Researchers continue to prove that ads viewed within a premium publisher environment drive greater advertising effectiveness. Each of the studies (here, here and here) offers insights and empirical data proving ad performance is better in premium content environments.
A new study to add to this notable library is the second phase of The Benchmark Series, the largest cross-media advertising effectiveness study conducted in Australia.
It’s important to note that the first phase of research showed that ads in premium environments offer 1.8 times better recall and 2.8 times the brand lift than short-form video on run of the internet. Further, ads in premium content also deliver 1.8 times higher recall than Facebook video. It appears that the brain processes ads differently depending on where an ad is seen. When people see ads in an environment that helps contributes to memory encoding, ad effectiveness is maximized. Premium editorial sites offer this context.
This new research supplies a unique perspective on advertising performance in premium long-form using Broadcast Video on Demand (BVOD). The VOD broadcasters’ included were 7Plus, 9Now, and 10 play. The study compares BVOD to YouTube, Facebook, and run-of-the-internet sites. It uses core ad effective measures likeability, brand recall and lift.
Both phases of the study were conducted by MediaScience, which is well-known for their expertise in neuro-measures (i.e. biometrics, facial expression analysis, eye tracking and EEG) methodologies. It included more than 5,350 participants and campaigns ran across 252 websites in Australia.
MediaScience defines premium content as:
Professionally produced content.
A media brand that people know and trust.
Brand safe environment.
Meaningful scale for advertisers.
Overall, the new research shows that ads that appear in BVOD are more effective and outperform video advertising across YouTube, regardless of whether the ads align with short or longer-form content.
Recall
Ads in BVOD environments are remembered better (1.3 times) than ads aligned to YouTube videos of any length. Further, when ads in BVOD are compared to YouTube videos shorter than 9 minutes, they generate 1.5 times greater unprompted recall.
Further, BVOD advertising delivers better unprompted recall (4.7 times) than Facebook video ads and 2.5 times better recall than run of internet short-form video.
Likeability
In terms of likeability, ads in BVOD generate 15% greater likeability compared to YouTube short-form. Dr. Duane Varan, CEO of MediaScience explains, “advertising in premium long-form video environments benefits from the content the ads sit alongside with premium content boosting their impact.” He adds, “The content is priming you for certain emotions and that benefits the ads that follow.”
The research shows that not all digital video environments are equal when it comes to advertising performance. Quality content environments matter when advertising and there’s plenty of research to support this statement. The reality is that it’s long overdue for advertisers to reevaluate where they place their ad dollars and their micro-targeted ad campaigns.
We all know that the days of the cookie as the primary means to ad targeting and personalization are coming to an end. From increased legislation to ongoing browser updates, the time has come to put the cookie behind us and move forward. The good news is that there are tried and true methods that ensure the free flow of information and effective advertising.
While brands, publishers, and platforms are likely to leverage cookies for as long as they can, the industry has viable solutions and advertisers should take advantage of them. Those who have gotten a head start already see the benefits of an addressable, cookieless solution that enables authenticated user experiences. Brands and publishers that have already made the transition should use this time to establish stronger relationships based on trust through first-party data strategies. Those who haven’t yet started the journey away from third-party cookies should get started right away by leveraging a trusted, first-party authenticated solution.
Authenticated audiences
Previously, brands looking to reach their audiences have been overcompensating for the lack of a transparent, authenticated solution. Data-driven publishers, with established, first-party relationships can leverage their authenticated data so marketers can target audiences and measure campaign outcomes with people-based identity.
In the past, marketers looking for a measurable solution had to turn to social platforms’ walled gardens, which have enjoyed the benefits of disproportionate media investments. Historically, advertisers spent 60% of their digital advertising budget on reaching audiences in walled gardens, allotting only 40% of the budget to the open web. Yet, consumers spent more than half of their time on the open web (66%), compared to just 34% on closed platforms.
