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Is there marketing in Russia?

Marketing in Russia is real, and in some cases mature, but the real quality marketing today is not determined by the volume of purchases and the number of banners, but by the number of banners. governanceDiscipline of Experimentation and Skill audienceRegulations have become tougher: ERID (the Unified Register of Internet Advertising) has ceased to be a “bureaucratic detail”, and 152-FZ (On Personal Data), together with the localization of PD, has turned cookies and technical identifiers into a subject of legal liability with real consequences. The e-commerce market has grown and has become even more complex. platform: the concentration of demand on marketplaces solves the problem of sales, but almost does not solve the problem accumulation of its own data asset Here’s a look at the water-free environment: what really happens in law, data and in the marketplaces where we overestimate ourselves, and why the crust of an MBA without causation is a weak defense.

Law and Data: Why Compliance is Infrastructure, Not Paperwork

EIR is no longer an option. From 2022, advertising aimed at the audience in the Russian Federation is subject to accounting in the Unified register of Internet advertising through Advertising Data Operators (ADD)Not reporting is not only a risk of blocking materials, but also questions about the recognition of costs: fiscal and accounting consequences are real. For practitioners, it is critical that the obligation applies to foreign legal entities when targeting the Russian Federation; operating systems – through ORD with specific data formats. Sources give direct access to the website of Roskomnadzor (REIT EIR/ORD), operators’ manuals, legal explanations. See: rkn.gov.ru/activity/register-ord/ and er.gr.fc.ru; also consultative materials.

Personal data is also cookies. Current version 152-FZ and enforcement practices treat technical identifiers (including cookies/DeviceID) as personal data if they can be used to identify the subject, as has been confirmed repeatedly by the courts. PD localization (to store and process records of citizens of the Russian Federation — on the territory of the Russian Federation). «Banner for a tick» does not save: you need to separate consent (necessary/analytics/marketing), fixing processing, consensus-log and clear agreements with technology providers – who is the operator, who is the processor, where the servers are, what storage periods and the mechanics of deletion / anonymization.

The global cookie reversal has not abolished causality. In 2025, Google effectively abandoned the scenario of “hard shutdown of third-party cookies” in Chrome in favor of the user-choice model; the British regulator CMA The new Privacy Sandbox has declared its previous commitment to Privacy Sandbox irrelevant. First-party identification, server-side tracking and consent-governance remains; but There is no “magic” replacement for the experiment and no MMM.Someone who has not built causality will continue to «measure what’s nearby,» not the causal effect.

The outcome of the legal block is simple: Compliance is not a brake, but the foundation of marketing architecture.Without it, all analytics and attribution are on the legal ice.

Market without cosmetics: the growth of e-commerce, the platform as a new “showcase”, budgets and reality

E-commerce has grown and concentrated. According to Data Insight for 2024, online retail in Russia is about 11.2 trillion RUB turnover about 6.8 billion orders. Growth has slowed relative to 2023, but the base is historically high; multicategory marketplaces are the dominant channel. buyerBut it lives more where convenience is maximum and friction is minimal on platforms.

Platforms are earning, sellers are leveling. Public materials Ozon In 2024, they show: GMV > 2.8 trillion RUB (+64% YoY), record high Adjusted EBITDA ~40 billion RUBIn 2025, management had set a target EBITDA range significantly higher, and the economic logic was transparent: the core of “marketplace + logistics + fintech + paid services to sellers” scale and monetizebut the beneficiary platformSo for the sellers, the conclusion is, the rules of the game. strangerand each change in the offer, SLA, indices and promotional tools changes your P.&L is faster than you can rewrite the dashboard.

Advertising is growing, but migration is going to ecosystems. By the end of 2024, ACAR estimated the advertising market approximately in the ≈0.9 trillion RUB (+~24% y/y) Driver — digitalAnd especially e-com and retail media. cash But they flow to the consumer ecosystems and marketplaces, where audience access indirectly And where the advertiser is more likely to pay for a «shelf space» rather than building its own data asset.

Key criticism: Budget growth does not equal value management growthExpenses are not assets. If you don’t have your ID, your consent, your storefronts and your demonstrable increment, you’re adding to someone else’s P.&L, not your capital.

Marketplaces under the magnifying glass: why it is sales, but not marketing

The algorithm is your first client. Internal instructions of platforms are frank: ranking depends on the Delivery speed/stability (SLA), card-conversion, rating, share-holding, price-index And the settings of the internal advertising. encouragement And it’s called «margin leveling down.» Yes, there are leverages — card content, stock management, recall, pricing and betting. selling inside someone else’s algorithmNot for brand building and audience ownership.

Data and communications are a closed loop. The rules of communication with the buyer from Ozon et al. explicitly prohibit taking the client to third-party messengers and communications; correspondence is in the chat platform, contacts are not yours. CRM asset does not accumulateYou don’t own the channel, you own it. no Opt-in perimeter for email/push/messaging.

Rules/fines/offers are always a risk. Return terms, delivery times, tariff designers, policies, and your model flew. That’s okay in the platform economy, but from a marketing perspective, that means volatility P&L And dependency on other people’s rules.

The paradox of platform success. Financial results of sites improve (monetization of logistics, fintech and services), while the average seller “marketing” degenerates into a “marketing” market. Position buybacks, discounts and rate managementThat’s it. marketingIt is not marketing as customer value management.

Conclusion: «only marketplace» almost inevitably. dumping and dependenceMature strategy. double-circuit: use the platform as a volume channel, but accumulate first-party asset In the “external” perimeter (website/app/CRM), LTV, brand and profit forecasting are not determined by an external algorithm.

