Prohibited ads across Search and Social platforms

Part of managing successful ad campaigns involves knowing what types of ad content is disallowed and what’s restricted across the social and search ad landscapes. Most prohibited content (counterfeit goods, illegal products, and services, etc.) and restricted content (political ads, alcohol, etc.) follow similar standards from one platform to the next but each company has its own set of rules.

Across all social and search ad platforms, the standard rules apply for prohibited ads: no promoting counterfeit goods, tobacco, illegal products or services. No promotions that include trademark or copyright infringement or fraudulent and deceptive practices. Restricted ad content – ads you can run, but with certain limitations – are a bit more varied from platform to platform. Some platforms make their rules easy to follow or refrain from getting too much into the minutiae of things, while others are very specific. The following list gives marketers a general idea of each platform prohibited and restricted ad guidelines, while also calling out the more unique policies from site to site.

Facebook and Instagram

Facebook’s prohibited ad content across its family of apps includes the standards: no ads promoting illegal products or services, tobacco products or firearms and weapons. It also prohibits ads for surveillance equipment or any ad content that includes third-party infringement (no ads that violate copyright, trademark, privacy, publicity or other personal or proprietary rights).  

But there are a few topics worth noting. For example, the company does not allow ads that lead to a non-functioning landing page, “This includes landing page content that interferes with a person’s ability to navigate away from the page.” You cannot advertise for payday loans, paycheck advancement services or bail bonds. And here’s one that makes anyone wonder if there was a specific instance that inspired the rule: Facebook does not allow the sale of body parts.

For restricted content, advertisers wanting to promote online dating services must receive permission from the platform before running ads, same with political and issue-related ads and cryptocurrency products and services. Promotions around gambling, state lotteries, OTC drugs and online pharmacies also come with restrictions.

Google and YouTube

Google keeps its prohibited and restricted ads general, outlining a high-level overview of what’s prohibited and what’s restricted. Prohibited ad content includes: Counterfeit goods, Dangerous products or services, Ads that enable dishonest behavior, Inappropriate content.

Google also separates out ad practices it prohibits abusing the ad network, misrepresentation and data collection, and use.

The company’s list of restricted ad content is more comprehensive, but still stays within the usual parameters without any odd items – like human body parts. Google’s restricted content ad policies include: Adult content, Alcohol, Copyrights, Gambling, and games, Healthcare and medicines, Political content, Financial services, Trademarks, Legal requirements (all ads must comply with the laws and regulations pertaining to the location where the ad is displayed). Google keeps its ad policies at a high-level for the most part, a tactic that gives the company more control to decide on a case-by-case basis what’s allowed and what’s not.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is a Microsoft-owned platform, but it's prohibited and restricted ad policies are separate from the rules outlined for Microsoft and Bing. In addition to the usual disallowed content, LinkedIn’s list of prohibited ads has some interesting entries. For example, the site does not allow ads for downloadable ringtones and occult pursuits (“Ads for fortune-telling, dream interpretations, and individual horoscopes are prohibited, except when the emphasis is on amusement rather than serious interpretation”).

Also, instead of having restrictive measures around political ads, LinkedIn prohibits any political ad content, the same as its parent company: no ads advocating for or against a political candidate or promoting ballot propositions. LinkedIn’s restricted ad content includes the following: Alcohol, Animal products, Dating services, Soliciting funds, Medical devices, Short-term loans, and financial services.

One side note about LinkedIn’s ad policies, the company specifically states that it prohibits ads that are offensive to good taste. “This means ads must not be, for example, hateful, vulgar, sexually suggestive or violent. In special circumstances, LinkedIn may determine that an ad that was acceptable is no longer appropriate as we update our policies to reflect new laws or clarify our position.”

Microsoft (Bing)

Microsoft’s disallows and restricted ad policies, which includes rules for Bing search ads can be confusing to follow. The company has published a one-page list of “Restricted and disallowed content policies,” but within that page are links to more detailed pages for “Disallowed content policies” and “Disallowed and restricted products and services policies”.

Microsoft disallows any election-related content, political parties, candidates and ballot measures. Ads promoting fundraising efforts for political candidates, parties, PACs and ballot measures are also prohibited. As with other platforms, Microsoft doesn’t allow weapons to be advertised on its platforms. This includes firearms and ammunition, but also knives: “Knives that are positioned as weapons or whose primary use is violence, including switchblade knives, disguised knives, buckle knives, lipstick case knives, air gauge knives, knuckle knives and writing pen knives.” In Brazil, India, and Vietnam, Microsoft does not allow advertising that promotes infant feeding products such as baby formula, feeding bottles, rubber nipples or baby food of any kind.

