1.Meta's data shows that Q4 might be the most hectic time of the year, but it's not showing up in Facebook's ad costs.Jon Loomer pointed out that Facebook Ads costs per 1000 impressions (CPM) were 30% to 60% below last year’s CPMs throughout the last three months.An unusual decline: Historically, Q4 is when Facebook sees its CPMs double, triple, or
more. This year, however, numbers show a clear sign of slower spend. And last year, average CPMs were also on a lower-than-usual scale.Seems to correlate with the declining ad revenue Meta reported in Q3. If true, these lower costs are your opportunity to snag cheap clicks and get more bang for your buck during a time when most of your audience is eager to spend. Still, take this with a pinch of salt—Jon used Within Marketing Pulse’s data to compile his report (which provides data from clients
with spends as high as $500M). While the sample might be decent enough for him to draw conclusions from it
2. If you're like us, you've been following Shein's meteoric rise. The fast-growing company is now one of the world's largest online fashion retailers, and they're looking to make a big change.Shein is exploring moving beyond its conventional business of selling its own brand apparel into a
marketplace platform that will enable other merchants to sell directly to customers. According to a memo to investors viewed by The Wall Street Journal, Shein is also diversifying its supply chain away from China, where Shein was founded. The company's supply chain is largely rooted in China’s southern Guangdong province, the country’s major manufacturing hub where it has a network of more than 3,000 suppliers. According to the memo: "The marketplace platform makes available a range of
additional merchandise and shipping options, and we expect it to result in increased customer engagement and satisfaction."
3. Optable has announced the appointment of Simon Theakston as Senior Director of Solutions Consulting and Brad Jeffrey as VP, North America Sales at a time when its platform is being used by growing numbers of clients worldwide. Simon was formerly Head of Digital Operations at iProspect, Senior Solutions
Engineer at BlueKai - where he was part of the team that launched its data management platform into Europe - and global DMP Lead at Oracle. He also co-founded Silver Bullet Data Services; a specialist organisation helping brands and publishers to securely maximise the value of their first-party data. With two decades of experience, Simon has an impressive track record in using data to power business objectives and improve customer experiences. He will act as a bridge between product and sales
teams at Optable.
4 TBWA\Media Arts Lab has announced the promotion of Beth Keamy to chief digital officer at its Los Angeles headquarters.Beth joined the agency in 2016 as global senior strategist. She led countless global digital- and social-media initiatives for Apple, including the launch of Apple’s first branded Instagram handle — a defining social-media moment for the brand. Beth assumed her role as managing director of the Los
Angeles office in 2020, where she led the work, the agency, and its people to record heights, while continuing to influence and drive the way in which Apple moved into new digital spaces.
5. The Royal Bahamas Police Force arrested former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried Monday, following an indictment by U.S. prosecutors.
In a statement on Twitter, Damien Williams, a U.S. attorney for the Southern District New
York said that prosecutors requested the arrest based on a sealed indictment they filed against Bankman-Fried. The indictment is expected to be unsealed Tuesday morning.Bankman-Fried is facing charges including wire fraud and wire fraud conspiracy, according to a report from The New York Times. The Bahamas and the United States have a shared interest in holding accountable all individuals associated with FTX who may have betrayed the public trust and broken the law, Prime Minister
Philip Davis said in a statement about Bankman-Fried's arrest. Meanwhile, he added that while the United States is pursuing criminal charges against SBF individually, The Bahamas will continue its own regulatory and criminal investigations into the collapse of FTX with continued cooperation from law enforcement partners around the world.
6. If you're like most companies, you've got big plans for data in 2023. According to a recent study from
Tamr, Inc., 93% of businesses polled have big data initiatives in their sights.For instance, 75% are focusing on improving data quality and 65% are investing in data management technologies.But over 50% admit they face obstacles in achieving all this. And some of these obstacles could hurt their ability to send data-based emails in a timely way. For example, 46% are still cleaning their data using manual processes, while 70% feel their company needs help turning data into valuable
business insights and almost 60% has trouble realizing business value from its use of data.Tamr argues that firms are hampered by legacy tools such as rules-based master data management (MDM), traditional data warehouses and data lakes. They need to embrace change if they want to deliver clean, curated continuously updated data products assembled from thousands of source systems to all potential data consumers in their enterprise," says Andy Palmer, co-founder chairman and CEO of Tamr."
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7. Jimmy Donaldson, aka MrBeast, has become an internet sensation. His YouTube channel has over 20 million subscribers and he's known for giving away huge sums of money in his videos.On Monday, he announced that he would be giving away $1 million to one Fortnite player in a temporary challenge on the leading battle royale platform.
The cash giveaway may not be new for Donaldson, who has become synonymous with giving away
huge sums of money (and made a reported $54 million in 2021), but it’s a new move for Epic Games influencer partnerships.“MrBeast’s Extreme Survival Challenge” will take place on December 17 and will involve various timed challenges with $1 million for the Fortnite player who finishes with the highest score between 12 PM and 3 PM EST on that day. Players will be able to find the challenge in the “Fortnite competitive” section of the game. The challenge island will go live on December 13,
giving players time to practice before the actual competition.
8. In a filing with the Federal Communications Commission, attorneys general from 50 states and the District of Columbia urge the agency to require mobile carriers to automatically block text messages from numbers likely to be associated with spam.The attorneys general say they are increasingly receiving complaints about illegal or unwanted text messages, and that mandatory
blocking represents “a common-sense measure to protect consumers from scams perpetrated through illegal text messages.” Their comments come in response to the FCC's requests for input about a proposal to require carriers to automatically block test messages from invalid, unallocated, or unused numbers, as well as from numbers on a “do not originate” list, which contains phone numbers linked to fraud.
“We agree with the Commission that bad actors have most likely shifted tactics to
take advantage of consumers’ most favored method of communication--text messaging,” the atorneys general write.
9. The FTC continues to issue Notices of Penalty Offenses concerning FTC Endorsement Guide violations to digital advertisers and marketers, both alone and in conjunction with the issuance of FTC Civil Investigative Demands. A Notice of Penalty Offenses is a document listing certain types of conduct that the FTC has
determined, in one or more litigated administrative cases (not consent orders), to be unfair or deceptive in violation of the FTC Act. Civil penalties can help the Commission deter conduct that harms consumers. Because they can exceed what a wrongdoer earned through their misconduct, penalties are intended to send a message that preying on consumers will not be profitable. READ LEGAL ANALYSIS
10. Google apologized last week for the "inconvenience" it caused when its ad managing platform stopped serving ads and prevented sites from generating revenue.This once again raises questions about agencies' and brands' dependency on Google advertising services.
The
December 9 post on Google's reporting system for Ad Manager reported: "Ad Manager is not delivering ads for the affected users."
NP Digital's clients running ads across Google Display Network were impacted by the outage of Google Ad Manager on Thursday of last week. Michael Gullaksen, the company's CEO, in an email to Search & Performance Marketing Daily wrote that impressions, in general, dropped more than 50% on that day but immediately rebounded the following
day.
