Who Targets Me

On political ads, transparency and what's right for democracy. Download our browser extension to get involved.

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

Full analysis of their rapid improvement: https://t.co/7A2ghKkwhI

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

Reform's new money has helped take their digital operation from patchy to professional. More content, better targeting, increased ad spend, more polish. Rivals take note.

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

Here's more about the changes we've made (and where we're taking it next): https://t.co/21uhpENBgc

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

After many months work, we launched a major new version of our Trends political ad tracking platform this morning.

Take a look (and let us know your feedback - we'd love to hear from you):
https://t.co/G3S1OmWE77

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

A long(ish) piece on the implications of Meta's forthcoming political advertising ban in the EU:
https://t.co/w4CwzZhWxd

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

If the EU doesn't act, it suggests that it actually wanted this all along and the Regulation on the Transparency and Targeting of Political Advertising was in fact intended as a "slow ban". That will prove to be a mistake.

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

Meta's decision to follow Google and discriminate against paid political speech in the EU is misguided and wrong. If you accept ads, you should accept political ads, it's as simple as that. The company can afford proper transparency and verification. https://t.co/cpOnEinHGw

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

Near monopolies should not be able to make de facto law about whether legitimate, legal protected speech is allowed. There are two options - either the EU requires political ads be accepted, or it extends the transparency requirements to cover all ads on VLOPs.

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

If you're interested in political ad data, we have a little survey running on https://t.co/wCV3AjPSiT - we'd love to hear from you.

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

Use Trends from @WhoTargetsMe to explore digital ad spending by over 100k political accounts in more than 50 countries:
https://t.co/F4xrIWXaAh

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

Here's what the parties spent on digital ads:

🌻 Die Grünen - €4.1m
🟨 FDP - €2.3m
🌹 SPD (inc. Mediaforce) - €1.6m
🇩🇪 CDU/CSU - €1.6m
⚡ Volt Deutschland - €1.1m
🟦 AfD - €900k
🙋‍♀️ BSW - €800k
🫲 Die Linke - €470k
🆓 Freie Wähler - €80k

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

Between the collapse of the German government on Nov 6th and the election on Feb 23rd, parties and candidates spent around €14m on Meta (Facebook and Instagram) and Google (YouTube, Search and Display) ads. That's in the region of 2bn ads, or 50 for every voter who turned out.

[Simon Kruschinski▲@meinungsfuehrer.bsky.social @meinungfuehrer]

Gespräch im ZDF Magazin Royale: Wahlkampf & Plattformmacht im #Grauburgunderbereich 🍷

Ich habe das ZDF-Team mit @favstats & @WhoTargetsMe bei der Recherche für die Sendung zum digitalen Wahlkampf unterstützt & landete im Studio Ehrenfeld.
Das Ergebnis: https://t.co/y5h5h5mwzE

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

We've made some changes to our political ad trends platform to make it easier to find data for forthcoming elections. Tracking over 100k Meta and Google advertisers with it. Have a look: https://t.co/F4xrIWXaAh

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

Over the coming months, we'll be adding new features to Trends. To help with the cost of running the tools, some will need a login or subscription. To stay up to date, automatically get a free account and a discount on new paid features, sign up here: https://t.co/bqJDBJWPD4

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

Over the coming months, we'll be adding new features to Trends. To help with the cost of running the tools, some will need a login or subscription. To stay up to date, automatically get a free account and a discount on new paid features, sign up here: https://t.co/bqJDBJWPD4

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

Reform are the biggest UK party for Meta ads in the last three months (though their spend is very spiky, whereas Labour's is more "always on"). This recent spike isn't quite of the scale of their spending over Christmas.

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

Reform have been running a Facebook ad campaign about a number of May's local council elections being cancelled. At least £10k spent on the ads so far. The petition they point to claims over 350,000 signatures - a big number. Lots of precious supporter data...

[Who Targets Me @WhoTargetsMe]

There is a real question as to whether Reform is a party capable of winning a UK election, but they certainly seem to be the most capable when it comes to generating online support at this point in time.