As independent publishers embrace the tactics of walled gardens, they leverage first-party authentications to deliver better, more targeted advertising. Initial campaign results from two publishers, Newsweek and Discovery, illustrate that an authenticated, cookieless solution has proven effective.
People-based solutions
Publishers and brands can now connect identities without the use of cookies or compromising data. For example, Newsweek was able to better plan and execute on advertisers’ marketing campaigns by leveraging a people-based, privacy-safe, cookieless solution that enabled publishers and brands to match identities.
Leveraging solutions independent of third-party cookies, the Newsweek team saw a total lift in eCPM as high as 224%, with an average lift of 52% across all web browsers. The lift in specific browsers — a CPM lift of 55% on Google Chrome, and a 93% and 60% CPM lift on Firefox and Safari, respectively — indicates the significant impact the new, cookieless solution can drive as an alternative to third-party cookies and in cookieless environments.
Although third-party cookies are still a capability in Chrome, Newsweek benefited from an audience lift on the browser by activating on the new cookieless solution. Because both Firefox and Safari no longer enable audience reach with third-party cookies, the lift on both browsers demonstrates how the cookieless solution enables a new, more premium channel based on authentications where marketers and advertisers can reach an audience they were not previously able to.
Newsweek’s COO Alvaro Palacios said, “Newsweek has proven through testing that digital media does not need third-party cookies to increase yields and the value of our inventory. This ID solution provides the infrastructure to match our readers with a brand’s customers, for marketing that could be more effective than with third-party cookies.”
On mobile devices, publishers are also seeing a higher CPM than on cookieless mobile web inventory. Through their new ID solution, Newsweek also achieved a CPM lift of 53% on iOS, compared to those that did not activate on this ID. Discovery Inc., a publisher with sites including HGTV.com, TravelChannel.com, FoodNetwork.com and DIYNetwork.com, also saw an average eCPM increase of 44% when enabling activation on the same ID solution on their cookieless inventory.
A new ecosystem where publishers and brands win
The CPM improvements that benefit Newsweek and Discovery are just an example of the incremental revenue opportunities achieved by leveraging an authenticated solution. As publishers continue to grow their addressable inventory, their revenue will also flourish. Brand marketers can now buy inventory activated by authenticated, first-party data. This enables them to reach more consumers on more channels than ever before. And that’s something third-party cookies were never able to achieve.
While third-party cookies may still exist in the near-term, advertisers should take advantage of the proven, more viable solution already available. Consider the cellular network transition from 4G to 5G. With speeds 100 times faster than 4G and better connectivity for seamless user experiences, 5G is the clear winner for a preferred connection. Yet, 4G still exists. In this same way, having already proven themselves to be more effective, authenticated cookieless solutions have also become the preferred solution while third-party cookies remain.
The digital advertising industry is constantly balancing the interests of publishers, brands, and browsers. The sometimes-competing interests may feel like a three-way tug-of-war at times. However, there are proven viable alternatives to third-party cookies that benefit brands and publishers equally.
To get ahead of impending browser changes, publishers must own their trusted first-party consumer relationships through authenticated solutions. Once publishers succeed in establishing trust with their consumers, they will then be able to develop a relationship that’s independent of cookies. And that will improve the user experience and increase yield for publishers and the brands that work for them.
Today’s online consumers expect ads to show them what they want, when they want it. An overwhelming 80% of shoppers say they’re more likely to make a purchase when a brand offers a personalized experience, while 70% say they’re more loyal to companies that demonstrate a clear understanding of their personal needs. So it’s not surprising that personalization has become a must for digital marketers.
To deliver these kinds of highly targeted and hyper-relevant marketing campaigns at scale, savvy advertisers use innovative display ad technologies like dynamic creative optimization (DCO). Powered by a combination of dynamic, data-driven content and automated machine learning, DCO is quickly becoming one of the most effective strategies for delivering the types of personalized campaigns that today’s online audiences demand.