Pinterest

Pinterest’s prohibited ad content guidelines follow the standard themes. No ads for Drugs and paraphernalia, Endangered species and live animals, Illegal products and services, Counterfeit goods, Sensitive content, Tobacco, Unacceptable business practices, Weapons, and explosives.

Pinterest defines “Sensitive content” as anything it deems divisive or disturbing. For example, language or imagery that is offensive or profane, excessively violent or gory, vulgar or sickening or politically, culturally or racially divisive or insensitive. It also does not allow content that capitalizes on controversial or tragic events – or references to sensitive health and medical conditions.

Pinterest does not allow any “Adult and nudity content” in ads on its platform. Also, ads containing clickbait are disallowed. Like LinkedIn, it prohibits political campaign ads. The company keeps its list of restricted ad content simple with a detailed outline of what it will and won’t allow around its restricted content. For example, ads that include contests, sweepstakes, and Pinterest incentives are restricted. Advertisers are asked not to require users to save a specific image or suggest that Pinterest in any way sponsors or endorses the promotion. It does state specifically that advertisers are not allowed to promote anything that, “Directs people to click on Pinterest buttons to get money, prizes or deals.”

Pinterest’s other restricted ad content includes: Alcohol, Financial products and services (ads promoting cryptocurrencies and payday loans are prohibited), Gambling products and services (no ads for lotteries, gambling gaming apps or gambling websites), Healthcare products and services. In terms of its healthcare-related ads, Pinterest does allow ads promoting products like eyeglasses or content lenses, Class I and II medical devices and OTC, non-prescription medicines. It does not allow ads for weight loss or appetite suppressant pills and supplements or promotions that claim unrealistic cosmetic results.

Reddit

Reddit’s list of prohibited and restricted list of ads follows suit with the other social platforms. Disallowed ads include promotions for counterfeit goods, hazardous products or services, illegal or fraudulent products or services and more of the same standard policies. It states specifically that advertisers are prohibited from using inappropriate targeting: “All targeting must be relevant, appropriate, and in compliance with relevant legal obligations of the advertiser.”

Reddit does not allow advertisements for addiction treatment centers and services, it does not accept advertising pertaining to political issues, elections or candidates outside of the U.S. It has a very specific list of financial services and products that are disallowed, including bail bonds, payday loans, debt assistance programs, cryptocurrency wallets, credit and debit cards, and “get rich quick schemes.”

Any advertiser wanting to promote gambling-related services must have their ads manually approved and certified by Reddit: “In order to be approved, the advertiser must be actively working with a Reddit Sales Representative.” This does not include ads for gaming promotions where nothing of value is exchanged, gambling-related merchandise or hotel-casinos where the ad is focused on the hotel. And while Reddit does allow ads for dating sites, apps and services, it prohibits any centered-on infidelity, fetish communities or any that discriminate by excluding persons of specific races, sexuality, religions, or political affiliations.

Snapchat

Snapchat’s prohibited ads include the usual suspects, but there are also entries that appear to be designed because of its younger audience. For example, the platform states specifically that it does not allow ads that, “Encourage Snapping and driving or other dangerous behaviors.” Also, it disallows ads intended to “shock the user” and no ads for app installs from sources other than the official app store for the user’s device. Other prohibited ads include any promotions that involve: Infringing content, Deceptive content, Hateful or discriminatory content, Inappropriate content.

Snapchat’s restricted ads for alcohol include a list of 18 countries where alcohol ads cannot be placed. Alcohol ad campaigns that run in allowed countries must not appeal particularly to minors or encourage excessive consumption of alcoholic beverages. They must also refrain from glamorizing alcohol, “Or otherwise misrepresent the effects of consuming alcohol.” Snapchat requires alcohol advertisers to include warning labels such as “Please drink responsibly” within their ad copy.

Also, alcohol promotions must be targeted to users who meet the legal drinking age requirement within the country where the ads run. The same goes for gambling and lottery related ads – they must be targeted to users who meet the legal age requirement to gamble. Same as Reddit, Snapchat allows ads for dating services, but they must be targeted to users age 18 and over, and cannot include provocative, overtly sexual content or reference prostitution. Also, Snapchat does not allow ads that promote infidelity.

