TAHLEQUAH, Okla. – A free roadside safety kit is being offered under the auspices of AAA, but it’s actually a phishing scheme that not only levies a “shipping charge,” but uses bank card numbers for unrelated items.
The Tahlequah Daily Press followed the link provided in a press release received by newsroom staff, preparing to write an article on something that sounded like a good deal for drivers who are members of AAA.
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TAHLEQUAH, Okla. – A free roadside safety kit is being offered under the auspices of AAA, but it’s actually a phishing scheme that not only levies a “shipping charge,” but uses bank card numbers for unrelated items.
The Tahlequah Daily Press followed the link provided in a press release received by newsroom staff, preparing to write an article on something that sounded like a good deal for drivers who are members of AAA.
This page requires Javascript.
Javascript is required for you to be able to read premium content. Please enable it in your browser settings.
TAHLEQUAH, Okla. – A free roadside safety kit is being offered under the auspices of AAA, but it’s actually a phishing scheme that not only levies a “shipping charge,” but uses bank card numbers for unrelated items.
The Tahlequah Daily Press followed the link provided in a press release received by newsroom staff, preparing to write an article on something that sounded like a good deal for drivers who are members of AAA.
This page requires Javascript.
Javascript is required for you to be able to read premium content. Please enable it in your browser settings.
The European Commission has announced that it will fine Google €2.95 billion, or around $3.5 billion, for violating European Union antitrust laws and “distorting competition in the advertising technology industry.” The decision follows from earlier in 2025, where a US federal judge concluded that Google maintains a monopoly in online advertising technology.
Google displays ads in search results, but it also has a dominant position as a software provider for online advertisers and publishers looking to sell ad space and place ads. The Commission’s main issue is with the way Google’s ad buying tools (Google Ads and DV 360) interact with its ad exchange software (AdX) and ad publisher servers (DFP) in seemingly preferential ways. Google appears to favor its AdX ad exchange by “informing AdX in advance of the value of the best bid from competitors which it had to beat to win the auction,” according to the Commission. It also found that “Google Ads was avoiding competing ad exchanges and mainly placing bids on AdX,” maintaining the dominance of Google’s ad exchange even if an alternative is a better option for advertisers.
The Commission is giving Google 60 days to share how it plans to address those issues or face an “appropriate remedy” for violating antitrust law. That could just be the fine, but might also include a forced sale of some or all of Google’s adtech business.
Lee-Anne Mulholland, Google’s Global Head of Regulatory Affairs, shared that the company will appeal the decision in the following statement provided to Engadget:
“The European Commission’s decision about our ad tech services is wrong and we will appeal. It imposes an unjustified fine and requires changes that will hurt thousands of European businesses by making it harder for them to make money. There’s nothing anticompetitive in providing services for ad buyers and sellers, and there are more alternatives to our services than ever before.”
$3.5 billion is a staggering amount of money, but it’s not technically the most Google’s been charged for violating EU laws. In 2018, the company was for forcing mobile network operators to pre-install Google apps on phones. Though Google has been under an increasing amount of scrutiny in the last decade for its business practices, it so far hasn’t faced many structural remedies for what has been called anticompetitive behavior.
For example, a US court found Google was in 2024, but a judge that the company wouldn’t have to sell off Chrome or stop paying Apple to make Google the iPhone’s default search engine. EU regulators have historically been more persistent than their US counterparts, and the European Commission is for at least one other advertising-related issue, but it remains to be seen if there’s any punishment that will actually faze the company.
Google has been accused of bias in its search algorithms. Recently, CEO Sundar Pichai was called to Congress to address these allegations.
Conservatives, including former President Donald Trump, have claimed that Google and other tech platforms favor left-leaning views.
Trump tweeted in March 2019 that Google, Facebook, and Twitter support the Radical Left Democrats.
Other users have also reported potential biases impacting their websites.
Concerns include Google possibly penalizing their sites or favoring competitors with better user experience practices.
This raises the question: Is Google impartial in its algorithmic treatment of different viewpoints?
What Makes Google Biased?
Google’s operations cannot be considered entirely neutral due to the inherent value judgments they must make regarding search engine results pages (SERPs). One significant bias is against thin content and anything potentially harmful to users as per Gotch SEO.
Google prioritizes content that meets users’ needs effectively, and if a website fails in this aspect, its rankings will suffer. This bias is favorable as it promotes high-quality content that benefits users.
Another aspect of Google’s bias stems from its dual role as a search engine and an advertising platform. Google’s primary goal is to serve users to maintain its position as the leading search engine. However, it also seeks to monetize this user traffic through its advertising services. This duality results in a bias towards the interests of paid advertisers.
In early 2020, Google made a change to how paid search results were displayed. Paid search results were placed at the top of the SERPs, making them nearly indistinguishable from organic results. This change underscored the importance of businesses utilizing effective tools to navigate the evolving landscape of search engine results.
The new ‘Ad’ label introduced by Google closely resembled a favicon, making it harder for users to differentiate between paid and organic results. This modification faced significant backlash, and Google eventually reversed the change. However, the intent behind the adjustment highlighted Google’s tendency to prioritize paid advertisers’ interests over those of users and organic search results.
Aspect
Description
Content Bias
Prefers high-quality, user-friendly content over thin or harmful content.
Advertising Bias
Places interests of paid advertisers above organic search results.
Moreover, the necessity for Google to monetize its services is clear. The search engine’s strategy to accommodate paid advertisers indicates how businesses must adapt. Utilizing membership management software and other tools becomes crucial for businesses navigating these biases.
Strategic Steps to Navigate Google’s Bias
This Image Is Generated by Midjourney
Google’s preference for high-quality content that benefits users highlights the importance of focusing on valuable and relevant information. Here are some steps to effectively navigate this landscape:
Create User-Centric Content: Developing content that addresses user needs and questions can enhance visibility in search results. Emphasize authenticity and usefulness.
Engage in Ethical Link-Building: Establishing reputable and organic link-building efforts can significantly boost your content’s standing. Avoid engaging in black-hat SEO techniques that can harm your site’s reputation.
Adopt a Balanced Paid Advertising Strategy: While pursuing organic reach, remain aware of Google’s alignment with advertisers. Leverage paid advertising judiciously to complement your overall strategy.
Monitor Industry Actions and Legal Proceedings: Stay informed about ongoing legal issues involving Google, such as allegations of market consolidation. This awareness helps you understand potential shifts in the landscape.
Advocate for Search Neutrality: Encourage transparent practices by tech giants. Actively engaging in discussions about search neutrality can help maintain a fair online environment.
Analyze and Adapt to Algorithm Changes: Regularly review updates to Google’s algorithms and adjust your strategies accordingly. This proactive approach ensures ongoing alignment with search engine preferences.
4 Ways to Boost Page Ranking!
1. Review Your Page Performance
This Image Is Generated by Midjourney
To create a successful SEO strategy, it’s important to address existing issues or concerns first. Conducting a thorough page audit helps identify areas that need attention.
Domain: Ensure your domain is relevant to your products and services.
Page Factors: Assess critical elements such as page loading time, a significant factor in Google’s ranking criteria.
Content: Evaluate the length and accuracy of your content, both crucial for high rankings.
Analyzing these factors helps understand your current standing and guides the creation of an effective improvement plan.
Additionally, staying updated with SEO trends for 2024, such as the increased importance of AI-driven search algorithms, can provide a competitive edge.
2. Create Excellent Content
High-quality content significantly impacts Google search rankings and helps attract and convert leads.
Keywords: Choose relevant keywords that align with what your target audience typically searches for. Utilize SEO tools to find effective keywords with low competition.
Relevant Information: Ensure your content is accurate, timely, and provides valuable solutions without being forced or overly promotional.
Well-crafted content that meets these criteria can significantly boost your page ranking.
3. Improve User Experience
User experience is defined by how visitors perceive their interaction with your website. Several factors contribute to a positive user experience:
Page Loading Time: Optimize loading times by sizing images appropriately, reducing user frustration.
Navigation: Simplify navigation to make elements easily accessible, preventing visitors from leaving your site.
Mobile Responsiveness: Adapt your website for mobile devices, considering different screen sizes and layouts.
Enhancing these elements can keep visitors engaged and improve your rankings.
4. Continuously Update Content
In the fast-evolving digital world, regularly updating content ensures it stays accurate and relevant. This practice prevents the spread of outdated information and helps identify opportunities for improvement.
Keeping your content fresh and current can significantly enhance your website’s appeal and overall ranking. Regular updates also align with how search engines prefer frequently refreshed information.
4 Steps to Take Now that You Recognize Google’s Bias
1. Develop a Quality Content Strategy
This Image Is Generated by Midjourney
Google’s preference for high-quality, user-focused content means that developing a robust content strategy is essential. This includes:
Creating Relevant and Valuable Content: Focus on producing articles, blogs, and other materials that provide genuine value to the reader.
Enhancing User Experience: Ensure that your website is easy to navigate and user-friendly, as Google favors sites that offer a good user experience.
Building Links: Link building remains crucial. Quality backlinks from reputable sources can significantly enhance your site’s visibility in search results.
2. Promote Transparency in Advertising
Given Google’s bias towards its paid advertisers, it’s important to advocate for transparency in advertising practices. This involves:
Monitoring Legal Developments: Stay informed about ongoing legal proceedings, such as the lawsuit alleging Google’s collusion with Facebook to dominate the online advertising market.