How DCO works
DCO is a type of programmatic advertising technology that gives marketers the ability to optimize dynamic creatives in real time. It creates a highly personalized experience tailored to the user’s needs, at that exact moment, by using data that’s collected when the ad is being served. The system updates dynamic elements instantly to provide content that’s most relevant based on a broad range of data signals. These include location, weather, gender, device, buying behavior, and where the user is in the buyer’s journey.
One of the reasons DCO is so effective is because the process is completely automated and continuously improving itself. AI takes care of multivariate testing and automatically optimizes ads based on data. This not only improves performance but also allows marketers to produce a high volume of ad variations quickly and at scale. DCO is also easy to implement when integrated with a data management platform (DMP) for access to data feeds and a creative management platform (CMP) for access to creative assets like copy, images, and display.
Getting it right: 5 best practices for dynamic creative optimization
While DCO is a hands-off marketing tool in many respects, it does require some forethought and strategy for success. To make the most of your next campaign, keep the following best practices in mind.
1. Meet customers where they are
Successful DCO campaigns adapt to the audiences they serve at every touchpoint. This includes determining where users are in the sales funnel and displaying creatives that best match that mindset. For example, creatives served to customers close to action might feature harder-selling pitches than those designed for higher-funnel consumers. You can also use conversion tags to track your creatives’ performance in the buyer’s journey and replace poor performers with new variations that might catch customers on their way out.
2. Include contextual elements
Use data triggers like location, time, and weather to keep campaigns grounded in a user’s environment. For example, images for a fast-food restaurant can be set to reflect time of day, displaying breakfast sandwiches and coffee in the morning and fries and burgers in the afternoon. Or a retailer can recommend umbrellas and Wellies during a rainstorm and sunscreen and visors on a sunny day.
3. Diversify your assets
DCO gives you the opportunity to test a wide range of creative assets and it’s important to take advantage of this technology and use it to the fullest. The more diverse your variation of CTAs, headlines, images, and other creative assets, the more your campaign will benefit from DCO.
4. Trust the machine
As the “O” in DCO implies, one of the biggest advantages of the technology is that it’s specifically built to optimize your creatives. But the platform only has as much control as you allow it. Resist the urge to make ads too busy and overload them with as many products as a template will allow. Trust the DCO platform’s AI to do its job and select the most effective elements for the moment based on data.
5. Review performance
While DCO handles the minutiae of multivariate testing, it’s up to you to examine your campaign as a whole and determine if it needs adjustment. Make time to review your creative’s performance data regularly so you can identify the elements that are most effective in driving engagement and optimize your strategy accordingly.
Deliver on expectations
DCO is a must-have tool for creating highly targeted and personalized dynamic ads. Using a powerful combination of advertising display and analytics, the technology helps brands deliver the right message to the right customer at the right time. It drives engagement and increases brand loyalty by creating the contextual relevance that today’s consumers not only prefer, but have come to expect.
My toddler and I share a love for the misadventures of Shaun the Sheep. In particular, we love the episode where sheepdog Bitzer is cleaning the farmhouse window. But the Farmer keeps pointing out specks that Bitzer, try as he might, cannot see.
After countless elaborate attempts to clean the windows, Bitzer notices a chunk of dirt on the Farmer’s coke-bottle glasses. The windows were spotless. The Farmer’s smudgy glasses caused him to see phantom blemishes and incite a great deal of (highly entertaining) chaos on the farm.
Recently, this episode came to mind when talking to a DSP about why a slew of their ads were being blocked on various publishers sites (by a different ad quality provider). The DSP shared the report with us. As we examined the wide variety of blocked ads, we confirmed they were clean. There was no cloaking or malicious code, no compromised landing pages. They were basically spotless. After some analysis, it clicked: We were witnessing fallout from LNKR.
LNKR is the smudgy glasses problem transported to digital media. However, it is far more devious and likely to wreak havoc throughout the digital advertising ecosystem.
