Who ?
Petitweb’s octopus, extending its tentacles on the market, to collect feedback on one of the biggest deals on the digital market (which is not lacking), or rather a real display network that doesn’t respect the Google charter (see our article on the study Analytics). Starting with that of Google, embodied in this case by Brian Albert, MD of Youtube (pictured).
What?
US and French reactions. Note: Advertisers have a lot of trouble talking about the topic.
Comment?
HOLY SHIT. @WSJ is reporting that ~80% of ads @Youtube services on the web have violated their terms of service and are therefore subject to refunds.
This is… a huge and devastating business. @GoogleAds billions of $$ is coming out.https://t.co/zRdyyIqZnf
— Nandini Jammi (@nandoodles) June 27, 2023
Let’s remember the topic, for those who don’t have time to read the presentation of the study, a simple screenshot is enough. The image below (reported in the study) shows two true view ads running simultaneously in mute, auto play, outstream mode, in the context of an article about capital punishment (not necessarily suitable for sale glossary)… In short, everything in violation of the general conditions of sale of Trueview.
Thanks to the merits, what reaction did Google have to this Molotov cocktail? Marvin Renaud, Director of Google Video Solutions, Brian Albert, CEO of Youtube (pictured)
Google’s reaction
The @WSJ article about Google and the research provided by @kfranasz from @AdalyticsHQ was extremely powerful.
What surprises me more than the article itself was the weak response from Google.
You are a major company being accused of something and yet the response seemed…
— AdTechGod 🍪 (@AdtechGod) June 28, 2023
The global director of video solutions of Google, Marvin Renaud, challenges the study in this post, published last Tuesday. “Adalytics would make extremely inaccurate claims” (“extremely inaccurate claims”), Google reiterates that advertisers only pay for the ad that is seen.
“We use real-time quality signals to determine if people are present and paying attention, which helps us serve ads on a partner site or app. Google is monitoring compliance with its Terms of Service and has stopped advertisements on 143,000 websites that violated these terms”. The report is according to Marvin Renaud inaccurate, when he establishes that the majority of ads are broadcast on third-party sites. “The opposite is true.” Brian Albert, who manages Youtube in the USA, comes to his rescue on Linkedin, in a post that reminds us of a cartoon whose main character is a black chick with an eggshell on its head. For his part, Petitweb asked for a reaction from Google France. But our email seems to have been lost in oblivion…
-Dr Krzysztof Franaszekthe founder of Analytics Research, confided here to The register, “Google didn’t dispute the top results of our research. Our report says the word ‘in stream’ and ‘out stream’ 274 times. In its response, Google doesn’t even mention these words. The report mentions the words ‘volume’ “mute”, “audible” and “sound” 116 times. Google makes no reference to the sound of the ad in its response.” And boom!
Reactions in the USA
-Adalytics shared their report with Fairness that verifies media purchases. Ruben Schreurs, chief product officer comments: “This report is very serious. What it reveals is a at best a misleading advertising product and at worst a fraudulent practice. If this is established, it will have a very significant impact on our industry and a negative impact on the quality and reliability of Google. We work for the biggest brands, almost all of which are mentioned in this report. And so we will immediately do our investigation. We thank Analytics for this work and look forward to a detailed response from Google. »
– Josh Lowcock, Mediabrands’ Global Chief Media Officer and Chief Policy Officer is quoted in the Wall Street Journal as “This is an unacceptable breach of trust. Google must fix and pay back.”
reactions in Europe
– Paul Tang, Dutch MEP at the Brussels European Parliament comments: “Google is the dictators’ puppet, dragging the European Parliament into this quagmire. The same parliament that declared Russia a state sponsor of terrorism on Nov. 22 is advertising on propaganda sites like Pravda because of Google’s outrageous schemes. This demonstrates a once again that the duopoly Google and Facebook is an opaque game of billions of dollars, which threatens democracy”.
-Deposit General Manager Philipp Schmidt From Prism Solutions who we interviewed: “after Facebook, Youtube is hit by the scandal. The black box side of Google is thickening over time. Advertisers can no longer say that they buy Youtube for the “on” sound and the full screen…In fact, is shooting elsewhere. Mastering the distribution framework will become increasingly important. And that’s good news for us. Because logically, brands should prioritize premium alternatives like Video Impact (Prisma, Figaro, and 366).”
Deselect
– Deposit Jérémie LeitaoMD of Do science “This is a very interesting article that is definitely incriminating against Google. In my opinion the reality is more nuanced.
Yes, it’s true that YouTube campaigns can run outside of YouTube, with no audio, outstream, and low viewability.
Yes, there is ambiguity from Google about serving TrueView outside of YouTube, however you can control that part when setting up your YouTube campaigns (which we do) to exclude that inventory outside of YouTube and focus only on YouTube inventory. Just uncheck video partners. And this box is not hidden at all:
The article’s figures on impression ratios outside of YouTube seem disproportionate to reality (at least in France). Our internal studies show that in France the data is too volatile from one campaign to another to draw conclusions (the sample in our country of campaigns where this option is activated is very small (all these points are important!). conclusion, yes, it is There may be some vagueness in the distribution framework (instream and outstream), but it is controllable on the platform and nothing prevents an advertiser from targeting only YouTube We also exclude outstream children’s content and music from YouTube campaigns for all our customers.
“Here Google wants to sell me its inventory that nobody wants.”
– Mathieu Ceccarelli, digital marketing consultant “hopes that advertisers concerned about this do not have Performance Max campaigns in their account. Google sells campaigns that are increasingly opaque and packaged, therefore unreadable to advertisers. With this type of campaign, the latter abandon the idea of analyzing their traffic, which opens the door to this kind of vagueness. That’s the cost to pay, if they continue to accept the opaqueness of the platforms. transparency that has made Google’s inventory so valuable.” He continues: “This type of news is going to multiply. I would just like to take this example on geo-targeting settings , which I raised following an audit and which reflects the risks advertisers face in complying with Google’s recommendations. Advertisers need to reject Performance Max campaigns, say no to Google Rep recommendations. They also need to understand that when Google talks about AI or broad targeting, there needs to be a small caveat: if AI were to play a big role in advertisers, it’s certainly not Google’s AI or Meta. Today, Google’s project with advertisers is to eliminate unwanted inventory and, at the same time, come up with increasingly flashy names for its upcoming campaigns. This news is unfortunate because there are interesting opportunities on Youtube like the Shorts, which are doing well. With this opacity, YouTube is ultimately very poorly rated by Google if we consider that, in some countries, time spent on YouTube is higher than on Facebook or Instagram.
– Pierre Harand, co-president of 55@he reacted to the study before taking his plane back from China: “If this study were true, it would be a problem, because there is deception on the merchandise.
https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-sues-google-monopolizing-digital-advertising-technologies
For me there are 3 possible scenarios:
1/ least worst: Analytics observes that advertisers have bought true View and end up on sites with an experience that has nothing to do with it. Didn’t they buy another campaign from another source with the same creative? And it would be the other channel that would lead to this disappointing experience.
2/ Online fraud is sometimes very sophisticated. Google may be the victim of a scam. But if Google gets scammed to this extent, it remains a huge scandal.
3/ It’s a system that Google has tolerated. And this would be very serious.
It is possible that our customers commission us to understand. In any case, this study is timely for some. At the moment, in fact, Google has an investigation by the State Department, precisely on its management of the inventory of third-party publishers. And Europe is threatening to dismantle Alphabet.”
– What about advertisers?
It’s not for lack of questioning them. Well you will have understood it since you have reached the end of this article. Advertisers… are silent.