Many of Snapchat’s restrictive ad policies are by country. For example, it only permits targeting lottery-related ads to 14 countries, including Brazil, Iraq, Italy, Poland, and Russia – but not the U.S. Snapchat does not permit targeting ads for online dating services to Bahrain, Egypt, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. Advertisers cannot target ads for OTC medicines in Columbia, Iraq, Lebanon, Romania, Spain, and Turkey. It also does not permit targeting ads for condoms in Bahrain, Ireland, Kuwait, Lebanon, Monaco, Oman, Poland, and Qatar.

Twitter

Twitter’s list of prohibited and restricted ads are arguably the easiest to follow. There are no out of the ordinary ads disallowed on the platform, and its restrictive policies are the same standard rules applied across the social ad landscape. The one area where Twitter distinguishes its policies from other platforms is by stating specifically that it prohibits ads promoting malware products and has restrictions around promotions for software downloads.

It’s worth noting that the ad content policies listed here for each of the platforms are as they stand now, but social platforms have a history of regularly changing their ad content policies. This has happened most notably during the past year and a half with political advertisements. Facebook has gone back and forth with its rules around cryptocurrency ads, totally banning the ads in January 2018 and then reversing its policies six months later. It wasn’t until last year Facebook began implementing ad targeting restrictions for weapon accessory ads to users 18 years and older.

Components of Mobile Audience Marketing

The birth of digital advertising brought with it the sophisticated use of data for audience targeting. While the cookie has served as the de facto mechanism for building audiences across desktop advertising, privacy-compliant location data now serves as the primary component of mobile audience marketing, through the use of location-based marketing strategies like geo-targeting and geo-conquesting.

However, marketers primarily focus on one component of mobile audience-marketing today – reaching the right audience. There’s growing attention on attribution, a second element, which shows that online ads result in physical retail sales. There’s also a third element to successful audience marketing which receives little attention today – understanding that audience before the sale of the campaign even occurs. Marketers looking to build out mobile marketing are missing roughly two-thirds of the picture that’s available to them today.

When creating the initial concept for a campaign, we’ve seen the most successful companies use location-based analytics to inform their sales pitches and presentations before the campaign even begins. They’re using data to learn how frequently customers visit their locations to segment their audience based upon loyalty. They’re evaluating which competitive locations their audience also visits to influence that audience and increase the efficiency of their ad spend. One of the most effective use cases is agencies and sales teams using this data early in the sales cycle to help their clients visualize and understand their audience, which boosts not only their credibility but also their ability to win the business.

The second component of mobile audience-marketing involves building and reaching the audience. There are numerous platforms available today that provide a black-box approach to buying very broad location-based audiences, such as Target shoppers or coffee drinkers. There is an elegant simplicity in choosing a pre-built audience, and there are always campaigns that are a great fit for this tactic.

On the flip side, if there’s one thing that Facebook and Google have proven when it comes to audience targeting; marketers absolutely love to see high degrees of transparency, flexibility and customizability as to how those audiences are made. They love taking control of the creation of the audience. Marketers that plan the most effective mobile campaigns spend a few extra minutes customizing the specific locations and date ranges that comprise their audience. They’re using the data and the visualizations they generated in the first step to increase their return-on-investment.

The last component of mobile audience marketing, and easily the most difficult, is attributing digital campaigns to in-store foot traffic and purchases. Advertisers increasingly ask for this, but there is still no holistic solution that can provide the answer. Fundamentally, this problem remains unsolved because of all of the various data silos that aren’t able to communicate with one another. The ad seen on TV can’t inform your phone or laptop that it’s also seen the ad, while the point-of-sale system or online checkout can’t notify those previous touch points to confirm the sale occurred.

Despite these challenges, true attribution will be available someday. In the meantime, marketers owe it to themselves to test multiple approaches to measure the effectiveness of their campaigns. When considered from the “audience” perspective, we see companies looking to evaluate how this audience behaved after the campaign. They’re looking to answer questions like “Did the frequency of visitation increase?” “Did my foot traffic increase against my competitors with this audience?” “From which competitors am I winning market share?” Reporting that provides insight into how a campaign influenced a digital audience’s behavior in the physical world wins bonus points within marketing teams and with clients. There are also benefits to using different solutions that provide audience building, media spend, activation and attribution. By working with various companies, there is limited opportunity for bias in the results, and therefore, marketers can have more trust in the data.

