TFM Digital has released a new white paper titled ‘Ditching Digital Skip Bins’, which explores emerging trends in Local Area Marketing (LAM). The report highlights a notable shift in brand budgets away from major digital platforms Meta and Google, driven by concerns over brand safety and the effectiveness of these channels for LAM efforts.

The white paper suggests that the termination of Meta’s third-party fact-checking program has led to an increase in user searches on Google for information on how to delete Meta platforms such as Facebook and Instagram. Despite projections that Facebook’s ad revenues will surpass those of linear TV by 2025, marketers are expressing dissatisfaction, claiming that the platform has reached saturation and is failing to deliver the expected results.

Meta and Google have been described as ‘digital skipbins’ in the report, due to an overreliance on automation that is not meeting the needs of business owners. The Macquarie Dictionary’s choice of ‘enshittification’ as the word of the year for 2024 reflects a perceived decline in the quality and results from these tech platforms.

The report notes that Meta’s cost per ad has increased by 14% year-over-year, with CPMs on Facebook and Instagram rising by 10.31% over the past two years. In response to these challenges, TFM Digital’s report presents an action plan aimed at improving LAM effectiveness, focusing on mental availability, local impact, campaign fit, and personalisation.

CEO of TFM Digital, Taylor Fielding, said: “We wanted to dig into the complex topic of Local Area Marketing (LAM) and simplify the space for marketers. Doing more with less is no longer the end to a corporate speech, but a mantra that all must live by. LAM is often placed in the too hard bucket.

“Indeed automation and efforts to become more efficient have led to marketing principles of measurement and effectiveness being sidelined for easy to deploy ‘cookiecutter’ personalisation tools. While automation platforms provide unparalleled access to information, when all rely on the same platforms, with the replica personas, differentiation becomes a distant hope; in essence all of our efforts become a darker shade of AI.

“So against the backdrop of a fragmented digital landscape, with dwindling attention thanks to an over exposure of online ads, we investigate how marketers can shift their mindset and approach to make LAM more effective.”

GM Advertising Sales QLD/SA/WA at News Corp, Kelly Healy, said: “Business owners are not marketers or media planners and buyers, they need guidance to be interrogating these campaigns – what is the best solution for the outcome I’m trying to achieve.”

CMO of Price Attack, Aimee Madson, said: “We had an experience on one channel, where our costs tripled and our results weren’t there. Times are tough. Retail is tough. So we have looked elsewhere – we can’t afford to waste money on a platform that doesn’t seem consistent anymore.”

Senior Marketing Specialist at Telstra, Anjela Gilbert, said: “Our aim is always to hypertarget local areas to drive traffic into stores. We’re more than happy for them to educate people online, but we know that customers are more likely to purchase in-store. So that’s the job of our LAM. Drive traffic to where we can best convert.”