We've Got Receipts

    — Topic —

    Digital Advertising

    4 receipts tracked • 75% industry hit rate

    — Filed —

    4 receipts on Digital Advertising

    Browse all →

    RECEIPT #ERIC-S

    JAN 10, 2024

    Called it.

    PREDICTION BY

    Eric Seufert
    “This is a short-term shock, and the platforms shouldn't get used to it. … While he expects Shein and Temu to continue aggressively spending on advertising throughout 2024, he expects a plateau or decline in 2025 because their marketplace sales are contingent on aggressive advertising.”

    FOLLOW-UP

    Seufert predicted a plateau or decline in 2025 after aggressive spending in 2024, stating the surge was a 'short-term shock'. Subsequent reporting in 2025-2026 indicated normalization of spending, aligning with his forecast that the growth would not be continuously rising.

    ORIGINAL SOURCE

    Business Insider
    Digital advertisingRetail MediaMarketplace Economics

    RECEIPT #ARI-PA

    OCT 06, 2024

    Partially right.

    PREDICTION BY

    Ari Paparo
    “If Ari Paparo had one piece of advice for everyone looking to buy ads today it would be to stop putting so much faith in measurements and look for other (read: cheaper) opportunities. I think it's very possible that will be the outcome. I would say 75% is my current estimate.”

    FOLLOW-UP

    While outcome-oriented, cheaper attention channels have grown, and AI-driven modeling is replacing traditional attribution, most large buyers still invest heavily in measurement tooling and analytics. The core behavioral shift of broadly reducing 'faith in measurements' has not materialized at scale.

    Digital advertisingMarketing effectivenessAdtech

    RECEIPT #BOB-HO

    JAN 01, 2024

    Too early to tell.

    PREDICTION BY

    Bob Hoffman
    “According to the World Federation of Advertisers, digital ad fraud may become the second largest source of criminal income in the world after drug trafficking.”

    FOLLOW-UP

    As of mid-2026, there is no widely cited global crime or economic report that formally ranks online ad fraud as the second-largest source of criminal income worldwide behind drug trafficking. While ad-fraud is consistently described as large and growing, with tens of billions of dollars in estimated annual losses, the specific rank cannot be validated from standard crime-economy datasets.

    Digital advertisingAd fraudCriminal income

    RECEIPT #BEN-TH

    NOV 13, 2024

    Story still evolving.

    PREDICTION BY

    Ben Thompson
    “I’m optimistic about this e-commerce channel becoming a thing, and this is generative AI enabling that… this is generative AI enabling more advertising, but not by generating ads — by making this ad product, click to message, viable for retailers in a way it wasn’t before…”

    FOLLOW-UP

    Meta has continued to invest heavily in messaging-based commerce and AI agents within WhatsApp, Instagram, and Messenger. Click-to-message ads have grown, but there is limited public data isolating their performance and revenue impact separately from Meta’s broader ad business, making it hard to empirically confirm they have become a major new e-commerce channel.

    Digital advertisingMetaAIPerformance marketing