Facebook *ahem meta* Responding: Tell Us What You Don't Want so we can Target you Better

This week Meta Platforms (f.k.a. Facebook...side note: does the name change remind you of Metta World Peace) announced that it would allow users to avoid being targeted with ads regarding certain topics like gambling or weight loss. These persistent advertisers are endemic examples of the abuses of digital marketing - pestering users, playing with their sense of self-restraint and self-worth, until they succumb to clicking on the ad and spending their hard-earned money on another scam.

In the short-term this move will likely hurt Meta's revenue only very slightly - these spots will be placed with other advertisers willing to pay just-about-as-much and only a small fraction of users will actually take the effort to choose to opt-out. Further, aren't the people who opt out less likely to click on the ad anyway??  This should give targeting this user group a higher CTR (and likely higher conversion rates once on the advertisers' sites) and thus a greater value to Meta (and the advertiser). 

The skeptic in me wonders whether Mark Zuckerberg has already done the calculus to know that in the medium term the increased data from users opting out of receiving these ads will more than offset the short-term loss in revenue given this new and unique data source incremental to what is already being captured by Meta.

The fact that when Meta makes a seemingly-altruistic decision to reduce some of the excesses on its platform, I immediately think about the broader narrative and assume there is a profit motive at play speaks to the loss of trust that Meta is suffering from across many parts of its business - from regulatory concerns, to user attrition, to partners flocking to other platforms.  How long will this loss of trust endure?  Will Stella (ahem Meta) get her groove back?

Trying to distract us with name changes and token sacrifices (that may not actually be sacrifices) is akin to a Hoodini trick / Kansas-City-Shuffle / bait-and-switch but will not restore trust. Only actually being trustworthy and making many good decisions over the course of multiple years can do that. Maybe Mark and Meta should try it.

Source: https://adage.com/article/digital-marketing-ad-tech-news/facebook-ad-changes-restrict-abusive-targeting-can-limit-weight-loss-and-gambling-ads/2379356