Advocating for Fair Practices: Support initiatives that push for transparency and fairness in how ads are displayed and ranked on Google.
3. Stay Informed and Proactive
This Image Is Generated by Midjourney
Maintaining awareness of Google’s responses to public concerns and regulatory actions can help you stay ahead. Keep track of any changes in Google’s policies and practices related to their search algorithms and advertising.
Monitor Google’s Actions: By keeping an eye on Google and other major tech companies, you can better advocate for search neutrality.
Advocate for Change: Encourage efforts aimed at ensuring that search engines do not unfairly favor paid advertisers over organic, user-focused content.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can Search Results Be Manipulated on Google?
Search results on Google can potentially be influenced through various means. This includes search engine optimization (SEO) techniques where websites employ specific strategies to rank higher in search results. Additionally, there are concerns about the potential for bias in Google’s algorithms, which some argue may favor certain types of content over others.
What Measures Does Google Have to Ensure Truthfulness in Their Search Results?
Google uses a variety of methods to verify the accuracy of information presented in search results. This includes algorithm updates, fact-checking partnerships with reputable organizations, and continuous refinement of their ranking criteria to reduce the spread of misinformation.
Has Google Been Known to Provide Inaccurate Historical Data?
Instances of Google presenting incorrect historical information have been reported. These inaccuracies can stem from errors in the source data or limitations in Google’s algorithmic understanding.
Do Google’s Services Include Any Form of Espionage on Users?
There have been concerns about Google’s data collection practices and their implications for user privacy. Google collects vast amounts of user data to improve service personalization and ad targeting. While there is no definitive proof of espionage, these practices have sparked debates over privacy and surveillance.
Are There Ways to Detect Inaccuracies in Information Provided by Google?
Detecting inaccuracies in Google search results involves cross-referencing information with multiple reputable sources. Users are encouraged to read critically, verify facts against authoritative publications, and use fact-checking websites. Additionally, Google’s transparency report provides insights into how they handle requests for information removal, offering some level of oversight.
How Does Google Ensure the Reliability of The Information It Provides?
Google invests heavily in artificial intelligence and machine learning to enhance the reliability of search results. This includes updates to their core search algorithms and collaborations with industry experts to improve content quality. The goal is to prioritize high-quality, authoritative sources in search results, though this system is not foolproof and continues to evolve to better address misinformation.
Final Thoughts
Does Google Lie?
While Google does not actively manipulate its biases, these biases favor websites with high-quality content and strong user experience. The steps highlighted above, such as creating superior content and advocating for transparent advertising practices, are effective strategies for aligning with Google’s preferences.
These methods can lead to a better chance of your content being favored by Google’s algorithms, thereby improving your website’s visibility and reach.
Google has been accused of bias in its search algorithms. Recently, CEO Sundar Pichai was called to Congress to address these allegations.
Conservatives, including former President Donald Trump, have claimed that Google and other tech platforms favor left-leaning views.
Trump tweeted in March 2019 that Google, Facebook, and Twitter support the Radical Left Democrats.
Other users have also reported potential biases impacting their websites.
Concerns include Google possibly penalizing their sites or favoring competitors with better user experience practices.
This raises the question: Is Google impartial in its algorithmic treatment of different viewpoints?
What Makes Google Biased?
Google’s operations cannot be considered entirely neutral due to the inherent value judgments they must make regarding search engine results pages (SERPs). One significant bias is against thin content and anything potentially harmful to users as per Gotch SEO.
Google prioritizes content that meets users’ needs effectively, and if a website fails in this aspect, its rankings will suffer. This bias is favorable as it promotes high-quality content that benefits users.
Another aspect of Google’s bias stems from its dual role as a search engine and an advertising platform. Google’s primary goal is to serve users to maintain its position as the leading search engine. However, it also seeks to monetize this user traffic through its advertising services. This duality results in a bias towards the interests of paid advertisers.
In early 2020, Google made a change to how paid search results were displayed. Paid search results were placed at the top of the SERPs, making them nearly indistinguishable from organic results. This change underscored the importance of businesses utilizing effective tools to navigate the evolving landscape of search engine results.
The new ‘Ad’ label introduced by Google closely resembled a favicon, making it harder for users to differentiate between paid and organic results. This modification faced significant backlash, and Google eventually reversed the change. However, the intent behind the adjustment highlighted Google’s tendency to prioritize paid advertisers’ interests over those of users and organic search results.
Aspect
Description
Content Bias
Prefers high-quality, user-friendly content over thin or harmful content.
Advertising Bias
Places interests of paid advertisers above organic search results.
Moreover, the necessity for Google to monetize its services is clear. The search engine’s strategy to accommodate paid advertisers indicates how businesses must adapt. Utilizing membership management software and other tools becomes crucial for businesses navigating these biases.
Strategic Steps to Navigate Google’s Bias
This Image Is Generated by Midjourney
Google’s preference for high-quality content that benefits users highlights the importance of focusing on valuable and relevant information. Here are some steps to effectively navigate this landscape:
Create User-Centric Content: Developing content that addresses user needs and questions can enhance visibility in search results. Emphasize authenticity and usefulness.
Engage in Ethical Link-Building: Establishing reputable and organic link-building efforts can significantly boost your content’s standing. Avoid engaging in black-hat SEO techniques that can harm your site’s reputation.
Adopt a Balanced Paid Advertising Strategy: While pursuing organic reach, remain aware of Google’s alignment with advertisers. Leverage paid advertising judiciously to complement your overall strategy.
Monitor Industry Actions and Legal Proceedings: Stay informed about ongoing legal issues involving Google, such as allegations of market consolidation. This awareness helps you understand potential shifts in the landscape.
Advocate for Search Neutrality: Encourage transparent practices by tech giants. Actively engaging in discussions about search neutrality can help maintain a fair online environment.
Analyze and Adapt to Algorithm Changes: Regularly review updates to Google’s algorithms and adjust your strategies accordingly. This proactive approach ensures ongoing alignment with search engine preferences.
4 Ways to Boost Page Ranking!
1. Review Your Page Performance
This Image Is Generated by Midjourney
To create a successful SEO strategy, it’s important to address existing issues or concerns first. Conducting a thorough page audit helps identify areas that need attention.
Domain: Ensure your domain is relevant to your products and services.
Page Factors: Assess critical elements such as page loading time, a significant factor in Google’s ranking criteria.
Content: Evaluate the length and accuracy of your content, both crucial for high rankings.
Analyzing these factors helps understand your current standing and guides the creation of an effective improvement plan.
Additionally, staying updated with SEO trends for 2024, such as the increased importance of AI-driven search algorithms, can provide a competitive edge.
2. Create Excellent Content
High-quality content significantly impacts Google search rankings and helps attract and convert leads.
Keywords: Choose relevant keywords that align with what your target audience typically searches for. Utilize SEO tools to find effective keywords with low competition.
Relevant Information: Ensure your content is accurate, timely, and provides valuable solutions without being forced or overly promotional.
Well-crafted content that meets these criteria can significantly boost your page ranking.
3. Improve User Experience
User experience is defined by how visitors perceive their interaction with your website. Several factors contribute to a positive user experience:
Page Loading Time: Optimize loading times by sizing images appropriately, reducing user frustration.
Navigation: Simplify navigation to make elements easily accessible, preventing visitors from leaving your site.
Mobile Responsiveness: Adapt your website for mobile devices, considering different screen sizes and layouts.
Enhancing these elements can keep visitors engaged and improve your rankings.
4. Continuously Update Content
In the fast-evolving digital world, regularly updating content ensures it stays accurate and relevant. This practice prevents the spread of outdated information and helps identify opportunities for improvement.
Keeping your content fresh and current can significantly enhance your website’s appeal and overall ranking. Regular updates also align with how search engines prefer frequently refreshed information.
4 Steps to Take Now that You Recognize Google’s Bias
1. Develop a Quality Content Strategy
This Image Is Generated by Midjourney
Google’s preference for high-quality, user-focused content means that developing a robust content strategy is essential. This includes:
Creating Relevant and Valuable Content: Focus on producing articles, blogs, and other materials that provide genuine value to the reader.
Enhancing User Experience: Ensure that your website is easy to navigate and user-friendly, as Google favors sites that offer a good user experience.
Building Links: Link building remains crucial. Quality backlinks from reputable sources can significantly enhance your site’s visibility in search results.
2. Promote Transparency in Advertising
Given Google’s bias towards its paid advertisers, it’s important to advocate for transparency in advertising practices. This involves:
Monitoring Legal Developments: Stay informed about ongoing legal proceedings, such as the lawsuit alleging Google’s collusion with Facebook to dominate the online advertising market.
Advocating for Fair Practices: Support initiatives that push for transparency and fairness in how ads are displayed and ranked on Google.
3. Stay Informed and Proactive
This Image Is Generated by Midjourney
Maintaining awareness of Google’s responses to public concerns and regulatory actions can help you stay ahead. Keep track of any changes in Google’s policies and practices related to their search algorithms and advertising.
Monitor Google’s Actions: By keeping an eye on Google and other major tech companies, you can better advocate for search neutrality.
Advocate for Change: Encourage efforts aimed at ensuring that search engines do not unfairly favor paid advertisers over organic, user-focused content.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can Search Results Be Manipulated on Google?
