Global agency heads: Despite screw ups, platforms still work

Industry Contributor 30 Jun 2019 - 2 min read

Global agency heads: Despite screw ups, platforms still work

By Paul McIntyre - Executive Editor

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Tags: Facebook, Google, Youtube, advertising, marketing, privacy, data, GDPR, ACCC, Interpublic, IPG, WPP, Havas

After multiple privacy and brand safety issues in the last few years, Google and Facebook are under intense scrutiny. But the marketing dollars keep coming and at Cannes, major advertisers and agency heads suggested that’s not about to change (Bloomberg).

Key points:

Facebook’s ad sales grew 38%, Google’s 22% in 2018
“Every once in a while there’s going to be a screwup and unfortunately the screw-ups are pretty big. The thing is, it still works.” – Michael Roth, CEO, Interpublic Group
It’s “unthinkable” not to advertise on the platforms, given their audiences, “but we need to guarantee to our clients that we can find a positive environment” – Yannick Ballore, CEO Havas
“The easiest way to talk is with your cheque book. But the pressure on a CMO to deliver results is intense.” Michael Kassan, founder of advisory MediaLink
Pedro Earp, chief marketing officer of beermaker Anheuser-Busch InBev, said even if big brands pulled cash, it may not force change, as platforms have large SME pool of customers
While platforms provide market beating reach and ease of use, they will remain dominant – Wenda Harris Millard, vice president, MediaLink

While platforms provide market beating reach and ease of use, they will remain dominant – Wenda Harris Millard, vice president, MediaLink

Marketers are under pressure to deliver results – and Facebook and Google deliver. So they will keep spending no matter what. That’s borne out by the fact platform ad revenues continue to grow. While brands do take a stand, for example pulling spend over Youtube's paedophile comments issue, they all came back. They have to because they need cheap reach, as IPG Mediabrands CEO Danny Bass said in March.

At Cannes, WPP CEO Mark Read offered some resistance, suggesting the platforms "clearly haven't done enough" and that some changes to platform design may be required to safeguard brands and consumers.

Meanwhile brands, agencies - and the platforms themselves - launched the Global Alliance for Responsible Media at Cannes. Its remit is to cut down dangerous content, though the announcement was light on specifics.

But it could be privacy regulation that reins in behavioural targeting has the largest impact – on both platforms and marketers.

Locally, if the government decides to head in that direction following the ACCC's report, the implications could be “enormous”, according to Omnicom Media Group chief revenue officer, Kristiaan Kroon, affecting “not only how our clients might use a business like Google or Facebook, but also how they treat their own data and what we can – and cannot – buy into”.