A journal from the Ichnos survey
Locked Out
Every article about advertising is written for somebody the platforms will take money from. If your category is refused, all of it — the spend advice, the creative testing, the lookalike audiences — is a description of a country you cannot enter.
This is written for the other side of that line. What the restrictions actually say, what happens when businesses try to get around them, and where 100 restricted industries can still legitimately be reached — drawn from a survey that reads the destinations rather than guessing at them.
Every figure quoted here comes from the live survey: 7,237 places mapped, 1,627 of them confirmed open, updated several times a day.
The first issue is being written
Two issues a week, Tuesday and Friday, each one about a specific restriction and what it means for the businesses inside it. The first is in progress.
In the meantime, the survey itself is public and free: see where 100 restricted industries can still be reached →
What this will and will not be
- No workaroundsThe advice to open a second ad account is everywhere and it is what ends businesses. We will keep saying so.
- Figures, not adjectivesEvery claim about where a category can be reached comes from the survey, with the count and the date attached.
- Written for the operatorNot for agencies, not for platforms. For the person whose account was rejected and who has a quarter to plan anyway.
- No paywallThe audience is defined by having been shut out of things. Shutting them out of the reading would be a poor way to begin.