Comment by disgruntledphd2
5 days ago
> the Commission forcing us to change our business model
This is total, utter, complete 100% grade A organic nonsense.
I worked at FB (but the same is true of basically all action driven advertising systems). Only a tiny proportion of users ever click, but they are incredibly lucrative for online advertising platforms.
The whole subscription was a really transparent attempt to get people to accept the tracking and it's honestly profoundly depressing that this is what they're reduced to.
Ads work even if nobody clicks.
At least, old school ads. Sensible ads. Like Coca-Cola. I have no idea how these ridiculous online gaming things stay in business but I'm sure it's much stupider.
> Ads work even if nobody clicks.
Correct, but those ads (brand) are much, much less common online because Google (first) and Facebook (second) pushed DR advertising, which is what most SMBs and smaller businesses do.
Like, some of this is because they're easier to measure which makes it easier to sell, but lots more of it was due to smaller businesses that couldn't afford brand spending money on something more connected to their business outcomes.
> I have no idea how these ridiculous online gaming things stay in business
Mostly whales. A really small proportion of users spend absurd amounts of money on these games, and much of the competitive games just advertise for free users to get crushed by the whales.
Did you buy coca cola because santa clause was drinking it or did you buy it because it was at eye level by the register in every store in America?
How do you think those drinks get there? Beverage companies are paying for shelf space.
But, if you think ads for drinks don't work, take a look at Pepsi's Project Refresh of 2010, and what happened to their sales. TLDR, Pepsi took it's superb owl ad budget and used it to do community grants instead; sales dropped and a couple years later, Pepsi went back to advertising during the superb owl and stopped doing community grants.
I knew what coca cola was and it kept it in my mind because SC was drinking it as opposed to pepsi or tab