Where Real Marketing Lives: Data Governance, Causality, and Product

Identification and consent. If cookies/DeviceID are included in the PD loop (and the courts recognize this), consent — not decorWe do. granular-consent: strictly necessary / analytics / marketing; fixation, deadline, logicand correct Data Processing Agreements with the suppliers (who is the controller/operator, where the servers are, how the data is deleted).

Event model and server side. The real “event schema” is not just views: search → listing → card → basket → checkout steps → pay-off → return > Delivery statuses > referralsPayment, refunds, statuses. server-side, with reference to the order and the user, otherwise you «measure the browser» and not the client and the transaction.

DWH, showcases and quality discipline. ClickHouse/Postgres/Vertica (or other DWH), ETL/ELT with SLA for freshness/completenessProtection against duplicates, contracts schemes (version), monitoring drifts. cohort, RFM, CLV/LTV (Pareto/NBD, BG/NBD + Gamma-Gamma, survival models) unit-economy After logistics/commissions/refunds. BI in the Russian stack is still convenient Yandex DataLensNative friendship with Metrica/AppMetrica, cheap cohorts/funnels, availability for products/marketing without constant involvement of engineers.

Attribution = causality, not “what’s nearby.” iROAS (incremental revenue/margin per RUB) is more important than last-click ROAS. A simple example: the office «draws» 100 orders, but geo-holdout shows +20 above the baselineSo the channel contribution is 20, not 100. MMM lag-satisfied and controlled experimentation A/B, geo-split, time-series is the only way to systematically answer the question, “What really creates an effect?”

The Russian stack is good enough. The myth of «no tools» is outdated: Yandex Metrica/AppMetrica give events, export of «raw» logs and cohorts; DataLens Imaging; DWH connections are routine; experiments are reproducible. data-discipline and experimentation.

MBA and “systemicity”: why without causality “crust” is a weak shield

Empiricism in managerial styles (including Bertrand) & Schoar has shown for years that managers do have different influences on firms’ policies, and «textbook style» doesn’t always correlate with long-term performance. «MBA as a universal booster» is not proven. For marketing 2025, it translates as: MBA is useful as a framebut Competitive advantage creates causality Ability to put testable hypotheses, to count profit-incrementRead data (SQL/Python at the analytics level) and not to confuse correlation with cause«Crust without causation» is an expensive sticker on the instrument panel.

Where Russian Marketing Overestimates Itself: Criticism by Point

1) “We grow on marketplaces — marketing is fine.” No, you’re fine. marketing The brand, LTV and CRM assets are not yours; the rules of communication are not yours; the cost of shelf space and algorithmic priorities are not yours. One ranking update, and the chart breaks.

(2) “Last-click shows that the channel is top”. Last-click shows that clickHe doesn’t say anything about causalProvability is only through holdout/geo-split and/or MMMAnd the reversal of the cookie agenda in Chrome didn’t cancel it.

(3) “The Banner was hanged and the law was enforced”. If you don’t. consent, consent-book, processing, localized correct DPA with contractors, you have no The «was there a tick?» argument seems to be yes versus «show the log» argument, you lose.

(4) “Draw BI, become data-driven”. No server-side on payment/refunds, no contract and SLA for quality It’s a data theater: beautiful graphics on dirty raw materials.

5) “Digital is growing — marketing is growing.” Grows. expense; but does it grow? fixtureIs there a proven LTV/CLV on the horizon? margin-incrementIf you don’t, you’ve just accelerated the rotation of the meter, not improved the economy.

A short answer to a long question

There is marketing in Russia. But his quality is measured by maturity. governance, causal attribution and product logic. ERIR and PDN have forced the market to clean up — and that’s a good thing: without valid consents and localized repositories, any “efficiency” hangs on the legal thread. E-commerce is colossal, but platform: marketplaces decide marketingnot audience. MBA for MBA is a weak insurance policy if the company does not have the discipline of experimentation and statistics. In the era of 2025, the winner is not the one who shouts louder in the office and buys clicks cheaper, but the one who wins the one who wins the most. Controls your data, can prove increment and builds your own ecosystem Not to confuse renting a shelf with owning a store.

Sources

  • Roskomnadzor: ERID/ORD — rkn.gov.ru/activity/register-ord/ and erir.grfc.ru

  • Federal Law No. 152-FZ “On Personal Data” (updated) – consultant.ru/document/cons_doc_LAW_61801/

  • Reviews on the interpretation of cookies as PD and the practice of consent (legal resources / analytics) — consultant.ru; reviews of profile law firms (for example, mlegal.de/en/newsen/new-rules-for-internet-advertising/)

  • Data Insight “Internet commerce in Russia 2025” (results 2024) — datainsight.ru/DI_eCommerce_2025

  • Ozon, FY2024: press releases/IR — ir.ozon.com (Q4 and FY 2024 financial results)

  • Reuters on Ozon 2024 results and expectations for 2025 — reuters.com/business/retail-consumer/russian-e-commerce-firm-ozon-reports-over-500-jump-2024-earnings-2025-02-27/

  • AKAR, results of 2024 advertising market (combined releases) – akarussia.ru/knowledge/market_size

  • Cookies/Privacy Sandbox and CMA position – reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulation/google-opts-out-standalone-prompt-third-party-cookies-2025-04-22/; reuters.com/sustainability/boards-policy-regulation/britain-says-googles-online-ad-commitments-no-longer-needed-2025-06-13/

  • Communication and communication rules on Ozon — seller-edu.ozon.ru/policies/rules/communications

  • Ranking and promotion on Wildberries (instructions for sellers) — seller.wildberries.ru/instructions/ (research results/factors)