In this week’s digital news, Google ads have experienced a reporting glitch, leading to a data breach that has exposed item IDs and product titles. This has raised privacy concerns on the platform. The outage affected reporting tools and product management features, meaning advertisers performance data and campaign management access was also affected. Google has released five key SEO insights and have filtered search queries meaning that Trends data is now a more accurate representation of what users are searching for.
Commercial radio listener figures have increased year-on-year. A report by Radio Joint Audience Research showed that listens were up an increase of 54.5% compared to the figures of 2023. Reddit CEO, Steve Huffman, will continue to block search engines and AI models from crawling its content, unless they strike a content licensing deal.
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Google Ads hit by major reporting glitch, exposing competitor data
Google Ads experienced a significant outage, affecting reporting tools and product management features. Hindering advertisers’ campaign management and access to performance data. The outage impacted the Report Editor, Dashboards, and Saved Reports, as well as Products and Listing Groups pages across various platforms.
A data breach has also exposed item IDs and product titles, raising privacy concerns. Google Ads, Liaison Ginny Marvin, acknowledged the issue and is investigating. Advertisers are advised to exercise caution and avoid acting on any data until the issue is resolved.
The search engine, Google has released five key SEO insights related to Google Trends. Google Search Advocate, Daniel Waisberg, has shared that Trends data is based on a statistically significant sample of actual search queries. And that Google also cleans the ‘noise’ out of search queries before publishing the data (i.e. A single user repeating the same query). A statistically significant sample is one in which random chance is not a factor. Google’s filtering of search queries means that Trends data is a more accurate representation of what users are actually searching for.
Commercial radio continues to capture a growing share of listeners
Commercial radio has increased its share of listening hours both year-on-year and quarter-on-quarter. Driven by growth from radio networks Global and Bauer. According to Radio Joint Audience Research (RAJAR), commercial radio had a 55% share of total listening hours for the 12 weeks ended 23 June 2024. This was up from 54.2% in Q1 and 54.5% at the same time in 2023. RAJAR is the official body for measuring radio audiences in the UK. The RAJAR is jointly owned by the BBC and industry body Radiocentre. Across the UK, 40.5 million adults over the age of 15 tuned into commercial radio each week. An increase from 39.1 million last year.
Reddit CEO does not believe all web content – especially theirs – is free for AI models and search engines to use.
Reddit CEO, Steve Huffman, will continue to block search engines and AI models from crawling its content. Unless they strike a content licensing deal. Huffman says that Microsoft, Anthropic and Perplexity act as though all of the content on the internet is free to use. With Microsoft’s AI CEO, Mustafa Suleyman, recently referring to web content as ‘freeware’. Meaning anyone can copy and use it – though Reddit are taking the opposite stance. Google has not been blocked by Reddit because the search engine pays the platform $60 million a year. This licensing deal puts Reddit in a powerful position. And their presence in key organic ranking positions lately has not gone unnoticed.
Consumer confidence reaches three-year high says PwC
The latest PwC Consumer Sentiment Survey shows consumers are finally feeling more confident after three years of instability. The survey, conducted in July, in the immediate aftermath of the general election, highlights encouraging trends in confidence that will hopefully translate into pounds spent on the high street. The survey has been running for over sixteen years, a key indicator of the propensity to spend over the following 6 to 12 months. In September 2022, it hit a record low of 44 but has been slowly increasing over the last eighteen months. The latest survey shows that sentiment increased from -5 over the Easter weekend to 0 the weekend after the general election. This improvement is above the long-run average and is seen across most demographics, excluding ABs and 35-44s.
Poor weather and consumers prioritising savings have led to a significant decline in retail sales.
Poor weather and consumer savings priorities have led to a significant decline in retail sales. The Confederation of British Industry (CBI). Reported a drop in the weighted balance of retail sales to -43% in July from -24% in June, with further declines expected in August. Wet weather in early July and increased consumer saving were key factors. Retailers face high levels of unsold stock, the most since June last year. While sales volumes are predicted to remain low, some firms hope for post-election market improvements. The UK economy, heavily reliant on household consumption, saw a 1.2% drop in retail sales in June. But real wage growth may boost future sales.
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