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Every Tech Company is an Ad Company 📺
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Every Tech Company is an Ad Company 📺
At first glance, companies like Google, Meta, Uber and Netflix might seem to be players in vastly different areas.
But delve deeper, and a hidden thread binds them all: the relentless pursuit of monetizing attention through advertising - termed as the “Dark Beating Heart of the Internet” by Tim Hwang.
Today, the most precious commodity isn’t gold or oil - it’s attention. And who better to mine this rich being than tech giants armed with terabytes of user data and sophisticated algorithms.
Lyft recently announced that riders would see ads on their ETA screen while waiting for their taxi and during transit.
They stated that their audience checks their phone “nearly nine times on average” during a ride. That’s nine glances going unmonetized - a grave error, now corrected.
It wants to replicate the success of its rival, Uber which generated a $900 million run-rate with their in-app advertising business.
Instacart’s IPO last year, highlighted an eye-opening fact: Advertising contributed to more than 30% of their revenue, making it a fundamental pillar of their business model.
Netflix, the OG streaming platform, has also hopped on this ad-train. Remember the “good ‘ol days” of cable TV with its never-ending ads? Netflix promised to bring those days back with its ad-supported tier.
Amazon, the e-commerce behemoth has slowly scaled its advertising business to a gargantuan $38 billion in 2022, third only to Google and Meta - the advertising duopolies of the world.
Instacart has 10 million MAUs.
Uber has 130 million MAUs.
Netflix has 240 million MAUs.
It’s no wonder they’re all thinking: “Why not print some dollars off of these millions of eyeballs”.
Source: Insider Intelligence
“You either die a hero as a company or live long enough to see yourself become the villain an advertising company”
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