Apple's Global Power

March 21, 2022

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At a $2.68TN company like Apple, whose worth is larger than the GDPs of Brazil, Italy, and Canada, department heads and leaders act as if they have their own national interest in mind. One "nation" of Apple could be called Privacy Island, the other Ad Revenue-ica. Their competing interests call for effective diplomacy. One aims to protect users' privacy, undoing harms like unscrupulous data-mining of the whereabouts and activities of its users, and the other to shore up the revenues and relevancy of the company's products and services.

Apple's Privacy Island

With April 2021's iOS14 upgrade nearly a year behind us, small brands, major corporations, and developers alike are still trying to sort out the aftereffects. Essentially, the release sought to end the company's reign as a source of mobile surveillance, offering consumers more ability to control the amount of data ad targeters could capture. The feature change meant users would have to opt-in in order for apps to track user activity across websites.

Ad Revenue-ica

While the changes do affect Apple's own revenues, the corporation presents a united front in its mission to provide a fundamental human right of privacy to its users, believing this stance will positively impact Apple's relevancy and user support. Elsewhere, these changes had significant implications for Meta, the owner of Facebook and Instagram, which relies on data for its ad-sales revenue, resulting in an expected loss of about $10BN in revenue this year due to the changes.

For D2C brands who have relied on ad spending through Facebook and Instagram, the changes are stark. For apparel brand Outerknown, 75% of its mobile traffic comes from iOS devices, resulting in a 25% reduction in the company's return on ad spend (ROAS) through Facebook.

As a result, brands are reallocating their marketing efforts. TikTok, Pinterest, and Criteo all stand to gain, as does ad spending through direct mail, radio, and podcasting. Meanwhile, influencer marketing startups like Grin will continue to make gains.