In the weeds: How cannabis businesses get around a web of online advertising barriers - Morning Brew

In the US, cannabis is a $17.5 billion industry. That’s despite its legality varying from state to state. Oh, and the fact that it’s still federally illegal.

Those contradictions create inevitable challenges for anyone running a cannabis business, especially when it comes to marketing.

Because of the legal variances and stigma around pot, agencies aren’t always willing to work with cannabis brands. Ditto for publishers willing to host cannabis-related ads. On top of that, Google and Facebook—staples for small businesses with modest marketing budgets—are largely inaccessible to cannabis advertisers.

Although cannabis businesses face a tangled web of restrictions on several fronts, they’ve carved out ways to promote their products online. Often, that means relying on organic content and SEO. Niche programmatic ad solutions are also emerging.

Post if you dare

If you’re a small business, arguably the most accessible and affordable tools to advertise your products are: a) the largest search engine and b) the largest social media network. Together, they happen to make up more than half of the digital ad market. Unfortunately for cannabis businesses, Google and Facebook’s ad platforms are off the table.

Google prohibits the advertising of “marijuana” as well as “pipes, bongs, cannabis coffee shops.” And Facebook says ads can’t “promote the sale or use of illicit or recreational drugs, or other unsafe substances, products or supplements.”

These policies make things difficult for...

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