“2021: Facebook & Google Will Take ALL The Advertising Dollars & Everybody Else Will Be F@cked!”
On Monday B&T published a controversial piece about the merging of ad tech and mar tech. Here, B&T chats with the article’s author and eminent authority on the subject Andrew Birmingham and tries to uncover what it all means for local agencies. Yes, be VERY scared indeed, it’s a frightening new world that’ll take few prisoners…
Put simply, what actually is advertising tech (adtech) and marketing tech (martech)? Ad tech’s the stuff that serves and counts your paid advertising; the actual technology, the analytics. Martech’s direct marketing; things like emails, social, posts, the automation that controls all the campaigns.
Why merge the two? Because that’s what marketers want. The two have been separate beasts for the past 20 years but marketers want the one screen, the one dashboard to understand where their spend is going. Video’s the anomaly, it can be either/or.
When’s this all going to happen? It will take another five years for the martech firms to roll this stuff out. The big players – Salesforce, Adobe and Oracle – are all buying and building ad tech platforms into their systems.
Is it really all a play so Google and Facebook can soak up even more ad dollars? Yes, those two will dominate the advertising landscape. Remember, too, it’s not about the number of ads being produced it’s about how much money’s being spent. Take the US, in the first quarter this year Google and Facebook snared 85 per cent of all the new (digital) ad dollars that came into the market.
How will this play out for local Aussie agencies? At present there are a heap of agencies offering ad tech; some they own and others they license. Increasingly a lot of the capability will end up inside Google and Facebook. Yes, there’ll be less providers and, yes, agencies will be working directly with two giants (Facebook and Google) who’ll control everything.
So that’s bad news then? Depends how you look at it. Do you want to put 80 per cent of your effort into two companies or 20 companies?
Will it hit agencies’ bottom lines hard? Agencies don’t care where the money gets spent so long as it gets spent. The next big thing for agencies will be (the next iteration) of programmatic. At the moment it still requires a lot of human intervention but it’ll be taken over by AI and machine learning and smart software. And as the past 20 years have shown, when it comes to humans and machines, the humans always lose. When it comes down to Google’s machine brain or people sitting at a buyer’s desk then Google will win every single time.
So it’s the beginning of the end of the media buyer then? A lot of people who buy advertising are stupid and make stupid decisions based on the data in front of them today and not what the data might look like tomorrow. That, in my books, is stupid
You appear to have a particular disdain for media buyers? If you refuse to buy into mobile campaigns at the moment because you think the cost or acquisitions are too high, and if you feel you can wait, say, three years for the cost of acquisition to halve and then jump in then, yes, you’re stupid. And the reason you won’t be able to get it at half the price is because the people who will are the ones in now and they’ll be building the capabilities to do it and you’ll be starting cold.
So if you aren’t in bed with Google or Facebook, you’d bloody want to be? At the moment, in Australia, digital is about 40 per cent of the total advertising spend. In the next five years it will be 50 per cent and could get there faster. And right now Google and Facebook have 50 per cent of that 40 per cent. And remember, Facebook in Australia is only really getting started; it’s barely even got going with Instagram. In five years’ time Google and Facebook will have 65 per cent of all digital spends in Australia.
By “Google” you basically mean search, yeah? Is the good old-fashioned creative ad going the way of the dodo then? There’s so much digital “noise” that brands need to make themselves more important not less important. If you want to charge $300 for a pair of sneakers you need to be have a pretty compelling case. It’s not all about the direct response (getting people to buy stuff), brands want to be fun, have a purpose in your life. Marketing’s still about being the top of the pile, top of mind over your competitor.
This all sounds bad news for creatives? Creatives love to think nothing beats their human genius but there’s a whole heap of companies like Adobe who are doing a stack of work on making ads made basically by computers. They’ll make tailor-made ads directly to suit the viewer in their favourite colours and models and style. It’s pretty clear that’s where the technology will take us in five to 10 years’ time.