Search results on Google can potentially be influenced through various means. This includes search engine optimization (SEO) techniques where websites employ specific strategies to rank higher in search results. Additionally, there are concerns about the potential for bias in Google’s algorithms, which some argue may favor certain types of content over others.
What Measures Does Google Have to Ensure Truthfulness in Their Search Results?
Google uses a variety of methods to verify the accuracy of information presented in search results. This includes algorithm updates, fact-checking partnerships with reputable organizations, and continuous refinement of their ranking criteria to reduce the spread of misinformation.
Has Google Been Known to Provide Inaccurate Historical Data?
Instances of Google presenting incorrect historical information have been reported. These inaccuracies can stem from errors in the source data or limitations in Google’s algorithmic understanding.
Do Google’s Services Include Any Form of Espionage on Users?
There have been concerns about Google’s data collection practices and their implications for user privacy. Google collects vast amounts of user data to improve service personalization and ad targeting. While there is no definitive proof of espionage, these practices have sparked debates over privacy and surveillance.
Are There Ways to Detect Inaccuracies in Information Provided by Google?
Detecting inaccuracies in Google search results involves cross-referencing information with multiple reputable sources. Users are encouraged to read critically, verify facts against authoritative publications, and use fact-checking websites. Additionally, Google’s transparency report provides insights into how they handle requests for information removal, offering some level of oversight.
How Does Google Ensure the Reliability of The Information It Provides?
Google invests heavily in artificial intelligence and machine learning to enhance the reliability of search results. This includes updates to their core search algorithms and collaborations with industry experts to improve content quality. The goal is to prioritize high-quality, authoritative sources in search results, though this system is not foolproof and continues to evolve to better address misinformation.
Final Thoughts
Does Google Lie?
While Google does not actively manipulate its biases, these biases favor websites with high-quality content and strong user experience. The steps highlighted above, such as creating superior content and advocating for transparent advertising practices, are effective strategies for aligning with Google’s preferences.
These methods can lead to a better chance of your content being favored by Google’s algorithms, thereby improving your website’s visibility and reach.
Big Tech companies are coming out of the woodwork to challenge the European Commission’s new enforcement regime for digital competition with TikTok and Meta Platforms filing legal appeals this week.
Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, ByteDance, Meta and Microsoft are all considered “gatekeeper” companies under the Digital Markets Act (DMA), the European Union’s new digital rulebook, for 22 core online services they run — everything from app stores and social networks to messaging services and online marketplaces.
Meta on Wednesday was the first to say it had filed a legal challenge to the EU’s revamped enforcement regime before the European Union’s General Court, disputing EU officials’ decision to bring its Marketplace and Messenger services in scope of the new digital competition rulebook.
TikTok’s owner ByteDance on Thursday argued its video-sharing platform was wrongly labeled as a social network under the new law. The firm also took issue with being targeted as a digital giant when it sees itself as a challenger to the other “gatekeeper” companies that have a vast ecosystem of digital services.
The six targeted firms had until November 16 to file their legal paperwork. Some already indicated that they aren’t happy with the new labels the Commission has given them, according to filings published online in recent weeks.
Already some companies are making changes to how they run their businesses in Europe. Facebook and Instagram will offer paid ad-free subscriptions in the EU. Google has been opening up data sharing as part of German and Italian antitrust cases.
Their other option is to convince European Union judges to overturn the Commission’s decisions.
But we don’t understand!
Companies designated as gatekeepers can ask the EU’s General Court to cancel individual decisions. That’s precisely what Meta and TikTok did in their filings Wednesday.
Alfonso Lamadrid, a partner at law firm Garrigues, said they could claim that they don’t understand why certain services were caught by the law and that EU officials failed to give “sufficient reasoning.”
They could also file appeals — either now or later — on the Commission’s probes to determine whether Apple’s iMessage, along with Microsoft’s Bing search engine, its Edge web browser and its advertising service, should be considered core platform services. There’s a February 6 deadline to wrap those up. Another probe into Apple’s iPadOS has until September 6 next year.
Lamadrid — who has worked with Google on antitrust challenges including the tech giant’s recent court appeal against an antitrust fine for its shopping service — said he doesn’t think Big Tech firms “will be taking the decision to appeal very lightly.”
Who might grumble?
Meta and TikTok aren’t the only gatekeepers unhappy with the Commission’s decisions so far.
Meta isn’t the only gatekeeper unhappy with the Commission’s decisions so far | Drew Angerer/Getty Images
Apple previously argued with the Commission that its services shouldn’t be subject to the new rules, according to the Commission documents.
Apple tried unsuccessfully to convince officials that its App Store comes in five separate versions for different devices and that its Safari browser in three, which would reduce the number of active users for each service. Apple didn’t respond to a request for comment.
ByteDance told the Commission earlier that its viral video app is “about content discovery, not about establishing or maintaining real-world connections,” according to an EU decision published last month.
Telecoms companies are also unhappy. They told the Commission it should designate Apple’s iMessage as a core platform service that needs to follow DMA curbs, according to a letter to Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton seen by POLITICO.
What are the others saying?
Microsoft is classified as a gatekeeper for its social network LinkedIn and Windows PC operating service. Microsoft spokesperson Robin Koch said in September that the tech giant “accepts our designation as a gatekeeper under the Digital Markets Act and will continue to work with the European Commission” to meet its obligations.
Alphabet — which has eight core platform services targeted under the DMA, including Google Search and web browser Chrome — said in September it will “work closely with the European Commission and other stakeholders” and would “make changes that meet the new requirements while protecting the user experience.”
Alphabet — which has eight core platform services targeted under the DMA, including Google Search and web browser Chrome — said in September it will “work closely with the European Commission and other stakeholders” and would “make changes that meet the new requirements while protecting the user experience.” | Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
Amazon’s marketplace and advertising businesses were both labeled as core platform services under the DMA in September. The company said at the time it is “committed to delivering services that meet our customers’ requirements within Europe’s evolving regulatory landscape” and would “work constructively with the European Commission as we finalize our implementation plans.”
Amazon earlier this year did challenge another digital label in the EU, asking a court to cancel the Commission’s declaration that it was a Very Large Online Platform.
But with just four months to go now until the rules are enforceable, any challenge could just poke the bureaucratic bear.
“This is now an important moment in time for compliance,” Lamadrid said, “so it’s not ideal to have pending court proceedings while you’re trying to negotiate with the Commission on compliance… I don’t think it’s in the company’s best interest to antagonize the Commission.”
This article was updated on November 16 to include recent developments.
BRUSSELS — A photo with a bloody dead baby whose face is blurred has been circulating on X for the last four days.
“This is the most difficult image we’ve ever posted. As we are writing this we are shaking,” the accompanying message says.
The footage is not from a reporter covering the conflict in Israel and Gaza, or from one of the countless accounts sharing horrifying videos of the atrocities.
It’s a paid message from the Israeli Foreign Affairs Ministry.
Since Hamas attacked thousands of its citizens last week, the Israeli government has started a sweeping social media campaign in key Western countries to drum up support for its military response against the group. Part of its strategy: pushing dozens of ads containing brutal and emotional imagery of the deadly militant violence in Israel across platforms such as X and YouTube, according to data reviewed by POLITICO.
Israel’s attempt to win the online information war is part of a growing trend of governments around the world moving aggressively online in order to shape their image, especially during times of crisis. PR campaigns in and around wars are nothing new. But paying for online advertising targeted at specific countries and demographics is now one of governments’ main tools to get their messages in front of more eyeballs.
The Israeli government’s efforts come as Hamas has pumped out its own propaganda on platforms including Telegram and X. The group — which is designated as a terrorist organization by the European Union, United States and United Kingdom — on Monday published online a first hostage video of a young French-Israeli woman.
The social media campaigns began shortly after Hamas militants killed more than 1,200 and abducted nearly 200 people in a surprise assault. Israel’s military responded with retaliatory strikes and a siege of the Gaza Strip, killing more than 2,330 Palestinians to date.
More than 2 million Palestinians trapped in Gaza have been subjected to worsening conditions ahead of an expected upcoming offensive, and Western leaders are increasingly calling on the Israeli government to exercise restraint and respect humanitarian law.
A barrage of ads
In a little over a week, Israel’s Foreign Affairs Ministry has run 30 ads that have been seen over 4 million times on X, according to the platform’s data. The paid videos and photos that started appearing on October 12 were aimed at adults over 25 in Brussels, Paris, Munich and The Hague, according to the same data.
The ads portrayed Hamas as a “vicious terrorist group,” similar to the Islamic State, and showed the scale and types of the abuse, including gruesome images like that of a lifeless, naked woman in a pickup truck.Another paid video posted to X, with text alternating between “ISIS” and “Hamas,” has disturbing imagery that gradually speeds up until the names of the two terrorist organizations blend into one.
“The world defeated ISIS. The world will defeat Hamas,” the ad ends.
A cyclist rides past kidnap and disappearance posters, showing recently kidnapped or missing Israelis, following the Hamas attacks on Israel, in central Paris on October 17, 2023 | Kiran Ridley/AFP via Getty Images
Over on YouTube, the Israeli Foreign Affairs Ministry has released over 75 different ads, including some that are particularly graphic. They have been directed at viewers in Western countries — including France, Germany, the U.S. and the U.K. — and have aired between the initial Hamas attack on October 7 and Monday, according to Google’s transparency database.
