Today in Digital Marketing - So, What Happens to Twitter Ads Now?

Episode Date: April 27, 2022

Are people already abandoning Twitter before Musk takes over?... A look at what the future holds for advertisers on Twitter... YouTube's ad revenue momentum is slowing, and hitting Google where it hurts... But it has a solution, and it involves its TikTok clone... And how will the Google Ads extension update impact your accounts?Go Premium! No ads, weekend editions, story links, audio chapters, better audio quality, earlier release time, and more.Get each episode as a daily email newsletter (with images, videos, and links).HELPFUL LINKS:ADS: Reach thousands of marketers from as low as $20 with our ad options.MORE CONTENT: Email newsletter, expert interviews, and blog posts.HANG OUT: Join our Slack communityEnjoying the Show? Tweet about us • Rate and review • Send a voicemailFOLLOW US:The Show: LinkedIn • TikTok • Reddit • FB Page • FB GroupTod: Twitter • LinkedIn • TikTok • Twitch • InstagramRECOMMENDED:Jyll Saskin Gales — Inside Google Ads Andrew Foxwell — Foxwell Founders Membership • Scaling After iOS14 • All CoursesCheck out the steep "Podcast Perks" marketing discounts we've negotiated for youOthers — AppSumo lifetime marketing deals • Riverside.FM podcast recording siteCREDITS:Today in Digital Marketing is hosted by Tod Maffin and produced by engageQ digital on the traditional territories of the Snuneymuxw First Nation on Vancouver Island, Canada. Our associate producer is Steph Gunn. Ad coordination by RedCircle. Production coordination by Sarah Guild. Theme music by Mark Blevis. All other music licensed by Source Audio.(If the links in the show notes do not work in your podcast app, visit https://todayindigital.com )Some links in these show notes may provide us with a commission.Our Sponsors:* Check out Kinsta: https://kinsta.comPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Today, are people already abandoning Twitter before Elon Musk takes over? A look at what the future holds for advertisers on the platform? YouTube's ad revenue momentum is slowing and hitting Google where it hurts. But it has a solution, and it involves its TikTok clone. And how will the Google Ads extension update impact your ad campaigns? It's Tuesday, April 27th. I'm Todd Mathen. Here's what you missed today in digital marketing. So are people abandoning Twitter before Elon Musk even takes over? Following the announcement that the richest man in the world would take over the ship,

several high-profile users reported massive decreases in followers. The company confirmed that these fluctuations in follower counts were not from bots. TechCrunch reports that Barack Obama, who is the most followed account on the platform, lost more than 300,000 followers after the news broke. Mark Hamill, another high-profile user and Jedi, tweeted, Weird, I just lost more than 8,000 followers in the last couple of hours.

Was it something I said? Meanwhile, right-wing politicians are gaining followers. Twitter says, actually, it's a little more complicated. Quote, appear to largely have been an increase in new account creation and deactivation. Unquote. How is the industry responding to Musk's takeover? We asked our Slack community of over 800 digital marketers if they plan to change how their brand uses Twitter once Elon Musk owns it. Michelle said it's a wait-and-see game as far as she's concerned.

I think that's how a lot of us feel right now. But the fluctuation in followers on the platform suggests you may want to keep a close eye on the platform and its ad performance over the coming months. And maybe join our Slack community too. It's free. It's at todayindigital.com slash Slack or tap the link in the show notes. If that isn't enough to make you rethink your brand strategy on Twitter, an interesting think piece in Adweek today suggests that advertisers on the platform may indeed face a volatile future. We know Musk's stated plans for Twitter include adding new products, making algorithms open source, and defeating the spam bots. But what will the future of advertising look like there?

The piece suggests that the future of Twitter advertising actually may look bleak for a few reasons. The first idea is that Twitter may become a less significant platform for paid social budgets. However, of course, for the platform to survive, it needs ads or other sustainable revenue sources. Twitter already accounts for less than 1% of global digital ad spending, according to Insider Intelligence. Despite the company's revenue exceeding $5.5 billion this year, its ad business is still significantly smaller than its competitors, and advertising accounted for 90% of its revenue last year.

The second reason? Brand safety. Marketers are wary of running campaigns alongside controversial or politicized content due to Musk's reputation as a free speech warrior and his efforts to promote free speech on Twitter. The third and final reason points to Musk's blatant aversion to advertising. In a now-deleted tweet, he advocated for the removal of all ads from the platform, stating, quote, the power of corporations to dictate policy is greatly enhanced if Twitter depends on advertising money to survive. Yesterday, Alphabet, Google's parent company, reported an 8% drop in quarterly profit for Q1, falling short of analysts' expectations. The company's profit fell from a year ago when it posted a $4.8 billion gain and experienced

a major rebound in demand for digital advertising. What's to blame? YouTube. Specifically, much lower revenue growth than expected. Analysts expected YouTube ad sales to be about 25% up. Instead, it was only 14% up. According to the company, several factors have affected marketing spend, including the war in Ukraine, rising inflation, and, of course, adjusting to Apple's privacy features. But YouTube's steep decline could also suggest that some brands may be shifting their budgets to other platforms.

