The 10 things in advertising you need to know today
1. Google parent company Alphabet beat its Q2 earnings expectations on both the top and bottom line, sending the stock popping more than 5% after-hours. Revenue was up 21% year-on-year, while EPS was at $8.42, versus the $8.03 expected.
2. Facebook said it might have to pay the feds between $3 billion and $5 billion. The IRS sent Facebook a statutory notice of a deficiency related to whether or not it understated its assets by "billions of dollars" when it transferred part of its business to an Irish subsidiary in 2010.
3. A group of 60 million Facebook users could be the secret to Facebook's next growth spurt. Facebook has its eye set on small businesses.
4. Yahoo is suddenly in a hiring frenzy, despite layoffs and its sale to Verizon. After announcing its sale to Verizon on Monday, Yahoo has posted 23 openings on July 25, 16 on July 26, and 19 on July 27.
5. UK news publisher Archant is so happy with the success of it's "pop-up" newspaper The New European that it has ideas for a bunch more. One plan is for a Christmas TV listings guide.
6. Former reporters at International Business Times are blasting the company's business practices on social media. Some of those former employees have accused the organization of giving insufficient severance packages and questioned its alleged ties to a religious institution.
7. Budweiser's "America" summer campaign was a huge flop. Two months after the launch of Budweiser's controversial 'America' rebrand, only 11% of adults 21 and over said they would consider buying the brand the next time they buy beer - Budweiser's lowest figure this year, according to YouGov BrandIndex data.
8. When Marissa Mayer added free food at Yahoo, employees "scrambled to stuff themselves" because they thought it was just a temporary perk. That's according to former Yahoo manager Jelena Woehr who wrote in a blog post that employees at Yahoo were so cynical before Mayer took over that they didn't trust her when she introduced free food in the cafeteria.
9. Gravity4 founder Gurbaksh Chahal has handed over his CEO role at the company to his sister, TechCrunch reports. Chahal is awaiting sentencing after a judge ruled last week he violated his domestic violence probation.
10. MTV is reviving a bunch of old shows for a new channel. MTV Classic will air shows like "Beavis and Butt-Head," "Daria," and "Total Request Live."