“We would never post such graphic things before,” said a spokesperson for Israel’s Mission to the EU, who was granted anonymity because of security concerns to speak candidly. “This is something that is not part of our culture. We have a lot of respect [for] the deceased,” they said, adding that “war is not only on the ground.”
In one ad, titled “Babies Can’t Read The Text in This Video But Their Parents Can,” a lullaby plays against a backdrop of a rainbow and a unicorn flies across the screen. The ad says, “We know that your child cannot read this,” but pleads with parents to sympathize with those whose children were killed during the attack on Israel.
Another ad notes that “Israel will take every measure necessary to protect our citizens against these barbaric terrorists.” Yet another shows images of bloodied hostages with their faces blurred.
Israel has largely targeted Europe with its narrative to win over support. Nearly 50 video ads in English were directed to EU countries, while viewers in the U.S. and the U.K. were pushed 10 and 13 ads, respectively. One of the videos had been seen over 3 million times as of Tuesday afternoon European time.
Platforms’ ongoing content challenge
The ad campaign has posed some challenges to social media companies, which have set standards for what type of content can be posted on their streams.
Google, for example, removed about 30 ads containing violent images from its public library after POLITICO reached out for a comment on Monday — meaning there is no public record that such ads ran for several days on YouTube. The company said it didn’t allow ads containing violent language, gruesome or disgusting imagery, or graphic images or accounts of physical trauma. (Some of the graphic videos are still available on the Israeli Foreign Affairs Ministry’s YouTube channel with some warnings.)
X did not respond to a request for comment. The tech company is currently being investigated by the European Commission over whether its handling of illegal content and disinformation connected to the Hamas attack has respected the EU’s content-moderation law, the Digital Services Act (DSA).
Under the DSA, companies have to swiftly remove illegal content, including terrorist propaganda, and limit the spread of falsehoods — or else face sweeping fines of up to 6 percent of their global annual revenue.
No similar ads were running on Meta’s Instagram and Facebook, LinkedIn and TikTok, according to the platforms’ public ad libraries as of Monday.
Some of the ads online have been met with some pushback by viewers who have sought ways to stop being targeted by the foreign ministry. But experts in the field say that this is simply the new reality of PR campaigns built around wars.
“This tactic is almost as old as war … Stirring moral outrage to build support for war is a very old practice,” said Emerson Brooking, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council. “But I do not think it has collided with social media in quite this way before.”
The EU reminded Google’s CEO Sundar Pichai last week to be “very vigilant” to ensure that YouTube respects the DSA | AFP via Getty Images
Still, amid an onslaught of disinformation and illegal content connected to the attacks, Israel’s online push may prove more complicated. The European commissioner in charge of enforcing the DSA, Thierry Breton, has warned some online platforms to step up their efforts to protect young viewers from harmful content. The EU also reminded Google’s CEO Sundar Pichai last week to be “very vigilant” to ensure that YouTube respects the DSA.
As Israel amps up its war online, its army’s retaliatory airstrikes have damaged Gaza’s telecommunications infrastructure, leaving millions on the verge of a total network blackout.
“It is difficult to imagine a robust counter-messaging effort by pro-Palestinian groups which could make use of the same advertising medium,” Brooking said. “It’s one part of the social media battlefield in which Israel has a real advantage.”
Hailey Fuchs contributed reporting from Washington. Liv Martin and Clothilde Goujard contributed reporting from Brussels.
Elon Musk has made himself Europe’s digital public enemy No. 1.
Since Hamas attacked Israel on Saturday, the billionaire’s social network X has been flooded with gruesome images, politically-motivated lies and terrorist propaganda that authorities say appear to violate both its own policies and the European Union’s new social media law.
Now Musk is facing the threat of sanctions — including potentially hefty fines — as officials in Brussels start gathering evidence in preparation for a formal investigation into whether X has broken the European Union’s rules. Authorities in the U.K. and Germany have joined the criticism.
The tussle represents a critical test for all sides. Musk will be keen to fight any claim that he’s failing to be a responsible owner of the social network formerly known as Twitter — all while upholding his commitment to free speech. The EU will want to show its new regulation, known as the Digital Services Act (DSA), has teeth.
Thierry Breton, Europe’s commissioner in charge of social media content rules, demanded that Musk explain why graphic images and disinformation about the Middle East crisis were widespread on X.
“I urge you to ensure a prompt, accurate and complete response to this request within the next 24 hours,” Breton wrote on X late Tuesday.
“We will include your answer in our assessment file on your compliance with the DSA,” said Breton, who also wrote to Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg to remind him of his obligations under Europe’s rules. TikTok’s head Shou Zi Chew was also asked on October 12 to explain how his platform was dealing with misinformation and graphic content.
“I remind you that following the opening of a potential investigation and a finding of non-compliance, penalties can be imposed,” Breton said. Those fines can total up to 6 percent of a company’s global revenue.
In response, Linda Yaccarino, X’s chief executive, wrote to Breton Thursday to outline how the social media giant had responded to the ongoing Middle East conflict. That included removing or labelling potentially harmful content, working with law enforcement agencies and adding so-called “community notes,” or crowd-sourced fact-checks, to posts.
The heat on Twitter did not begin with the Hamas attacks. Ever since Musk bought the platform, he’s been hit by criticism that he’s failing to stop hate speech from spreading online.
X has cut back on its content moderation teams, in the spirit of promoting free speech; pulled out of a Brussels-backed pledge to tackle digital foreign interference; and tweaked its social media algorithms to promote often shady content over verified material from news organizations and politicians.
Musk has responded — via his social media account with 159 million followers — with jeers and attacks on his naysayers. But the latest uproar over content apparently inciting and praising terrorism has made it a surefire bet that X will be one of the first companies to be investigated under the EU’s social media rules.
In response to Breton’s demand, Musk asked the French commissioner to outline how X had potentially violated Europe’s content regulations. “Our policy is that everything is open source and transparent,” he added. In the U.K., Michelle Donelan, the country’s digital minister, also met with social media executives Wednesday to discuss how their firms were combatting online hate speech.
The probe is coming
In truth, an investigation into X’s compliance with Europe’s new content rulebook has been on the cards for months. Over the summer, Breton and senior EU officials visited the company’s headquarters in San Francisco for a so-called “stress test” to see how it was complying.
Under the EU’s legislation, tech giants like X, TikTok and Facebook must carry out lengthy risk assessments to figure out how hate speech and other illegal content can spread on their platforms. These firms must also allow greater access to external auditors, regulators and civil society groups that will track how social media companies are complying with the new oversight.
Investigations into potential wrongdoing under Europe’s content rules will likely involve months-long inquiries into a company’s behavior, the Commission taking a legal decision on whether to levy fines or other sanctions, and a likely appeal from the firm in response. Such cases are expected to take years to complete.
Within Brussels, the Commission has been compiling evidence of potential wrongdoing across multiple social media companies, even before the EU’s new content legislation came into full force in August, according to five officials and other individuals with direct knowledge of the matter.
The goal is to start at least three investigations linked to the Digital Services Act by early next year, according to three of those people. They spoke on condition of anonymity because the discussions are not public and remain ongoing.
In recent days, Commission officials have been compiling evidence associated with Hamas’ attacks on Israel — much of which has been shared on X with little, if any, pushback from the company.
That content included verified X accounts with ties to Russia and Iran reposting graphic footage of alleged atrocities targeting Israeli soldiers. Some of these posts have been viewed hundreds of thousands of times. Other accounts linked to Hezbollah and ISIS have similarly posted widely with few, if any, removals.
It is unclear whether such footage will lead to a specific investigation into X’s handling of the most recent violent content. But it has reaffirmed the likelihood Musk will soon face legal consequences for not removing such material from his social network.
Combating violent and terrorist content requires “people sitting at a computer screen and looking at this and making judgments,” said Graham Brookie, senior director of the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab, which has tracked the online footprint of Hamas’ ongoing attacks. “It used to be that there were dozens of people that do that at Twitter, and now there’s only a handful.”
Steven Overly contributed reporting from Washington. This article has been updated.
While there will be necessary adjustments along the way, the removal of a cookie-driven marketing economy should be a major upgrade for marketers and customers. Here are a few ways that the absence of cookies will make digital advertising better.
1. Cookieless advertising will create a better customer experience
Advertising with cookies is a data-driven affair. This often makes interactions cold and calculated. It can also make them misleading.
In 2022, Search Engine Land was already trumpeting the end of the third-party cookie as a net positive.
“Third-party cookies are predisposed to inflation and double-counting when it comes to conversions,” the publication explains, “And conversions, whether tied to an online purchase or a form submission, are what most businesses truly value.”
Rather than focus on the customer, third-party cookies focus on results — and often, those results are miscalculated and inflated by competing marketing tools. By removing the third-party cookie factor, companies can refocus on what matters most: their customers. A more customer-centric marketing model looks past the algorithms and calculations and attempts to infuse every business activity with a customer-first mindset.
A cookieless future is an opportunity for innovation and creativity. Native advertising platform Nativo utilizes a solution that leans into a new version of contextual targeting that prioritizes customer personalization. This solution uses AI to analyze and predict customer behavior, rather than third-party cookies. If companies rely more on AI for predictive analytics, they can protect the privacy of their customers while still collecting helpful data that can help them convert.
