Jonathan Chambers, director of Investment at Generation Media, examines whether YouTube is still tracking children online and how the agency’s suite of tools can help companies navigate the space.

Jon Chambers

You may be aware of recent headlines centered on the possibility that YouTube advertising campaigns may be mistakenly tracking children’s data online. This has led to some agencies recommending a pause of Performance Max activity (the offending advertising product in question).

Before breaking down the issue in question, we want to reassure you that:

• Performance Max is not a Google product we currently use on any of your activity. It relies on tracking across online domains which would contravene our commitments to COPPA and GDPR-K compliancy.
• Campaigns are targeted using purely contextual methods reliant on qualitative and quantitative research, enhanced by AI.
• No children’s data is tracked by us or any advertising products we use, either internally or via a third party.

This is because Performance Max campaigns rely on tracking activity across online domains. If a child watches YouTube and is not signed in, when they click on an ad and leave YouTube there is potential that the advertiser will place a tracking tag on that user’s onward activity.

This practice should not impact any children’s advertisers, but advertisers and agencies should be aware that the tracking elements required for Performance Max campaigns would contravene COPPA and GDPR-K regulations. However, many advertisers in the toy space, particularly retailers, will also be targeting parents and other adults online. The advantages offered by Performance Max campaigns might therefore be tempting to take advantage of.

Readers should be aware that Performance Max campaigns don’t provide any placement data, instead using algorithmic data to place campaigns across Google’s entire advertising infrastructure (Search, Shopping, Display, YouTube, etc.), optimising based on performance only. Whilst this can generate enhanced results, an Adalytics study of over 300 campaigns found that more than 100 featured on ‘made for kids’ YouTube content, as the campaign methodology cannot yet account for contextual restrictions. This therefore puts advertisers at risk of tracking children’s online usage.

The potential for Performance Max as a product is huge, but implementation remains flawed at this stage. This is why, at Generation Media, we have been building out our proprietary tech stack to help navigate the complex online space. Given the importance of YouTube to children’s brands, this includes Optimus Buy, the world’s first Data Management Platform configured to optimise campaign performance when targeting children on YouTube based purely on contextual and anonymised contextual data. For advertisers targeting parents, Optimus AI uses the same contextual methodology but overlays it with quantitative panel match data to identify which channels have a higher affinity to purchasers of a certain type of product or brand.

Solutions exist beyond Google’s owned and operated infrastructure, and we’ve trialled and test many of these to make sure performance can be matched and exceeded, without the brand safety concerns.

It must be pointed out that Google has denied the findings of the Adalytics report as “deeply flawed and misleading”, following its previous denial earlier this year that they were not misleading advertisers with their YouTube TrueView format. Regardless, the continued debate around Google’s commitment to children’s online safety means that advertisers in this space should always take extra caution when managing budgets on YouTube, and use trusted, accredited partners with the experience needed to navigate this increasingly tricky space.

Readers with questions are invited to get in touch at jonathan.chambers@generationmedia.co.uk.