ads For Bail Bonds Services
Google announced this week via its Inside AdWords blog that it will soon be banning ads for bail bonds services.
In the statement, Google writes:
‘At Google, we take seriously our responsibility to help create and sustain an advertising ecosystem that works for everyone. Our ads are meant to connect users with relevant businesses, products and services, and we have strict policies to keep misleading or harmful ads off of our platforms—in fact, we removed 3.2 billion bad ads last year alone.
Today, we’re announcing a new policy to prohibit ads that promote bail bond services from our platforms. Studies show that for-profit bail bond providers make most of their revenue from communities of color and low income neighborhoods when they are at their most vulnerable, including through opaque financing offers that can keep people in debt for months or years.
We made this decision based on our commitment to protect our users from deceptive or harmful products […] Enforcement of this policy will begin in July 2018. This policy change is part of our ongoing efforts to protect users on our platforms.’
Apple Is Removing Apps That Share Location Data Without Consent
With GDPR just around the corner, it has been reported that Apple has begun removing apps from its store which violate its Terms of Service, in particular those that share locations data with third parties without the consent of the user.
App developers are reportedly being told ‘upon re-evaluation’ their apps do not meet standards and that they are in violation of privacy rules.
For more news updates, guides and opinion pieces, take a look at a few more of our articles.