The lesson? Refocusing on the current customer experience rather than third-party data is a good thing.
2. Companies will need to be more intentional with data
In the past, companies have been able to lean on the customer information gleaned by third parties to target their advertisements. This is effective to a degree, but it has also created a relationship gap between companies and their clientele.
Now, brands will need to take a more thoughtful and personalized approach to their data collection and use. Remember, the end of the third-party cookie isn’t technically the end of the cookie concept.
Companies can still collect first-party cookies. Treasure Data refers to these as “data you collect directly from interactions with your customers and audiences on your own channels.” The customer data management platform adds that this can include demographics, website activity, email engagement, purchase history and even customer feedback, interests and other behaviors.
While brands will still be able to collect first-party data, they won’t be able to use it in traditional third-party data methods. Instead, they’ll need to invest in purposeful data management. This will require specific marketing end-goals to make it worthwhile, such as asking for feedback to improve a product or plan a future marketing campaign.
Brands will also need to stay up to date with the latest consumer data privacy laws. As of mid-2023, nine U.S. states had comprehensive data privacy laws in place, and many others had bills in the works. This combination of purpose and security will create much more intentional data use in the future — and that’s absolutely an upgrade from the current third-party cookie marketing environment.
3. Phasing out third-party cookies will cultivate better customer relationships, too
The removal of third-party cookies will allow brands to refocus on customers, but the impact will go past better awareness and revenue growth. It will also restore a sense of relationship. This, combined with first-party data, will make it easier to personalize and deepen customer connections.
Writing in January 2020, Michael Schoen, the GM and VP of Marketing Solutions at Neustar, said, “A cookieless world is beneficial because it leads to an identity-centric approach, which we have seen to be a more effective approach to marketing.” The executive added, “When you stop focusing on the cookie and instead focus on the consumer’s overall journey, you have more insight and control when it comes to your impact on both.”
The departure from cookies will allow companies to refocus on their customers, not just in specific interactions, but over the long term. They will see them as individuals with thoughts, proclivities and needs rather than reducing them to condensed data points.
From better customer experience to deeper client relationships to safer, more intentional data usage, the death of third-party cookies is likely to have a positive ripple effect that will elevate 21st-century marketing as we know it. The only thing now is to wait until Google starts phasing third-party cookies out next year — then the marketing fun can begin in earnest.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
If you’re a marketer, advertiser or any other related position, pop-ups are one of the many tools at your disposal. They can be very effective at generating conversions and leads by prompting users to take action like signing up for a newsletter or using a coupon code to make a purchase.
Today, websites can have many different types of pop-ups and banners, from cookie notifications to first-time visitor pop-ups to exit intent pop-ups. Despite their value for lead generation, pop-ups can be problematic from a user experience perspective, and using pop-ups incorrectly can actually drive users away. How you execute these pop-ups can mean the difference between users converting or quitting the site entirely. The challenge is to find the right balance to achieve your goals without annoying your users.
Knowing what kind of pop-ups to use, as well as how to use them effectively, will keep your users happy. Here are a few things to know about strong pop-ups, as well as some options you can consider when working on your next pop-up strategy.
When done correctly, pop-ups are powerful converters. Data from one million live Duda sites shows that, on average, sites that used pop-ups saw a conversion rate four times higher than sites that didn’t use them. Sites without pop-ups saw a 3.7% conversion rate, whereas sites with pop-ups had a 16% conversion rate.
Knowing what type of pop-up you need will also keep users satisfied. There are pop-ups for marketing purposes, and then there are pop-ups for compliance needs. For marketing, 8.4% of our live sites leverage pop-ups for marketing offers or to deliver timely information. These pop-ups drive top-level conversion growth, and they typically offer a discount or encourage users to fill out a form.
There are also required pop-ups, such as cookie policies for GDPR compliance. Duda data shows that out of one million live sites, 25% use GDPR-related pop-ups.
Keep user goals in mind
To create an effective pop-up strategy, you need to ask yourself a few questions. What are your goals, and what kinds of pop-ups accomplish those goals? Additionally, what problems can your pop-ups solve for your users?
The most effective pop-ups are those that keep the user’s needs at the forefront and deliver value that is worth their while. To accomplish this, you need to first understand what your users are looking for and then serve them a pop-up that delivers a clear and compelling solution to that need. We consistently see websites that leverage pop-ups get higher conversion rates, sometimes 3-5 times higher, when using a pop-up instead of other methods, like banners, on a web page.
Be considerate of timing
No one wants to be approached the second they walk into a shop before they’ve had the chance to even look around. The same is true for your pop-ups. Not only are immediate pop-ups bad for your Google search rankings, but they’re also the type of pop-ups users are likely to find the most aggravating. A better practice would be to time pop-ups either as a user is leaving or time it so they’ll close automatically after a few seconds.
It may go without saying, but you should make sure your pop-ups are accessible and easy to read. Do they have a strong visual focus? If they take up a portion of the page, is it visually distinct from the rest of the page? Do they have clear CTAs? Is it obvious what the user is being asked to do?
Common accessibility issues include tab loops, missing labels, tab focus and keyboard support. According to Duda’s data, these issues represented 8-10% of the total issues detected during typical audits. Clearing up these issues will go a long way toward making your pop-ups more successful. Additionally, any third-party content that appears within an inline frame as part of the pop-up could introduce inaccessible content that would be difficult to correct.
Despite their negative connotations at times, pop-ups are very effective at driving top-level conversions and generating leads. If you’re a marketer or agency professional, they’re an important part of your strategy. But there is a right way to do them that doesn’t wear out your user’s trackpad trying to find the “X.”
For the better part of 15 years, Google has seemed like an unstoppable force, powered by the strength of its online search engine and digital advertising business. But both now look increasingly vulnerable.
This week, the Justice Department accused Google of running an illegal monopoly in its online advertising business and called for parts of it to be broken up. The case comes a couple of years after the Trump administration filed a similar suit going after the tech giant’s dominance in search.
Google said the Justice Department is “doubling down on a flawed argument” and that the latest suit “attempts to pick winners and losers in the highly competitive advertising technology sector.” If successful, however, both blockbuster cases could upend a business model that’s made Google the most powerful advertising company on the internet. It would be the most consequential antitrust victory against a tech giant since the US government took on Microsoft more than 20 years ago.
But even though the lawsuits drive at the heart of Google’s revenue machine, they could take years to play out. In the meantime, two other thorny issues are poised to determine Google’s future on a potentially shorter timeframe: The rise of generative artificial intelligence and what appears to be an accelerating decline in Google’s online ad marketshare.
Just days before the DOJ suit, Google announced plans to cut 12,000 employees amid a dramatic slowdown in its revenue growth, and as it works to refocus its efforts partly around AI.
Google has long been synonymous with online searches; it was one of the first modern tech companies whose name would become a verb. But a new threat emerged late last year when OpenAI, an artificial intelligence research company, publicly released a viral new AI chatbot tool called ChatGPT.
Users of ChatGPT have showcased the bot’s ability to create poetry, draft legal documents, write code and explain complex ideas, with little more than a simple prompt. Trained on a vast amount of online data, ChatGPT can generate lengthy responses to open-ended questions, though it’s prone to some errors, or answer simple questions – “Who was the 25th president of the United States?” – which one might have previously had to scroll through search results on Google to find.
ChatGPT is trained on vast amounts of data and uses this to generate responses to user prompts. While ChatGPT’s underlying technology has existed for some time, the fact that anyone can create an account and experiment with the tool has led to loads of hype for generative AI and made the technology’s potential instantly understandable to millions in a way that was only abstract before. It has also reportedly prompted Google’s management to declare a “code red” situation for its search business.
“Google may be only a year or two away from total disruption. AI will eliminate the Search Engine Result Page, which is where they make most of their money,” Paul Buchheit, one of the creators of Gmail, tweeted last year. “Even if they catch up on AI, they can’t fully deploy it without destroying the most valuable part of their business!”
If more users begin to rely on AI for their information needs, the argument goes, it could undercut Google’s search advertising, which is part of a $149 billion business segment at the company. Media coverage of ChatGPT has doubled down on this notion, with some outlets pitting ChatGPT against Google in head-to-head tests.
There are some reasons to doubt this nightmare scenario might play out for Google.
For one thing, Google operates at a vastly different scale. In November, Google’s website received more than 86 billion visits, compared to less than 300 million for ChatGPT, according to the traffic analysis website SimilarWeb. (ChatGPT was released publicly in late November.) For another, even in a world where Google provides specific, AI-generated responses to user queries, it could still analyze the queries to provide search advertising, just as it does today.
Google has its own investments in highly sophisticated artificial intelligence. One of its AI-driven chat programs, LaMDA, even became a flashpoint last year after an engineer at the company claimed it had achieved sentience. (Google has disputed the claim and fired the engineer for breaches of company policy.)
Google CEO Sundar Pichai has reportedly told employees that even though Google has similar capabilities to ChatGPT, the company has yet to commit to giving out AI-generated search responses because of the risk of providing inaccurate information, which could be detrimental to Google in the long run.
Google’s stance highlights both its incredible influence, as the most trusted search engine on earth, and one of the core problems of generative AI: Due to the technology’s black-box design, it’s virtually impossible to find out how the technology arrived at a specific result. For many people, and for many years to come, being able to evaluate different sources of information for themselves may trump the convenience of receiving a single answer.