The ability to reach and understand audiences across desktop advertising is mature. As mobile marketing increasingly dominates ad spend, and the use of geo-targeting strategies rises, the use cases and techniques also evolve. Mobile marketing initially adopted many of the tried-and-true approaches from the desktop ecosystem. As mobile advertising begins to mature, so does the ability for marketers to use data before, during and after campaigns. This comprehensive approach ultimately increases the effectiveness and credibility of campaigns.

Why Businesses can’t run without Google and Facebook

Google controls many of the ways businesses access customers online making it almost impossible to run a company without buying advertising from the internet giant. As politicians increase scrutiny of large technologies companies, Google’s lock on these digital relationships is becoming a potential liability. While consumers pay nothing for most Google services, some businesses say they often can’t avoid giving more money to the company because the internet giant is the main source of answers when go online to get information.

While Facebook matches advertisers with people interested in certain topics, Google can tell what a person really wants, right as that person types their query into the search bar. Showing up at the top of search results is imperative for most companies and in recent years Google has changed its software, especially on smartphones, to make buying ads the best way to achieve that goal. It’s not possible to run a business without advertising on Google.

Nowhere is Google’s power more pervasive and potentially damaging to businesses than in the esoteric market for ‘branded keywords’. This is where businesses buy ads based on their brand names. Some businesses say that they have to buy these ads whatever the cost because rivals can bid on the keywords too. In recent years, this pressure has increased because on mobile devices Google search ads show up at the top of the results, rather than on the side of the page with desktop results. This means people are more likely to click on the ads, rather than the free, ‘organic’ links to companies’ websites.

Google has said in the past that it doesn’t break antitrust laws and that competition online is just a click away. Google also regularly stresses that it never accepts payment to be included in or to be ranked higher in organic search results and doesn’t manipulate search rankings to benefit advertisers. Beyond just branded keywords, the cost of all types of Google search ads has been rising at about 5% a year, according to Merkle, that’s well ahead of US inflation, which is running at 1.6% currently.

Many Google advertisers are happy to pay more because the company has so much data that it can target the marketing messages and generate big returns on that spending. When it comes to brand keywords, some advertisers will spend beyond what makes sense. These decisions are not as rational. That’s a question that comes up when advertisers see costs go up. People are thinking about that and testing it by stopping buying those branded keywords to see what happens. These tests usually result in a decline in traffic, both from search ads and from free, on organic results.  How big depends on the advertiser.

Future of TV Ads in Digital World

Television continues to play a central role in the way that we consume news and entertainment, whether the content comes from a traditional network or via a streaming service. While viewing habits have shifted, cords have been cut and mobile phones have become first screens, we still like watching TV. We still define the content we watch as a “television program” and we often still want to view that content on a TV set in our living room or den.

In many cases, TV set is just one of many screens that we are cycling through as we participate in social media conversations. Our viewing habits have been evolving ever since cable was introduced in the 1970s and they will no doubt continue to change. But for now, TV in its new and advanced form remains a central part of the media ecosystem.

As streaming and over-the-top (OTT) distribution models have matured, a new umbrella term has emerged to describe what TV has become: Advanced TV. It represents the convergence of old-style linear TV with streaming video delivered through OTT platforms and digitally enabled connected TVs. Marketers and brands must grapple with all that Advanced TV offers because it provides marketers with a full-screen captive experience with the targeting power of digital.

Advanced TV enables marketers to optimize reach and influence today’s hyperconnected consumer. Marketers can now serve the most impactful advertising content, trigger campaigns that sync with local events or weather conditions, deliver ads based on first-party data and get real-time analytics of viewing habits, depending on the sophistication of the TV platform, network and/or provider.

Currently, Smart TVs, OTT devices such as Apple TV or Roku, game consoles such as PlayStation and connected TVs offer the most digital bells and whistles, but more and more households are becoming directly addressable through the cable and satellite providers, meaning that brands can target individual households within the broadcast environment of linear TV.

