How Facebook went from a Silicon Valley startup to an advertising juggernaut

Hi! I'm Lauren Johnson, a senior advertising reporter at Business Insider, and welcome to Advertising Insider daily, where we brief you on the top advertising and media news. Subscribe here to get this newsletter in your inbox every weekday.

Today we look at Facebook's relationships with agencies, the startups that investors think will take off this year, and creators' experiences with Instagram's shopping tools.

Ski trips, cocktails, and exclusive groups: How Facebook made itself indispensable to advertisers and built an ad juggernaut

• Patrick Coffee and I looked at how Facebook built its $70 billion advertising business by building relationships with advertisers and big ad holding companies that handle multi-million budgets for brands.
• In addition to pitching its ballooning user base, Facebook also hired Microsoft sales executive Carolyn Everson, who started Facebook's client council and Facebook Marketing Partners program. Everson also hosts multi-day trips for large advertisers to the Deer Valley Ski Resort in Park City, Utah and invites executives to her house in Beaver Creek, Colorado.
• Facebook's business has since shifted towards small and midsize marketers that now represent its largest group of advertisers.

Read the full story here.

17 advertising and marketing startups that investors say are poised to take off despite the coronavirus

• It's getting harder for advertising and marketing startups to raise funds as investors look for strong returns on their investments.
• Despite the hit that the ad industry has taken from the coronavirus, investors still believe some advertising and marketing startups have a strong future.
• They said ones that are solving problems like helping with data collection and building creative for social media are primed to take off.

Read the full story here.

Instagram influencers describe what it's like to use the app's expanded shopping features and the changes they still want to see

• Sydney Bradley talked to creators about a recent change in eligibility standards for Instagram's shopping feature.
• "This tool is definitely a time saver and offers a better linking experience for the creator, a better shopping experience for the users, and better conversion potential for the brand," influencer Katie Sturino told Sydney.
• But creators said that they would like the availability to tag more brands in their posts as well as integrations with affiliate networks that they can use to drive sales of products that they post about.

Read the full story here.

More stories we're reading:

• Netflix names content chief Ted Sarandos as co-CEO with Reed Hastings (Business Insider)
• eMarketer cuts Alibaba's 2020 ad forecast as search struggles amid the coronavirus pandemic (Insider Intelligence)
• Facebook is adding a label to all posts about voting from political candidates, including the president (Business Insider)
• S4 Capital Hopes to Raise $126 Million to Further Expand Through Mergers (Adweek)
• Media Agency Review Activity Spikes During COVID-19 (Ad Exchanger)
• Hollywood Stays Away From Facebook Ad Boycott (New York Times)

Thanks for reading and see you tomorrow! You can reach me in the meantime at ljohnson@businessinsider.com and subscribe to this daily email here.

— Lauren