All this has taken place against the backdrop of what seems to be an extended, multi-year decline in Google’s online advertising marketshare. Google’s position in digital advertising peaked in 2017 with 34.7% of the US market, according to third-party industry estimates, and is on pace to account for 28.8% this year.
Google isn’t the only advertising giant to experience this trend. One-off factors like the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, as well as fears of a looming recession, have broadly affected the online advertising industry. Others, like Facebook-parent Meta, have been particularly susceptible to systemic changes such as Apple’s app privacy updates restricting the amount of information marketers can access about iOS users.
But the decline also comes as Google faces new competition in the market. Rivals including Amazon, TikTok and even Apple have been attracting an increasing share of the digital advertising pie.
Whatever the cause, Google’s advertising business, which is still massive, seems to face growing headwinds. And those headwinds could be exacerbated if some of the predictions about generative AI come to pass, or if the Justice Department’s lawsuits ultimately weaken Google’s grip on digital advertising.
As part of the case, the US government has asked a federal court to unwind two acquisitions that allegedly helped cement a Google monopoly in advertising. Dismantling Google’s tightly integrated ads machine will restore competition and make it harder for Google to extract monopoly profits, according to the US government.
This and other antitrust suits — though threatening in their own right — simply add pressure to the broader dilemma facing Google as it stares down a new era of potentially tumultuous technological change.
The Justice Department and eight states sued Google on Tuesday, accusing the company of harming competition with its dominance in the online advertising market and calling for it to be broken up.
The move marks the Biden administration’s first blockbuster antitrust case against a Big Tech company. The eight states joining the suit include California, Colorado, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Tennessee and Virginia.
The fresh complaint significantly escalates the risks to Google emanating from Washington, where lawmakers and regulators have frequently raised concerns about the tech giant’s power but have so far failed to pass new legislation or regulations that might rein in the company or its peers.
For years, Google’s critics have claimed that the company’s extensive role in the ecosystem that enables advertisers to place ads, and for publishers to offer up digital ad space, represents a conflict of interest that Google has exploited anticompetitively.
In Tuesday’s complaint, a copy of which was viewed by CNN, the Justice Department alleged that Google actively and illegally maintained that dominance by engaging in a campaign to thwart competition. Google gobbled up rivals through anticompetitive mergers, the US government said, and bullied publishers and advertisers into using the company’s proprietary ad technology products.
As part of the lawsuit, the US government called for Google to be broken up and for the court to order the company to spin off at least its online advertising exchange and its ad server for publishers, if not more.
Google, the US government alleged, “has corrupted legitimate competition in the ad tech industry by engaging in a systematic campaign to seize control of the wide swath of high-tech tools used by publishers, advertisers, and brokers, to facilitate digital advertising. Having inserted itself into all aspects of the digital advertising marketplace, Google has used anticompetitive, exclusionary, and unlawful means to eliminate or severely diminish any threat to its dominance over digital advertising technologies.”
The suit was filed in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.
Tuesday’s suit marks the federal government’s second antitrust complaint against Google since 2020, when the Trump administration sued over Google’s alleged anticompetitive harms in search and search advertising. That case is still ongoing. Google has also been the target of antitrust litigation by state and private actors.
In a statement, Google said the DOJ suit “attempts to pick winners and losers in the highly competitive advertising technology sector.”
“DOJ is doubling down on a flawed argument that would slow innovation, raise advertising fees, and make it harder for thousands of small businesses and publishers to grow,” a Google spokesperson said, adding that a federal judge last year knocked down a claim that Google colluded with Facebook in a separate antitrust suit led by the state of Texas. That judge also ruled, however, that a number of monopolization claims in the Texas case could move forward.
The lawsuit is a frontal assault against Google’s massive, primary business of advertising. Google generated $209 billion in advertising revenue in 2021, according to its annual report, a figure representing more than 80% of its total revenue. By comparison, the next largest giant in online advertising, Facebook-parent Meta, generated $115 billion in 2021.
Third-party estimates suggest that Google and Facebook accounted for the majority of US digital ad revenues, hitting a peak around 2017, with Google taking about a third of the market. Since then, however, others including Amazon have begun encroaching on that business.
The US complaint echoes concerns that have prompted similar antitrust investigations in the United Kingdom and in the European Union.
Google not only controls the platform publishers use to sell online ad inventory, the Justice Department alleged Tuesday, but also the advertising tools marketers use to claim that inventory and the exchange that facilitates those transactions.
“Google’s pervasive power over the entire ad tech industry has been questioned by its own digital advertising executives,” the complaint said, “at least one of whom aptly begged the question: ‘[I]s there a deeper issue with us owning the platform, the exchange, and a huge network? The analogy would be if Goldman or Citibank owned the NYSE.’”
Tuesday’s complaint marks an opening salvo against Big Tech by DOJ’s antitrust chief, Jonathan Kanter. Kanter has spent months laying the groundwork for a broader offensive against the tech industry’s most dominant companies, reflecting commitments by President Joe Biden and others in the US government to hold powerful firms accountable. Under Kanter, Justice Department antitrust officials have pushed to bring more cases to trial as well as to prosecute cases involving unconventional legal theories.
In 2020, House lawmakers released a 450-page report finding that Google, along with Amazon, Apple and Facebook, hold “monopoly power” in key business segments. The report was the result of a 16-month investigation in which congressional staff reviewed corporate documents and interviewed the tech industry’s many customers and rivals. It concluded, among other things, that Google was uniquely positioned to benefit from its powerful role in the online ad industry.
“With a sizable share in the ad exchange market and the ad intermediary market, and as a leading supplier of ad space, Google simultaneously acts on behalf of publishers and advertisers, while also trading for itself,” the report said.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Marketers are experimenters. We have to be. Some marketing strategies simply don’t work because of bad audience targeting, excessive competition, cost/reward imbalances or other issues. It’s our job to figure out what works and what doesn’t.
When we figure out that a strategy simply isn’t working, our job is simple: Change the variables to try and make it work or discard it entirely. But what happens when we find out that a strategy is working?
The most straightforward option is to maintain the status quo, repeating the process as consistently as possible to continue seeing the benefits. But if you want to keep pushing for better results and improve outcomes for your business, it’s important to scale that marketing strategy somehow, increasing its effectiveness and giving it greater influence.
How can you scale a marketing strategy effectively?
Scaling options
Let’s start by looking at some of the core options you have for scaling and marketing strategy.
Invest more money. First, you could consider spending more money on the strategy itself. This can manifest in any number of different ways, depending on the type of marketing you’re pursuing. For example, if you spent $1,000 to print 2,000 copies of a flyer and that flyer was highly effective, you might spend $5,000 on the next round of printing to get 20,000 copies of that flyer. In SEO, you might spend more money on link building or content development. In PPC advertising, you might increase your bids and overall budget.
Conquer new territory. Another option is to conquer new territory — contending with some of your top competitors, changing your geographic location or placing your ads in new areas. For example, if you’re used to competing only with businesses in your current city, you might expand to start advertising for the entire state. If your ad only ran on one podcast, you might consider running it with several other related podcasts.
Expand to new audiences. Some marketers expand their strategy by trying to target new audiences. Chances are, your strategy worked in part because it was designed to be highly relevant to one specific niche. Can you make adjustments so that your strategy applies to new niches entirely?
Effective marketing strategy scaling
Regardless of if you take one of these routes, all of them or some other route you created for yourself, these are the most important strategies you have for making your marketing scaling effective:
Scale gradually (when possible). For the most part, it’s better to scale gradually. You don’t know for a fact that your results are going to continue, and venturing into uncharted marketing territory is always a risk. Don’t hemorrhage all your marketing dollars on an uncertain strategy; increase your efforts one step at a time.
Do your market and competitive research upfront. If you’re trying to reach a new geographic location or a new target audience, it’s important to know what you’re getting yourself into. Do all your market research and competitive research front so you have a much better understanding of the contextual environment you’re about to enter.
Keep your processes consistent. It’s easy for marketing strategies to become loose and uncoordinated when more people are working on them or when you’re applying them to new contexts. Don’t lose sight of the principles that made this strategy successful in the first place. Keep all your processes consistent and formally documented.
Hire professional help when possible. If you have a small- to mid-sized business, you may not have the internal resources necessary to scale this strategy effectively. Accordingly, you should consider hiring outside professional help. Hiring a professional marketing agency, a team of contractors or new members of your marketing team could be exactly what you need to see ideal results.
Be cautious with repetition. Seeing excellent results from an advertisement or a new piece of marketing collateral might motivate you to repeat your approach exactly. But you should also be cautious with repetition. Repeating your message is a great way to make it stick, but it’s also a great way to annoy people if you aren’t careful. Don’t overwhelm your customers.
Keep a close eye on your ROI. Throughout the entirety of your scaling operation, keep a close eye on your return on investment (ROI) and see if it goes through any changes. Are you getting as much value as you expected? If not, why? This is usually a sign that something critical changed when your strategy began to expand; see if you can find the discrepancy and eliminate it moving forward.
Scaling a marketing strategy isn’t always straightforward, and it isn’t always guaranteed to work. But if you recognize the key challenges and remain cautious but ambitious, you’ll have a much higher chance of success.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
It’s probably not difficult to grasp that our customers’ purchase behaviors are deeply entangled with moods.