There is not currently a unified measurement standard that aligns broadcast and digital reach, and audience targeting is still complex. Nielsen released its cross-media measurement solution, Total Content Ratings, after media companies reportedly pressured Nielsen to slow down the rollout because it was not ready for prime time. Privacy is a key consideration that must be navigated.  However, emerging measurement and data techniques are arriving from all corners of the industry, with the ability to provide more advanced data than ever before, helping marketers to more easily reach their objectives.

Ways to stay ahead in Digital Advertising

In the last three decades, the evolution of the advertising industry has accelerated almost unimaginably. The gradual movement from Print to Audio, and then to Television, has been replaced by the leaps and bounds of the digital age. If we are going to continue to meet the industry’s needs, it’s vital that we adapt quickly to keep up. No matter how much support executives offer, though, a big part of learning is self-directed. Here are some tips:-

Be Curious – Research shows that not only are we better at learning things we are interested in, but we’re also actually more receptive to new information, regardless of subject, when we’re working on something that inspires our curiosity. With practice, we can cultivate curiosity as a habit.

Emulate – When we see something that works, whether it’s a stunning ad campaign or an innovative workflow, replication alone will yield few results. When we come across a successful campaign it behooves us to ask what problem was solved or what challenge was overcome. By bringing this curiosity to bear effective solutions, we can better understand which pieces are relevant to our work.

Learn from Mistakes – Our brains are wired to learn from the decisions of others, and the kick we get when they stumble may be an evolutionary incentive to take note of where they fell short. Understanding why a seemingly airtight presentation missed its mark can help us avoid making similar mistakes in the future and can point us to areas with high growth potential.

Stay Informed – Keeping up on developments in the industry is critical to our own growth.

Be Attentive – While the toolkits and strategies our competitors use to forge ahead are often secret, their impact on the product is visible to anyone who takes the time to look.

Experiment – It’s important to continuously experiment with new workflows and techniques. There is no need to throw out the rulebook, but adding your own flourish to a tied and true tool or including a new approach in an otherwise conventional project, can be a great learning opportunity.

Plan Learning Time – By blocking out time in our busy schedules and setting concrete benchmarks, we can make learning a more engaged and rewarding experience.

Be Proactive – If there is a question you have, asking for a training module, or even just a clarifying comment, could benefit not just you, but the whole team.

Find a Mentor – Mentors can help situate developments in a broader view of the industry, not only helping us triangulate where we are but also building a more nuanced picture of what is to come.

Know yourself – We can only become truly effective learners by focusing the same critical eye on our own work that we do on the work of others.

Using these insights to set goals for ourselves and to inform an evolving strategy of success is the only way to effectively apply the learning techniques we integrate into our lives.

Virtual Ownership

Ownership pervades our lives and in a strange way, shapes many of the things we do. Adam Smith wrote, “Every man and woman lives by exchanging, or becomes in some measure a merchant, and the society itself grows to be what a commercial society is properly”. Much of our life story can be told by describing the ebb and flow of our particular possessions – what we get and what we give up.

Since so much of our lives are dedicated to ownership, wouldn’t it be nice to make the best decisions about this? Unfortunately, this is rarely the case. We are mostly fumbling around in the dark. Why - because of three irrational quirks in our human nature. The first quirk is that we fall in love with what we already have. The second quirk is that we focus on what we may lose, rather than what we may gain. The third quirk is that we assume other people will see the transaction from the same perspective as we do.

Ownership also has “peculiarities”. For one, the more work you put into something, the more ownership you begin to feel for it. Pride of ownership is inversely proportional to the ease with which one assembles things. Another peculiarity is that we can begin to feel ownership even before we own something. “Virtual ownership” is one mainspring of the advertising industry. We get a catalog of hiking clothing from Patagonia, see a polyester fleece pullover and we start thinking of it as ours. The trap is set, and we willingly walk in. We become partial owners even before we own anything.

Ownership is not limited to material things. It can also apply to points of view. Once we take ownership of an idea – whether it’s about politics or sports – what do we do? We love it perhaps more than we should. We prize it more than it is worth. And most frequently, we have trouble letting go of it because it can’t stand the idea of its loss. What are we left with then, an Ideology – rigid and unyielding.

There is no known cure for the ills of ownership. As Adam Smith said, it is woven into our lives. But being aware of it might help. Everywhere around us we see the temptation to improve the quality of our lives by buying a larger home, a second car, a lawn mower and so on. But once we change our possessions we have a very hard time going back down. Moving backward to our pre-ownership state is a loss, one that we can’t abide, it’s psychologically painful.