The trouble with browser extensions
At heart, LNKR is the browser extension heir to the malicious toolbar, a classic form of adware. Browser toolbars tended to create extra ad slots on publisher pages to serve ads. (These sometimes came with even more noxious malware.) However, LNKR simply injects malicious code right into one or more existing ad placements—on top of publisher-served ads. Most often, the malignant code prompts an auto-redirect with a fake software upgrade or antivirus tool download. (Surprise—it’s really more malware!).
Consumers knowingly (perhaps looking for some unique feature like “change text into pirate speak,” ya landlubber), or unknowingly, install a browser extension with LNKR code. Once that’s done, the LNKR operators can deliver redirect code into any ad slot at any time when the infected browser visits any website. If the malicious code is injected and the redirect is served, the consumer comes under attack.
Reputation and revenue
To compound the problem, they they’ll think that the publisher they just visited served them malvertising. The publisher’s brand is damaged even though it had nothing to do with the attack. (That character defamation also gets passed upstream to the SSPs and DSPs serving ads to the user.)
A publisher’s bad-ad blocker may shut down legitimate ads because users with the LNKR-infected extension have unwanted code injected on top of them. That could rob publishers of revenue. That’s because every single ad campaign served to the infected user will be mistaken for malware and slapped away.
If not corrected at the user level, or discounted from malvertising reporting, most eligible creative sent to an infected user will eventually be blocked. Thus, the scenario in the be bad ads ad infinitum. SSPs will scream at DSPs for pushing malware through the pipes when the accused advertising creative and supply chain is legit. This can further come back to bite the publisher if SSPs pause or cut off relationships with lucrative DSPs.
The publisher and its demand partners end up becoming patsies for LNKR’s bad deeds, because with these malicious extensions… The malware is coming from inside the browser!
A greater danger
Of course, this confusion damages relationships between AdTech platforms. (And let’s face it, they already have serious trust issues). But beyond that, it muddies the waters for malware hunters. More and more innocuous ads are falsely labeled malvertising. This distracts ad quality providers from the job of tracking down the real bad apples—which are always employing clever new evasive measures to avoid detection.
LNKR also represents more of a danger to consumers beyond a malware delivery channel. The browsing of infected users can be tracked and LNKR can also grab search parameters when a user employs any kind of search engine. LNKR has already exhibited the ability for advanced microtargeting. It can infect actual web pages where a user has write access, enabling it to spread to additional users.
Worse, information from infected browsers—as well as access to them—is sold on the dark web to malevolent actors with more malignant schemes. Indeed, LNKR is a key player in the ransomware ecosystem. It’s an ideal tool for extracting personal data that can be exploited for great harm.
Consumer awareness is critical
Distinct LNKR incidents, with each one accounting for thousands of individual hits, have been on the rise since the beginning of 2021.
LNKR is an effective malvertising tactic. The number of incidents (which can account for thousands of individual hits) detected by The Media Trust has been swelling since the beginning of 2021. Nipping this ever-growing threat in the bud relies on something that’s long been difficult for the digital advertising industry: consumer education.
Browser extensions are sticky. And consumers often forget what they’ve actually installed. Unused extensions can easily pile up and extension apathy is exactly what the bad actors behind LNKR prey on. That’s where the smudgy glasses issue hits full stride: infected consumers keep getting hit with redirects. They also have no idea that a browser extension causes the issue, let alone which specific extension.
Alongside software updates, operators of the main browsers often prompt users to check their extensions to make sure they’re only housing ones they want. In addition, users need to keep their approved extensions updates—not always a simple task. But older versions of extensions can have unseen vulnerabilities and be compromised.
The rest of the industry needs to spread the truth wherever possible. We must explain that LNKR is a bigger threat than just some annoying redirects. Extension hygiene may not be sexy, but it’s key for an overall good experience on the web and helping you stay clear from malware and unwanted data tracking.
