iOS 14, Privacy, and the Future of Digital Advertising

UPDATE: I have recorded the presentation that was delivered in the Clubhouse room and released it as a podcast, which can be found on Spotify below: The Mobile Dev Memo podcast is available on: Apple PodcastsSpotifyGoogle Podcasts — This week, I am running an experiment: in lieu of my regular Monday column, I...

4d

Podcast: The future of mobile attribution with Maor Sadra and Peter Hamilton

In this episode of the MDM Podcast, I speak with mobile ad tech veterans Maor Sadra (CEO of INCRMNTAL) and Peter Hamilton (former CEO of TUNE) about Applovin’s acquisition of Adjust, whether fingerprinting will be a viable attribution mechanism post-ATT, and the nature of mobile ad fraud. The Mobile Dev Memo podcast is available on: Apple...

4d

The CPM math doesn’t work

One theory being circulated related to Apple’s soon-to-be-implemented ATT privacy policy is that the CPM compression caused by degraded ad targeting efficiency will allow many advertisers to spend more money, given that ad inventory will become cheaper. The second-order effect of this being that competition for impressions will increase as these advertisers...

2w

Why doesn’t Google have to show the ATT prompt?

In this episode of the MDM Podcast, I unpack a very specific, very important question with my guest, Thomas Petit: Why doesn’t Google have to show the ATT prompt? This discussion was catalyzed by the enormous amount of confusion that was created when Google announced last month that it would not expose the ATT prompt in its owned-and-operated...

3w

The profound, unintended consequence of ATT: content fortresses

With its ATT privacy policy, Apple is diminishing the ability for advertising to be personalized by limiting the use of third-party data for that purpose. In doing this, Apple is imbuing first-party data with an incredible value premium. The products that command the most first-party data will operate as autonomous content ecosystems, subsuming all...

3w

What’s the standard for ATT 6-bit conversion values?

This guest post was written by David Philippson, the CEO of DataSeat Last week Apple published a privacy white paper, “A day in the life of your data”, to coincide with Tim Cook’s presentation to the EU on data protection. This solidified the timeline for IDFA deprecation, specifying that App Tracking Transparency (ATT) is being rolled out in...

4w

Workshop: Understanding and preparing for AppTrackingTransparency in iOS 14

Click here to register for the workshop I have been asked by a number of advertisers to re-launch the How to Build and Scale successful apps without the IDFA workshop series I delivered over the course of August. Given the demand, I have decided to run a limited workshop series called Understanding and preparing for AppTrackingTransparency in...

4w

“Allow this app to personalize advertising for you?”

Last week, I circulated a thought experiment on Twitter. What if, instead of the verbiage that currently decorates the App Tracking Transparency prompt, the prompt text read: In an alternate universe…(1/X) pic.twitter.com/S9jbDOKFY7— Eric Seufert (@eric_seufert) February 2, 2021 Predictably, the tweet received a fair amount of pushback....

4w

Why did Applovin buy Adjust?

Yesterday, Applovin, the mobile ad platform and games publisher that is rumored to be going public in 2021, announced that it has acquired Adjust, the Berlin-based mobile advertising attribution company. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, although I have been told by a number of people that the cash price was substantially less than the $1BN amount...

5w

Apple privileges its own ad network with ATT. What’s its privacy endgame?

Last week, I highlighted on Twitter the fact that Apple published documentation for a new API called the Apple Ads Attribution API for its Search Ads platform on January 6th. This new API provides more actionable granularity to advertisers than the SKAdNetwork framework. Mobile advertisers will be forced to adopt SKAdNetwork for users that opt out of...

Feb 2021