There’s a reason that we call shopping therapeutic. Purchasing things we want sends a serotonin surge to the brain that can temporarily make us feel better if we’re stressed, depressed or anxious. Moreover, according to widely-cited research by Gerald Zaltman, 95% of purchase decisions are made subconsciously and driven by emotions — so it’s no surprise that advertisers have been interested in understanding and evoking particular mood states for generations.
Now that data about internal states of mind is becoming more available, the stakes are higher when we consider how to act on this sensitive consumer information. For example, how far should brands go to utilize emotional data to encourage purchases?
Let’s take a look at where we’re at and how brands can take a human-centered approach to the use of this sensitive information.
Let’s start with how we gauge emotions. Until recently, our data about feelings relied on self-reporting by consumers since it’s impossible to embody another person’s emotional experience. Self-reporting means that consumers answer direct questions about how they are feeling at a given time or in a given context. Usually, this happens via market research surveys.
Neuroscience is advancing to the point that we may be able to accurately predict emotional states without relying on overt consumer admissions. This type of emotional assessment may prove to be even more accurate than direct consumer reporting since many people struggle to predict how they’ll feel in particular contexts.
Technology that assesses activity in our brains is getting more advanced and better capable of predicting mood states. While most of this innovation is happening in research labs, we’re getting closer to realizing this technology as a marketing tool.
Neuroscience and wearables
The Art of Shopping, a subconscious shopping experience between art retailer Saatchi and eBay, is one of the most direct campaigns that aimed to utilize this technology in shopping.
During the experiential retail event, attendees browsed an art gallery while wearing headsets that were designed to track a consumer’s mental engagement. When the software suggested that viewers were inspired, eBay added similar items to the patron’s shopping cart.
While the activation was interesting, getting consumers to voluntarily and consistently wear mind-tracking headsets is far-fetched in our current environment. Although, it may become more common as more consumers adopt augmented and virtual realities.
Today, wearables like fitness trackers and smartwatches are becoming more ubiquitous and can aggregate mood data inferentially or from the self-assessment of consumers. The devices can assess everything from our heart rate and breathing patterns to our mindfulness activity. This can imply or correlate to stress levels or provide more direct mood data on apps like Calm and Halo that encourage emotional reporting.
There are other ways to gauge the mood of consumers, and some of them have a troubling history.
Meta, formerly Facebook, was famously under the microscope for conducting a large-scale emotion experiment aimed at understanding if emotions spread through networks.
It actively manipulated the algorithm of nearly 700,000 users without their informed consent, in order to serve them positive or negative content and to gauge the apparent mood in their resulting posts. Among other goals, the company was interested in how emotions might make the site more or less engaging.
The more engaged users are on the platform, the more valuable they are to Meta’s advertisers. Critics worried that the company wanted to understand how to manipulate emotions to bolster its bottom line and increase purchases for its advertisers, without apparent regard for the impact on the consumer.
Meta isn’t the only tech company making actionable inferences about emotions. Search engines like Google track emotional effects by utilizing software to assess language for positive and negative sentiments in search, among other tactics.
In conjunction with the rest of their consumer data, such as browsing and purchase history, these tech behemoths have real power to understand, contextualize and leverage consumer emotion without the use of neurological equipment.
Marketers are curious about how mood impacts purchases, and thereby interested in creating purchase paths that are aligned with particular feelings. Payment providers are paying attention as well. In fact, in their latest Future of Payments research paper, Worldpay from FIS identified personalization, including emotional engagement, as a trend that payment providers are attending to.
Creating payment journeys that utilize emotional information from consumers may sound troubling. But it’s worth noting that consumers increasingly expect these kinds of personalized experiences from brands — as long as they are additive to the consumer journey.
When an experience provides convenience to a consumer and helps the brand connect meaningfully with them, it can make the consumer feel supported and improve emotional engagement and loyalty.
Striking a balance between utilizing emotional data to offer mutual brand-consumer gains while respecting consumer rights and privacy is tricky. This is why we need to think deeply about creating consumer safeguards as we venture into the future.
There’s no shortage of data, and we’re only going to get better at detecting and reacting to emotional states in various contexts. As advertisers and marketers, we need to be thoughtful about how all this emotional data is applied.
We’ve already seen social media companies exploiting negative emotional states like anxiety and depression to move users toward a purchase path of aspirational products in categories like beauty and fitness (What’s even more troubling is that the algorithms are likely contributing to the negative emotional state, but that’s a conversation for another day). We’ve seen the same algorithms promote negative headlines that are likely to elicit engagement, which results in exacerbated political polarization and negative societal impacts more broadly.
As an advertising community, we need to implement safeguards to protect consumers. These safeguards should come from regulators, as well as individual brands. Creating an ethics playbook prior to locking in uses of emotional data in the purchase path, conducting thought experiments for secondary and tertiary impacts of the use of mood-based information, and defining and acting in accordance with a brand’s values can help to ensure marketers are responsible brokers of mood data.
It’s worth remembering that understanding emotion can have powerful positive consequences as well. As humans, we’re emotional beings and brands that can meet consumers where they are in their internal experiences are likely to create better and more meaningful connections. It’s imperative for brands to think through how they’re using emotional information, not only to create lasting relationships with consumers but also to take a human-centered approach to innovation.
Google may be the giant in the digital advertising world, but even it is not immune to the impact that the economic downturn and recession fears are having on the online ad market.
Google parent company Alphabet
(GOOGL) on Tuesday reported earnings results for the third quarter that fell short of Wall Street analysts’ estimates for both sales and profits, due in large part to a sharp slowdown in the growth of its core advertising business.
It reported revenue of nearly $69.1 billion, up just 6% from the same period in the prior year. Google’s advertising revenues grew just 2.5% year-over-year, compared to the 43% growth it posted a year ago. YouTube’s ad business, which competes with TikTok, was especially hard hit, with revenue declining nearly 2% from the year-ago quarter.
Google’s net income, meanwhile, came in at $13.9 billion, down more than 26% from the year prior and well below the $16.6 billion analysts had projected.
The company’s shares fell 6% in after-hours trading Tuesday following the report.
Sundar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet and Google, nodded to the tougher economic climate in a statement included with the results.
“We’re sharpening our focus on a clear set of product and business priorities,” Pichai said. “We are focused on both investing responsibly for the long term and being responsive to the economic environment.”
Tech companies, including Google, reported that they’d started to feel the impact of declining online ad spending in the prior quarter. High inflation, looming recession fears and the ongoing war in Ukraine have all continued to weigh on the industry.
Growth in other areas of Google’s business also appear to be slowing. Google Cloud revenue grew 37% year-over year, a deceleration from the nearly 45% growth it posted in the year-ago quarter, and the segment’s net loss increased to $699 million from $644 million during the same quarter last year.
Net loss from Google’s “Other Bets” segment, which includes business efforts such as its self-driving car unit Waymo, also accelerated year-over-year during the quarter to $1.6 billion.
“Google delivered a disappointing quarter with the search giant underperforming our expectations across almost all business units, most importantly its core ad search segment,” said Investing.com Senior Analyst Jesse Cohen.
During a call with analysts Tuesday, Pichai said the company has begun “realigning resources to invest in our biggest growth opportunities.”
“Over the past quarter, we have made several shifts away from lower priority efforts to fuel highest growth priorities,” Pichai said, adding that the company plans to cut back on headcount additions during the final three months of the year.
Google CFO Ruth Porat said on the call that strong growth in the fourth quarter of 2021 will make year-over-year ad revenue growth comparisons to the current quarter difficult, and that the strength of the US dollar is expected to increasingly weigh on the company’s results. The company did not provide detailed financial outlook for the current quarter.
Meta on Wednesday posted the second quarterly revenue decline in its history since going public and warned that it is making “significant changes” aimed at cutting costs ahead of 2023, as it confronts an economic downturn that is hitting its core online advertising business.
For the three months ended in September, Meta
(FB) posted revenue of $27.7 billion, down 4% year-over-year and slightly above Wall Street analysts’ expectations. The Facebook parent company posted its first-ever quarterly revenue decline during the June quarter.
The company reported net income of nearly $4.4 billion — less than half the amount it made during the same period in the prior year and below analysts’ projections.
“We’re approaching 2023 with a focus on prioritization and efficiency that will help us navigate the current environment and emerge an even stronger company,” Mark Zuckerberg, Meta’s founder and CEO, said in a statement.
Meta’s stock fell almost 17% in after-hours trading Wednesday following the results.
Demand for online advertising has declined in recent months amid rising inflation and fears of a looming recession. Tech companies like Google and Snap have also seen hits to their ad revenues. Meta CFO David Wehner said on a call with analysts following the report that the average price per ad across Meta’s platforms fell 18% during the quarter.
At the same time, Meta’s user growth is slowing amid heightened competition from rivals like TikTok. Meta reported having 2.96 billion monthly active users on its core Facebook app at the end of the quarter, up 2% year-over-year. That’s down from the 6% growth rate it posted in the year-ago quarter. Daily active users on Meta’s family of apps grew 4% to 2.93 billion, down from the 11% increase it posted the year prior.
Zuckerberg noted on the call that Instagram now has more than 2 billion monthly active users and WhatsApp has more than 2 billion daily active users.
