Prof. Cavazos: When It Comes to Digital Advertising, Some Companies Know 'Things Are Not Right'
May 10, 2021
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Interviewed by Zenger, a digital wire service, and appearing in Forbes, Roberto Cavazos, a lecturer and executive in residence in The University of Baltimore's Merrick School of Business, says there is a growing awareness among some of the world's largest companies that fraud is running rampant in digital advertising.
Citing Proctor & Gamble's experiment in completely shutting off its digital ads for one year to see what would happen, Prof. Cavazos believes that the digital ad landscape is due for some changes.
P&G "didn't miss any sales," he says. "There’s a lot of big players that have a sense things are not right."
Prof. Cavazos, who was recently named the Merrick School's program director for its M.S. program in Cybersecurity Management and the specialization in Risk Management and Insurance, points to fraudulent methods like click farms, where people are paid to repeatedly click on ads and skew results, as evidence that serious reforms are necessary—especially for more vulnerable small businesses and their customers.
"If I'm a consumer or a group of small businesses, I'm advertising my hair solons or chain of pizza restaurants, and my revenue is $8 million a year and I lose a couple of hundred thousand, it hurts," he says.
And, because the digital ad space is highly specialized, its complexity can confuse even experienced advertisers.
"The ecosystem for online advertising is complex, and I would even argue unnecessarily so. Anything you add complexity to, you're going to add waste and costs. It's like a 15 percent tax on every dollar."
Read the article in Forbes.
In 2018, Cavazos joined the Merrick School of Business as a lecturer and an executive-in-residence in the field of data science. Previously, he was consulting in areas of economics and data science. His work has been cited in The Wall Street Journal, CNBC, Forbes, CBS, the Times of London, Elle, Advertising Age, the Baltimore Business Journal, among others. He focuses his research in economic analysis, statistics, data science, process improvement and fraud detection, predictive analytics, and cost of fraud.
Cavazos's most recent work with the artificial intelligence-driven cybersecurity company, CHEQ, has revealed the overwhelming risk and fraud that advertisers face in digital advertising as well as the economics costs associated with fake influences, fake news, affiliate fraud, and click fraud.
Learn more about Roberto Cavazos.
Learn more about the M.S. in Cybersecurity Management program or the specialization in Risk Management and Insurance, both part of the Merrick School of Business.