The folks at Clario have put together a fascinating chart that breaks down which online platforms and brands collect the most data and what they know about us.

I thought it was worth sharing. Facebook and Instagram top the list (no surprise).

We all do it — click ‘accept’ on a cookie pop-up without reading any of the information, just so we can see a website sooner. It’s almost become second nature, with those little boxes getting in the way of what we actually want to do.

Clario Blog

Each time we visit, engage, and click, brands gather more and more personal information about us.

H/T Social Media Today

When you launch an advertising campaign, you want results. For B2C products, a digital ad with an incentive, such as a discount or limited-time sale, you can expect to track the ROI in short order. The sales cycle is short.

For B2B businesses, the sales cycle is much longer. 74% of B2B sales to new customers take 4 months or great. Almost half (46.4%) take 7 months or longer. It’s unrealistic to expect fast results when targeting B2B customers.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Measure ROI over the length of your sales cycle
• Don’t confuse Conversion Rates with ROI

So, when can you effectively measure the ROI? …

“Our investigation leaves no doubt that there is a clear and compelling need for Congress and the antitrust enforcement agencies to take action that restores competition, improves innovation, and safeguards our democracy.” — Rep. David Cicilline

After reviewing more than 1.3 million internal documents and interviewing more than 240 people and three dozen antitrust experts, and former employees of the major tech companies, the House Judiciary Committee’s Antitrust Subcommittee wrapped up its 16-month investigation. The report concludes that Apple, Amazon, Google, and Facebook have exploited their power of the marketplace in anticompetitive ways.

“This investigation has revealed that Apple, Amazon, Facebook, and Google were committed to drowning out competition through unfair and anti-competitive practices — often doing so at the expense of user privacy and innovation,” said Rep. Val Demings. “Their anticompetitive acts have come at a cost for consumers and small businesses.” …

We’re in for some big changes when it comes to tracking and advertising. While government regulators are making noise about taking action against major tech companies, the industry has not-so-quietly been making a couple of key changes that could lead to a cookie-less future.

Cookies are those things websites use to track you as you move around the internet. When you visit a site, it places a cookie on your computer so that it can know it’s you when your return. …

Here’s a new wrinkle to Google search for local businesses. Advertisers on Google can now display a green checkmark, which Google will tag businesses with either “Google Screened” or “Google Guaranteed.”

It’s only available right now for certain categories of business, such as law, financial planning, and real estate for the Screened badge and service-oriented companies for the Google Guaranteed mark. To get the checkmark, businesses will have to go through background checks, provide proof of insurance and licenses, and other paperwork. …

We’ve heard so much about cord-cutting in the past few years. As streaming has increased, broadband-only homes are on the rise and now make up as much as 37% of homes, according to Kagan.

If you’re wondering why those still paying for satellite or cable haven’t joined the cord-cutter movement, we have the answer:

The majority of Americans that pay for live television say the main reason is local and/or cable news, according to a new study done by Civic Science.

Facebook is publicly ramping up the battle with the Australian government over pending legislation that would force it to pay royalties for use of copyrighted news content.

It’s a battle being watched closely in both media and tech circles because the implications go farther than just what’s happening in Australia. The tech giants likely fear such legislation spreading in other places. There are already other proposals in the E.U.

The proposed internet reform law under consideration could require platforms, such as Facebook or Google, to pay royalties for news sourced from local publishers. It would also require Google and Facebook to provide advance notice of algorithm changes and user data — and suggests significant penalties for failure to comply. …

Digital giants’ dominance of advertising marketplace, control of online content put radio and TV broadcasters at competitive disadvantage

News Release from the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB)

The dominant marketplace power of a handful of digital technology platforms puts local broadcast radio and television stations at a competitive disadvantage for advertising revenue and impedes broadcasters’ ability to effectively monetize their own content online, said President and CEO Gordon Smith in a filing submitted to the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial and Administrative Law.

This overwhelming competitive position jeopardizes broadcasters’ ability to invest in, produce and deliver local news and information, Smith said.

Broadcast radio and TV stations rely heavily on advertising revenue to invest in local journalism, with TV stations spending an average of one-quarter of their total expenses on news costs. Only a slight majority of TV stations report profitable local news operations, the NAB filing asserts, and many radio stations in markets of all sizes struggle to make local news programming financially viable. However, the struggle to offset newsgathering expenses has become significantly more difficult as broadcast stations face advertising competition from a few giant digital platforms, the size and scale of which easily dwarf the entire broadcasting industry. …