By Lou Mastria
Big Idea: Every part of America benefits when responsible digital ads flourish. From Main Street entrepreneurs who use IBA to build business to the millions of local jobs created by a thriving ad-driven economy, digital advertising powers America.
Big idea (cont.): To protect those benefits, our industry has built an independent self-regulatory system that provides all Americans with simple and convenient access to information and control over the types of advertising they receive.
Digital Advertising Puts Customers on Main Street
Scroll your local news site, stream your home team’s video highlights, chat on your favorite social media app, or play your favorite online game, and you’ll see the ads that support those popular services.
Digital ads fund free or low-cost access for all Americans to millions of popular apps, websites, and services ranging from video to news, sports, weather, search, games, education, social media, music, communications, reference, productivity, and more.
In fact, when a survey asked Americans to put a value on the free digital content, services, and apps that are currently funded by advertising, consumers said those services would be worth more than $1,400 annually, if they had to pay for them.
But ads do more than pay for free digital content and services. They create millions of jobs, help small business owners grow, increase competition, and drive our economy’s success. Advertising provides timely information on sales and discounts, drives traffic to reservation systems for local restaurants, offers information on hours and locations; help people discover new products and services, and provides a vital communications channel between businesses and their customers.
Ask any small business owner or entrepreneur in your state how they plan to grow their business and succeed, and their answer will almost involve advertising. Digital advertising has allowed millions of local businesses spanning the spectrum from car dealerships to realtors, coffee shops, dry cleaners, plumbers, clothing stores, restaurants, and gyms to find customers in their communities.
Take an example of a new business selling sports apparel in your community. Digital advertising allows that business to deliver ads to the people who are most likely to be interested in their products. Rather than sending out generic and ineffective ads, they can deliver ads for racing gear to NASCAR fans, basketball all-stars to hoops aficionados, and UFC superstars to fight night addicts.
More and more, digital is providing opportunities to small and mid-size businesses to compete with larger and more established companies. At a recent industry conference, case studies showed how local businesses can now advertise on the Olympics, NFL, college football, and other previously out-of-reach media properties through the programmatic ad tech which fuels the web and, increasingly, streaming services. Small and mid-sized companies now have the ability to make sub-$1,000 buys and compete with multi-billion-dollar brands throughout the digital advertising universe.
From the smallest startup to the largest global brand, advertising drives business, delights consumers… and creates jobs.
A new study from S&P Global Market Intelligence found that US advertising supports more than 29 million American jobs, or nearly one in five positions (18.3%) in the workforce. The financial benefits for the economy are equally notable, as advertising drove 21.9% of total sales in the economy, or $10.4 trillion of US economic output.
Whenever there are economic shocks, the question policymakers and Main Street alike ask each time is: Will consumers return? Time and again, relevant, responsible advertising has helped fuel recoveries and revive consumer confidence.
Responsible Advertising Puts the Individual in Control
While advertising is a powerful driver of jobs, entrepreneurship, and growth, the success of every campaign depends on consumer trust, and the digital advertising industry has built a comprehensive self-regulatory program to provide individuals with information and control over the types of advertising they receive.
The centerpiece of that program is the Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA), a not-for-profit founded by the industry’s leading associations, which established the industry’s foundational Principles for self-regulation more than a decade ago. Those principles – spanning transparency, consumer control, data security, and accountability – set baseline standards for every company that operates in digital advertising, and they are independently enforced by the DAA’s accountability partners at BBB National Programs and the Association of National Advertisers (ANA), who have undertaken more than 140 compliance actions since the program’s launch.
On the consumer side, the DAA gives every American information and control over the types of advertising they receive through the ubiquitous AdChoices icon, the small blue triangular icon that appears in the corner of most ads, on the footer of popular websites, and through many privacy policies and apps.
AdChoices serves as a gateway to information and control over each individual’s advertising experience, allowing a person to get information about the source of the ad they are viewing and choose whether they want to receive interest-based advertising from that ad network or opt-out of all ad networks at once.
A recent survey demonstrated the success of the AdChoices initiative, as large majorities of respondents said they recognized the icon (79%), found it useful (78%), described it as easy to understand (85%), and said it increased trust in the advertisers who used it (72%).
To reach their audiences and drive growth, advertisers of all sizes need to work with platform and technology partners who have the reach and expertise the brand may lack. This interaction is like the specialized firms auto manufacturers use to transport their vehicles from factories to dealer lots, the retail partners who drive sales for cell phone providers, the special effects partners for companies in the entertainment industry, or a thousand other examples from other industries.
Small Businesses Depend on Advertising Partners to Reach Customers
In the interest of transparency and control, DAA makes these intermediary companies visible to consumers, so each consumer can make his or her own choices about data collection and use with these companies via a single unified interface. In this aspect, the digital advertising industry is more transparency and control-focused than many others.
Moving from Self-Regulatory Success to an Effective National Standard
The DAA joins its association partners and companies across the industry in strongly supporting a preemptive national privacy law that protects both consumers and the digital advertising ecosystem. Until such a law has been enacted, the DAA’s self-regulatory programs will continue to serve as a vital national standard, as The Wall Street Journal recently noted, and as a universally available tool for consumers to express their privacy preferences.
As Congress considers future privacy legislation, we hope members will recognize the extraordinary value for their constituents and the nation in the advertising-supported ecosystem and codify a unified federal standard that protects Americans against bad actors, sets common-sense safeguards around the use of sensitive data, and continues to give consumers information and control over their online advertising experience.