In terms of agency land, who won’t survive in this new, rather daunting, landscape? What agencies offer to brands is a set of skills they can’t afford in-house. An agency that works with 50 clients get the benefits of what works across a broad spread. Given that Google and Facebook are going to be so utterly dominant in the coming years then an agency’s knowledge and expertise around how they can plug their clients into their systems is going to be critical.
Your advice to agencies? Tell your clients that they should be putting their money into things that look expensive today because you need to able to build the capabilities today because you’ll want to exploit them tomorrow. Mobile is a great example of that. Agencies who deal with the traditional media need to understand that money is going to shift out of things like free to air TV. Money will follow eyeballs and the money is flowing to the other channels. For example, more people are watching video and the money will naturally follow that.
If all the cash is going to Google and Facebook, that sounds like very bad news for the media companies then? The players that have typically driven media spend in Australia have been Fairfax, News Corp, APN, the radio stations etc. But by the time you take Google, Facebook, Seek, Realestate.com and Sensis; you take all the money that they’re going to get in digital advertising, then that leaves absolutely nothing for anyone else. They (the traditional media players) are all fucked and they know they’re fucked! They’ll be fighting over the scraps after Google and Facebook have taken what they want.
Please login with linkedin to comment
Advertising Standards BureauLatest News
The Mars Agency Announces Latest Findings Of Retail Media Report Card
The Mars Agency has developed a scorecard that assesses the capabilities of leading platforms across key criteria required to optimally plan, execute, and measure effective retail media programs. The scorecard aims To help brands efficiently evaluate their spending options across retail media networks in Australia (and New Zealand). With spending on retail media advertising in […]
‘It’s The Lesser Of Two Evils’ – NRL Eyes US Betting Market As Aussie Regulators Circle
US betting firms will be delighted by the circa 50,000 Americans who could soon watch the NRL on their favourite app.
A-League In Deep Discussions With New Partner To Keep Games On TV After Production Company Enters Administration
The A-League's insatiable appetite for scoring own goals continues.
TV Ratings (27/03/2024): Jungle Members At War Over Concealed Lipstick
A heated argument between two jungle members did the numbers for Ten last night, with I’m A Celeb obtaining a total national reach of 1,282,000. Fans were delighted as Candice Warner and influencer Skye Wheatley got into it over a stick of lipstick, leading Warner to dub the Instagram star “selfish.” Wheatley, best known for […]
Is The Australian Music Industry In Trouble? Inquiry Launched Following Splendour Cancellation
Earlier this week, an inquiry was launched into the challenges and opportunities currently facing the Australian live music industry in the wake of multiple festival cancellations. On 25 March 2024, the Minister for the Arts, the Hon. Tony Burke MP, asked the Committee on Communications and the Arts to inquire into and report on the […]
Liana Dubois, Leandro Perez, Aimee Buchanan & More Gather For Inaugural Compadres Leadership Event
Didn't get the invite? Perhaps you're not as important as you thought.
Cathay Captures The Unforgettable Thrill Of Cathay/HSBC Hong Kong Rugby Sevens, Via Publicis
Nobody does rugby like Hong Kong, apparently. Certainly nobody does it as badly as Australia.
Cocogun Nabs Christine Watts, Kirsty Reynolds & Shev Tan Bolstering Management & Creative Teams
Cocogun bolsters its team with new hires. Committed to purchasing a bigger sofa, too.
The Media Store’s Jacquie Alley & Sam Cousins Take The Plunge With Pro-Bono Work For Cure Cancer
B&T chats with The Media Store bosses about their great pro-bono work and sponsored swim.
Hawke’s Brewing Co. Taps Rocket Comms For PR Agency Following Competitive Pitch
We're expecting Rocket Comms productivity to crash in spectacular fashion following this win.
Spotlight On Sponsors: Patties Serves Up A Taste Of Home For Olympians & South Sydney Rabbitohs Recommit To Gambling Reform
While the Rabbitohs commits to gambling reform, B&T reckons the team should commit to a decent auto sponsor.
Google: “Inevitable” That Bad Actors Will Abuse Ads Platform As Advertiser Account Suspensions Double
Google maintains it's simply impossible for it to entirely stop bad people placing & paying for ads using its service.
