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The Top Three 🏆

The industry’s most important stories today.

🥇 DEMAND GEN UPDATES

Big changes are on the way: Google announced major updates to Demand Gen campaigns today, including new controls over ad placement, and creative tools.

Alongside these changes, the company is retiring Video Action Campaigns starting in April. It’s recommended to switch to Demand Gen before the automatic transition in July. more

• New channel controls (starting in March):

  • Advertisers can choose where ads appear across Gmail, Discover, and YouTube, with specific targeting for Shorts.

  • Google Display inventory will be added.

• Creative enhancements:

  • Vertical 9:16 image ads for Shorts (coming in Feb).

  • A new tool to create shorter videos at scale.

  • Improved ad creation with shareable previews.

🥈 MAKE FACEBOOK COOL AGAIN

MFGA: Meta is all-in on creators making Facebook cool again. During its earnings call yesterday, CFO Susan Li said “creators are one of our central focuses,” while CEO Mark Zuckerberg said he’s focused on growing Facebook’s cultural influence. Though details were sparse, reports suggest video creators could be key to making the aging platform relevant again. more

• To attract influencers, Meta has rolled out new initiatives like a bonus program for Reels on Instagram and Facebook, alongside individual content deals.

• Zuckerberg's push to revitalize Facebook, a 20-year-old app, raised questions from Wall Street analysts asking for more specifics, but he didn’t offer many details. He did, however, note that Facebook is a personal focus for him in 2025.

🥉 META’S Q4 REVENUE REPORT

Meta's Q4 report card is in: Revenue grew 21% year-over-year to $48 billion in Q4, surpassing expectations. The company expects heavy infrastructure costs tied to AI investments in the year ahead. more

• Ad impressions across Meta's platforms increased 6% during the year-end period, with the average ad price up 14%. CPMs are expected to keep increasing.

• Generative AI was a major topic, with more than 4M advertisers using at least one of Meta's AI tools.

• Advantage+ shopping campaigns saw 70% year-over-year growth in Q4.

Today’s Other News ☑︎

Everything else that matters.

Advertising 📣

• Search advertising is shifting as AI-powered search and platforms like TikTok challenge Google. With new ad formats and Google facing legal issues, A new Digiday thinkpiece says marketers must adapt to the rise of conversational queries. Experts recommend focusing on intent-based searches, organic visibility, and experimenting with new tools before the landscape changes. more

• Microsoft reported its second quarter 2025 earnings yesterday, showing that search and news advertising revenue was up 21%, up from 18% and 19% in the previous quarters. Overall, the company’s revenue was up 12%. more

• Google today launched a new Google Ads API Research Group to gather feedback from developers. The group will focus on incorporating developer suggestions into product decisions and improvements. more

  • Developers interested in participating can join through an this opt-in form.

• Super Bowl ad prices have hit a record high of more than $8M, with sponsors securing around 10 of the most expensive 30-second spots for the Feb. 9 broadcast on Fox. Ad rates for the most-watched TV event in the U.S., are up from last year’s record $7M. more

Social Media 📱

• LinkedIn’s latest earnings results show a 9% revenue bump, reaching $4.6B. Comments on the platform are up 37% YoY, and short-form videos are also continuing to show growth. more

  • Like it always does, LinkedIn claimed it’s seeing “record engagement,” but still will not define what it’s measuring, nor what the actual numbers are.

• Instagram is adding some new views-related metrics for Reels. more

  • View Rate: Tracks the percentage of viewers who watched beyond the first 3 seconds, with a comparison to average retention. You can also filter by followers vs. non-followers.

  • Views Over Time: Shows how many views your post has received so far compared to the average views your posts typically get over the same period, with breakdowns by followers and non-followers.

  • New Tips: Offers insights into which content is resonating with your audience, with comparative data on each clip’s performance.

• Threads has hit 320M monthly active users. The company says it’s adding more than 1 million sign-ups per day. more

• Instagram has added a translation option for DMs, letting users translate messages directly within the app into their native language. more

  • A note mentions that “text from messages you translate will be shared with Meta to provide translations.” Meta wouldn’t use that data for anything else… right?

Commerce 🛒 

• 🤔 Data for deodorant: CVS Health is testing a new mobile app that unlocks display cabinets so customers can access products. more

Legal ⚖️ 

• Amazon is being sued for allegedly collecting personal and location data via its Ads SDK without user consent. The suit claims the tech giant secretly tracked and sold California residents' sensitive data. Amazon has yet to respond. more

• 🏳️ Zuck waves white flag: Meta said yesterday that it will pay U.S. President Trump $25M to settle a 2021 lawsuit he filed over the suspension of his Facebook and Instagram accounts following the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. more

  • So far, I have not heard any news about how much Zuck will pay me for banning my podcast ad account from advertising. Watch this space.

• Meta is challenging the EU Commission’s $841 million antitrust penalty, which found the company breached European anti-trust rules by integrating Facebook Marketplace into the app, giving it an unfair advantage over classified competitors. more

Marketing Tool of the Day 🔨

Cool stuff we found on the web (not a paid placement)

If you’ve ever been annoyed by the API limits of cloud-based AI tools like ChatGPT or Perplexity, this might be a good thing to look into.

LM Studio lets you run AI models locally on your computer, so you’re not stuck waiting on a server, or burning through tokens. It’s like having ChatGPT, but totally under your control.

• Download and run open-source AI models on your own machine—no internet required once they’re set up.

• No API fees, no data-sharing concerns—everything stays local.

• Works with popular models like Llama 2 and Mistral, so you’re not locked into one ecosystem.

Might be handy if you’re testing AI-generated content or need a chatbot that won’t ghost you when OpenAI is overloaded. Worth checking out.

Deep-Dive Report 🧠

Local Consumer Review Survey 2025, BrightLocal

BrightLocal’s latest survey shows that online reviews still matter—but how people use them is changing. Here’s what you need to know:

• 96% of people read online reviews before choosing a local business.

• More Google: 87% of consumers use Google to find reviews, up from 81% last year.

• More research: More consumers (27%) rely on a single review site, up from 23% last year.

• Less trust: 46% of consumers trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations—a slight drop from 49% in 2021.

• Video matters! Over 75% of U.S. consumers watch videos when researching local businesses.

• 36% prefer videos posted by businesses over those from influencers or regular users.

Spotted on Social 🔍

The social web’s best posts in the last 24 hours.