These challenges to its core business come as Meta is funneling billions of dollars into an ambitious new bet to build a future version of the internet called the metaverse that likely remains years away.
Wehner said operating losses from the company’s metaverse ambitions, which are categorized under its Reality Labs unit, are expected to “grow significantly year-over-year” in 2023. Reality Labs lost nearly $3.7 billion in the September quarter, and has cost the company a total of $9.4 billion so far this year. Revenue from the Reality Labs unit also fell by nearly 50% year-over-year in the September quarter.
Altimeter Capital, a Meta sharehoder, last week wrote an open letter calling on the company to reduce its headcount expenses by at least 20% and its annual capital expenditure by at least $5 billion, and to limit its investment in the metaverse to no more than $5 billion per year.
In Wednesday’s report, Wehner said the company is “making significant changes across the board to operate more efficiently.” Executives said the company expects headcount at the end of 2023 will be roughly in line with or slightly smaller than the 87,314 it reported as of the end of September (an increase of 28% from the year prior).
“We are holding some teams at in terms of headcount, shrinking others and investing headcount growth only in our highest priorities,” Wehner said. He also hinted that the company could shrink its physical office footprint.
Zuckerberg said on the call that the three key areas of investment for the company in the coming year are its AI discovery engine that’s powering Reels and other recommendations, ads and business messaging, and its future vision for the metaverse. Meta earlier this month unveiled its newest virtual-reality headset, the Meta Quest Pro, and touted its potential for business customers.
In the final three months of the year, Meta expects quarterly revenue between $30 billion and $32.5 billion. On the high end, the projection would mark a 3.5% year-over-year decline from the same period in the prior year.
After months of layoffs, hiring freezes and other cost-cutting measures,big tech companies are set to provide the most detailed look yet at just how bad things have gotten for their businesses amid fears of a looming recession.
Snapchat’s parent company, which tanked much of the tech sector in May with a warning about a worsening economy, is set to report third-quarter earnings on Thursday. Apple
(AAPL), Amazon
(AMZN), Facebook
(FB)-parent Meta, Microsoft
(MSFT), Twitter
(TWTR) and Google-parent Alphabet
(GOOGL) will each report earnings results the following week.
“People probably should be bracing themselves for these results,” said Scott Kessler, technology global sector lead at research firm Third Bridge Group.
For years, the giants of Silicon Valley seemed almost immune to swings in the global economy. Even amid a pandemic, a trade war and other geopolitical uncertainty, the biggest names in tech only seemed to grow bigger and richer. But like other sectors in recent months, they have faced a variety of new challenges.
Rampant inflation is eating away at consumers’ paychecks and reducing their ability to spend freely on tech products and services. Increased costs and recession fears have cut down on demand for online advertising and enterprise tech services. And other macroeconomic issues such as continued supply chain snarls and higher interest rates are stunting growth, analysts say.
To make matters worse, tech companies must also confront the growing strength of the US dollar, which is currently trading at its highest level in two decades. That can mean sales made overseas are not worth as much, according to Angelo Zino, senior industry analyst at CFRA Research. A stronger US dollar may also make hardware products from companies like Apple less affordable for foreign consumers, which, as Zino points out, is problematic given “most of these companies are generating more than half their revenue outside the United States.”
In a striking shift, most of the big tech companies are now expected to report slowing profit and revenue growth, or even year-over-year declines, for the three months ending in September, according to analyst estimates.
Amazon
(AMZN), which is projected to be in the best shape, is expected to post essentially flat salesfrom the year prior. Meta’s revenue is projected to fall 5% year-over-year, marking the company’s second consecutive quarterly revenue decline. Net income at Meta, Amazon
(AMZN), Google and Snap is also expected to be down from the year prior.
These dour projections come after many tech businesses were already showing signs of weakness in the prior quarter. Meta in July posted its first year-over-year quarterly revenue decline since going public in 2012 in large part due to decreased demand in the online advertising market that fuels its core business. Twitter
(TWTR), Snap, Google, Apple and Microsoft all also reported that shrinking ad budgets had taken some toll on their June quarter earnings.
“We compare investor negative sentiment on tech today to what we have seen only 2 other times in our decades of covering tech stocks: 2008 and 2001,” Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said in a note to investors this week, referring to two prior recessionary periods.
Many of the issues currently weighing on tech companies are unlikely to let up anytime soon, which is why industry watchers will be paying close attention to the guidance these companies offer for the rest of 2022.
“More than anything, people really want a good understanding about what to expect” from the final three months of this year, which has “historically been the most important quarter for these companies,” Kessler said. Investors will likely want to know, for example, whether the online ad market has begun to stabilize ahead of the crucial holiday season.
Negative results or future outlook could lead to increased pressure on tech firms to focus on their core businesses and cut back onbig bets that aren’t expected to quickly product returns. Some of that is already underway.
Meta may be in a uniquely difficult position. Last October, Facebook rebranded as Meta and ramped up investments to build a future version of the internet called the metaverse, which isn’t expected to be fully realized for years, if ever. But the Wall Street Journal reported last month the company was quietly reducing staff — and some analysts expect more cuts to come.
“I do think you’ll see them announce cost cuts. I think they’ll reduce the workforce,” Zino said. “Meta is really boxed in a corner here. Their core business is in an environment where they’re not going to see much growth at all … and they don’t have any major revenue center outside of advertising.”
Gannett, the largest newspaper publisher in the United States, is suing Google, alleging the tech giant holds a monopoly over the digital ad market.
The publisher of USA Today and more than 200 local publications filed the lawsuit in a New York federal court on Tuesday, and is seeking unspecified damages. Gannett argues in court documents that Google and its parent company, Alphabet, controls how publishers buy and sell ads online.
“The result is dramatically less revenue for publishers and Google’s ad-tech rivals, while Google enjoys exorbitant monopoly profits,” the lawsuit states.
Google controls about a quarter of the US digital advertising market, with Meta, Amazon and TikTok combining for another third, according to eMarketer. News publishers and other websites combine for the other roughly 40%. Big Tech’s share of the market is beginning to erode slightly, but Google remains by far the largest individual player.
That means publishers often rely at least in part on Google’s advertising technology to support their operations: Gannett says Google controls 90% of the ad market for publishers.
Michael Reed, Gannett’s chairman and CEO, said in a statement Tuesday that Google’s dominance in the online advertising industry has come “at the expense of publishers, readers and everyone else.”
“Digital advertising is the lifeblood of the online economy,” Reed added. “Without free and fair competition for digital ad space, publishers cannot invest in their newsrooms.”
Dan Taylor, Google’s vice president of global ads, told CNN that the claims in the suit “are simply wrong.”
“Publishers have many options to choose from when it comes to using advertising technology to monetize – in fact, Gannett uses dozens of competing ad services, including Google Ad Manager,” Taylor said in a statement Tuesday. “And when publishers choose to use Google tools, they keep the vast majority of revenue.”
He continued: “We’ll show the court how our advertising products benefit publishers and help them fund their content online.”
The legal action from Gannett comes as Google faces a growing number of antitrust complaints in the United States and the European Union over its advertising business, which remains its central moneymaker.
EU officials said last week that Google’s advertising business should be broken up, alleging that the tech giant’s involvement in multiple parts of the digital advertising supply chain creates “inherent conflicts of interest” that risk harming competition.
Earlier this year, the Justice Department and eight states sued Google, accusing the company of harming competition with its dominance in the online advertising market and similarly calling for it to be broken up.
Meta has begun to remove news content from Facebook and Instagram in Canada, the social media giant said Tuesday, in response to recently passed legislation in the country that requires tech companies to negotiate payments to news organizations for hosting their content.
As a result of the move — which Meta had previously said would occur before the law takes effect — Meta’s Canadian users will no longer be able to click on links to news articles posted to Facebook and Instagram.
The decision comes amid a global debate over the relationship between news organizations and social media companies about the value of news content, and who gets to benefit from it.
Google has also announced that it plans to remove news content from its platforms in Canada when the law takes effect, which could happen by December.
The Canadian legislation, known as Bill C-18, was given final approval in June. It aims to support the sustainability of news organizations by regulating “digital news intermediaries with a view to enhancing fairness in the Canadian digital news marketplace.”
It comes after the passage of a 2021 Australian law that the tech platforms initially opposed by warning it would similarly force them to remove news content. Since then, the platforms have reached voluntary agreements with a range of news outlets in that country.
Like-minded proposals have been introduced around the world amid allegations that the tech industry has decimated local journalism by sucking away billions in online advertising revenues.
In May, Meta also threatened to remove news content from California if the state moved ahead with a revenue-sharing bill. The legislation was put on hold last month.
And at the federal level, the US Senate in June advanced a bill that would grant news organizations the ability to jointly negotiate for a greater share of advertising revenues against online platforms, thanks to a proposed antitrust exemption for publishers and broadcasters.
In a blog post Tuesday, Meta said the Canadian legislation “misrepresents the value news outlets receive when choosing to use our platforms.”
“The legislation is based on the incorrect premise that Meta benefits unfairly from news content shared on our platforms, when the reverse is true,” the blog post said. “News outlets voluntarily share content on Facebook and Instagram to expand their audiences and help their bottom line.”
Canadian users of Meta’s platforms will still be able to access news content online by visiting news outlets’ websites directly or by signing up for their subscriptions and apps.