Quantcast Expands APAC Sales Team With Appointment Of News Corp Account Manager
No pressure at all when you are appointed as a client success manager.
Publicis Sapient Tests Microsoft-Powered Gen AI Search Tool With Homes & Villas By Marriott Bonvoy
Given Gen AI's record for mangling stuff, B&T cannot see the problem with letting it decide your next holiday digs.
Volkswagen & DDB Group’s “Roo Badge” To Reduce Kangaroo Related Road Collisions
Watch out for RooBadge as Cannes Lions' most debated campaign this year.
Twilio Launches Unified Profiles & Agent Copilot Features To Boost Productivity & Engagement
Agent Copilot sounds like James Bond's less interesting cousin.
Reebok & Honda Among New Clients For onetwo agency
OneTwo finally lives up to its name with this double billing.
Ogilvy Report: Throw Out The Social Strategy Rule Book, The Rules Of The Past No Longer Apply
B&T was puzzled that all 'influencers' aren't, effectively, 'virtual', but here we are.
WhiteGREY & AKQA Merge In Australia, Lee Simpson Departs
Fortunately, the combined agencies aren't opting for a trite portmanteau for the new name.
Splendour In The Grass 2024 Music Festival Cancelled!
Music fans all over the country reportedly relieved they can pack away their rain coats and gumboots for another year.
TV Ratings (26/03/2024): “Fairy Bread, F***ing Disgusting”: Gordon Ramsay Slams Aussie Food In Food Stars Launch
Ramsay not one for mincing his words, even when it comes to minced meat pies.
Paramount+ International Boss Doubles Down On Aussie Content, Says Ad-Tier will Grow Audiences And Revenue
Good news as Paramount will not be binning I’m A Celebrity for re-runs of Frasier.
Brent Smart: Telstra Pushing For 50-50 Brand-Performance Split But Warns Numbers ‘Won’t Look Great’ Initially
The old brand vs performance debate continues. But here, Brent is firmly sitting on the fence.
Crowded House, Tones And I & Dom Dolla Win Big At The Shure Rolling Stone Music Awards
B&T staffer reports back with humdinger of a hangover & feeling seriously uncool after mixing with music types.
Opinion: Dyslexia “A Hidden Gem” For Brands & Agencies
Dyslexics offer underappreciated benefits in the corporate field, according to this op-ed.
David Jones Taps Criteo To Power Online Retail Media Arm
Want to see ads for things you probably can't afford? David Jones has got you covered with new retail media play.
oOh!media Sets Up Team To Target Business Audiences Across Airports & Offices
oOh! wants brands to harass you every minute of your next business trip.
QMS Launches Australian First DOOH & TV Partnership With Samba TV
Samba TV, of course, is not a channel dedicated to dancing. Much to our dismany.
Slew Of New Hires At Amplify
Four new faces join the Amplify offices. Team say desk scarcity becoming "acute".
Adobe Announces Content Authenticity Initiative Expansions To Counter Deep Fakes
Try as they might to enlighten them, we suspect Trump supporters will continue to watch and believe Fox News.
The PR Group Appoints TechCrunch Senior Reporter Catherine Shu As Director Of Content & Media
Catherine Shu makes the bold leap from journalism to PR. Says inevitable pay bump was "unrelated".
HERO Nabs Ebony Santin From AMPR
Rumours Santin cleared out the stationery cupboard before departing are as yet unconfirmed.
Karena Noble Checks Out Of EVT Hotels & Resorts To Launch Comms Consultancy
Noble still managed to squeezed in a continental breakfast before departing.
Canva Acquires Design Platform Affinity To Bring Professional Design Tools To Every Organisation
Canva & Adobe face off continues. We're not picking sides but keenly aware that Canva's office is next door to ours.
“Lean On Our Team To Help You Find An Audience”: Why Understanding Audience Engagement Is Essential In Journalism
Engaging the audience is critical to journos, apparently. We'd thought self-loathing & alcoholism were key.
Adobe Summit: Major Gen AI Developments, Data Concessions & Partnerships
What happens in Vegas stays there. Unless it's the Adobe Summit and then you get to read about in B&T.