Global Marketing News – 12th November 2015
Belgians order Facebook to stop tracking non-users
A Belgian court has ordered Facebook to stop tracking users who are not members of the social network.
The order relates to a Facebook cookie that tracks the activities of anyone who visits the website, regardless of whether the person is logged in to the social network or not.
The cookie gathers information such as which pages the user visits and how long they stay on each page.
Belgian law says that this counts as “personal data” and that companies must have explicit permission from users before gathering such data – something that is not the case for non-members.
Facebook has been ordered to remove or alter the cookie within 48 hours, such that it does not track non-members.
If it does not comply it will receive a fine of 250,000 Euros per day until it does so.
Facebook has kicked back against the order, saying: “We will appeal this decision and are working to minimise any disruption to people’s access to Facebook in Belgium.”
Chinese cross-border ecommerce to surpass $1 trillion in 2016
The Chinese cross-border ecommerce market is predicted to surpass 1 trillion US dollars next year, according to China Internet Watch.
There are over 5,000 cross-border ecommerce sites in China, including the hugely popular giants Alibaba and JD.
Ecommerce is popular in China and sales are still growing at a rate of around 25% a year.
The report also revealed that the US is the most popular destination for Chinese online shoppers looking at foreign sites, although Australia came top when looking at the amount of money that Chinese users spent online.
Internet landscape in Sudan revealed
Research by BuddeComm has revealed the internet landscape in Sudan.
The internet penetration rate is expected to reach 30% by the end of the year, with the majority of this being driven by internet-enabled mobile phones.
Around three-quarters of Sudanese citizens have a mobile phone, but only 1% have a fixed broadband connection.
The relatively high mobile penetration rate is being helped by increased competition between mobile service providers as they compete to provide customers with the most attractive deal.
With internet penetration still remaining relatively low, however, it is a country with great future potential.
This potential was recognised by Google in July this year, when the international internet giant announced that it was to launch its Android app store Google Play in Sudan.
MoboMarket adds features to appeal to Indian market
Baidu has updated its app store MoboMarket to include a Hindi language option to better cater for its swelling numbers of Indian users.
MoboMarket is a third-party Android app store, and now has almost 5 million monthly active users in India and over half a million apps.
A Baidu spokesperson commented on the new features for the Indian market, saying: “In addition to its built-in support for Hindi, MoboMarket version 3.0 also includes localised content and a recommendation system specifically designed for Indian users, which will highlight apps related to local holidays and events.”
Baidu is most well-known for its search engine of the same name, which is the most popular in China with a market share of around 60%. It announced earlier this year that it was targeting both India and Indonesia for further global expansion, where it is focussing on a mobile-centric strategy.
Digital ad spend growing fast in Europe
And finally, digital ad spending is growing at a faster rate than total ad spending in Europe, according to research by Emarketer.
The study predicts that digital ad spending will grow by 9% in the continent this year, whereas total ad spending is only predicted to rise by 3%.
The UK is set to be the leading country for digital ad spend, with almost 9 billion Euros being predicted to be spent on online advertising in the country.
Germany is the second biggest market at 5 billion Euros, followed by France and Italy, with these four countries set to account for around 70% of all digital ad spending in Europe this year.
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Gemma Houghton
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