A finger was also pointed at a decline in search ad growth. Search ads grew nearly 25%, but that was a decline from the over 35% increase in the fourth quarter of 2021. And so here's how YouTube appears to be planning to regain some momentum. Ads are being tested on Shorts. It's short form video format, which competes with TikTok and Reels.

Advertisements have been slow to appear on the format, despite running on the rest of the platform. However, following news that YouTube ad revenue fell short of expectations, the company also noted a drop in direct response ads, such as app install campaigns. Now the company has told investors it is experimenting with monetization on Shorts, specifically with app install ads and other promotions. This is according to Bloomberg.

YouTube Shorts now generate 30 billion daily views, according to Google. Do you have business insurance? If not, how would you pay to recover from a cyber attack, fire damage, theft, or a lawsuit? No business or profession is risk-free. Without insurance, your assets are at risk from major financial losses, data breaches, and natural disasters. Get customized coverage today starting at $19 per month at zensurance.com. Be protected. Be Zen. So while some users may be fleeing Twitter and YouTube fell below expectations,

here are a few updates on how the other platforms are faring. First, Snapchat reached 332 million daily active users at the end of its first quarter of this year. The company also reported revenue of $1 billion, up almost 40% year-over-year. That's Snapchat. Next up, LinkedIn. The latest Microsoft performance update reported a 35% year-over-year increase in revenue to almost $3.5 billion for the professional network, as well as what they called record levels of user engagement. Finally, remember all the controversy surrounding Spotify and Joe Rogan podcast and stuff? Well, its users apparently don't seem to care that they can't listen to Neil Young anymore.

In its first quarter, the streaming platform says its premium subscribers rose 15% to 182 million. Monthly active users also saw an increase growing by almost a fifth to 422 million. Google appears to be phasing out the Google Business Profile Manager even after it said that the tool would still be available for larger businesses with multiple locations. Some people are reporting that when they go to the Business Profile Manager at google.com slash business, even if they have multiple locations, they see a notice that says, quote, managing your business profile is moving to search and maps. From early 2022, you can no longer manage your business here. Google Business Profile Manager is changing to

make management easier. You can now access everything directly on search and maps, unquote. The notice has two buttons. One says stay here and the other says try it on search. When you click stay here, you're taken to a short poll asking you if you tried to manage your business listings in Google search or on Google Maps. If you say yes, you should be asked if you'd like to continue using Google Business Profile Manager. For how long, though? Nobody knows.

On the good news side, though, on May 1st, which is this Sunday, the Google Ads extension upgrade will be fully rolled out. Here's what's changing. The upgrade involves a new feature that allows you to pause extensions, which Google says won't affect the performance of your ads or extensions. The upgrade will also allow standard extensions to live alongside automated extensions. With this upgrade, Google says advertisers will have, quote, greater visibility into automated extensions for the first time,

and more control if they decide they want to use them as part of their campaign, unquote. Automated extensions will also be able to be paused by advertisers. Last but not least, once upgraded, sitelinks, callouts, and structured snippets extensions can trickle down to lower levels of a campaign. To prepare for the migration, it might be a good idea to double-check that all of your account, campaign, sitelinks, callouts, and structured snippet extensions are acceptable for all your ads and ads groups.

But here's what's going away. Device preference for mobile in all extensions, start and end date in call extensions, and ad schedules in app extensions. And finally, just at our deadline, Meta reported its results. ARPU, that's average revenue per user, exceeded the expectations of analysts, but pretty much every other number was off, including the important monthly active users metric. Revenue rose 7% in the first quarter of this year, but that is the first time in Facebook's decade-long history as a public company that growth has been in the single digits.

We will, of course, have more about this tomorrow. For the two words we have been waiting for months to be spoken, we're spoken at our house today. But the joists are good. The new beam is good. That the foundation is good. Yeah. The weight of the hot tub would be distributed to the existing wall and to here.

So, it's fine. It's fine! Those were the words I've been waiting for. I don't know. I still don't have the bill from the structural engineer, so I don't know how much each word in that very short sentence is going to cost us, but our tiny little hot tub can finally go up on the deck without fear of, you know, everything crashing to the ground.

Don't forget, if you've got a marketing position you're trying to fill or maybe you're looking for that next great gig, consider a classified ad right here. It's just 20 bucks. You can book it online. Link in the show notes. I'm going to be out of town for business for the next couple of days. So in my stead, of course, our associate producer, the intrepid Steph Gunn, will be here. I will see you on Monday. They say dreams don't come true. I know that they do. Be the last one standing.

Don't give up, no. See it through. Look to the horizon. Be the star in you.