Cleaning up the LNKR smudge
Publishers, though, need to demand more from their bad-ad-blocking services. Ad quality providers must be able to identify LNKR and confirm blocks are not false positives, discount LNKR from bad-ad counts. In addition, the creative blocker needs to ensure it’s stopping the delivery of adware that will further spread the LNKR menace. That’s right: They must block pop-ups, scams, and ads distributing unwanted programs.
Finally, being able to recognize LNKR and alert publishers’ upstream partners ensures less legit creative gets caught in the crossfire. Discounting LNKR in malware reports will limit ire between AdTech partners that could eventually impact publisher revenue.
In real life, a little microfiber cloth makes quick work of a blemish on your glasses. Unfortunately, wiping browsers of the LNKR smudge is going to be a complex, industry-wide struggle. The first step, however, is widespread acknowledgement of the danger at hand.
It is no secret that the last year drove significant changes in consumer behavior. It transformed the way we shop, with 75% of U.S. consumers saying that they have tried a new shopping behavior. And most intend to continue that behavior after the pandemic. During this period, consumers also spent more time on digital media, streaming, digital audio, and online gaming.
Despite consumers’ demand for more content—and the increasing complexity of multi-channel distribution—most media companies are still in the early stages of transforming their operations to take advantage of these new realities. And many brands are not confident they can measure results accurately and completely across media types. That’s especially true in the growing connected TV (CTV) and gaming channels.
Additionally, there’s the ongoing need for diligence around brand suitability through solutions that thread the needle between protecting their clients’ brands and driving media effectiveness. Instead of relying on rigid blocklists, evaluations of brand suitability should examine and understand page activity along with context to address continuous content evolution.
All those changes in behavior lead us wondering—how well do we really understand today’s consumer? We need to continue to ask questions about the true impact of ads. We need to ask what we are getting in terms of attention, what messaging resonated with whom, do we know if somebody is paying attention differently on one platform versus another, and what media channels drive sales and store visits.
The Association of National Advertisers (ANA) recently polled marketers to understand which media KPIs are most important. It’s telling that half focused on ad effectiveness. Proactive marketers are taking steps to understand this campaign performance information. These steps include:
Optimize baseline verification measurement
Verification is the baseline to evaluate ad effectiveness. This includes validity and viewability (e.g., is a real ad served to an actual person who can see a relevant ad)? Ads need to be in a suitable environment as defined and controlled by each brand. And ad fraud is a challenge all brands face.
As an example, we recently exposed a publishing site that appeared to be redirecting traffic to three hidden domains with completely different content that is not safe for work (NSFW). The site leverages domain misdirection and context spoofing to commit blatant ad fraud and subvert brand safety measures.
Track engagement and impact
Once you connect your campaign to datasets that reveal meaningful impact, things rightly center around attention. To succeed, marketing campaigns new measures and metrics suitable for gauging cross-channel impact past the baseline of verification. Human, viewable, and brand-safe impressions still set the standard for core measurement. But true brand effectiveness requires deeper evaluation.
Measure across channels
Fluid media consumption habits change how we reach and capture audiences. This shift requires both robust content and multi-channel dissemination. It also calls for the ability to understand how consumers actually pay attention across emerging formats to uncover what real viewing means.
Innovative marketers who plan and experiment with formats beyond traditional social media posts and editorial-style content learn much more. That’s because verification alone won’t tell you about impact post view. To get this insight, marketers are using measurement to evaluate key metrics including:
How many impressions were relevant?
How many uploads of the same ad ran to the same viewer?
Did anyone pay attention?
Did you capture your audience in the environments where they spend their time?
Evolve and achieve
Effective measurement is a constant evolution. Undoubtedly, results from each campaign can help you continuously refine your digital strategy toward better outcomes. However, without additional insights, advertisers will have performance blind spots regarding true measures of campaign effectiveness.
Proactive measurement and tracking key KPIs will enable advertisers and publishers to determine if viewers are paying attention to an ad (via time on the screen and engagement). Armed with this information, they can establish custom metrics based on business need, and use analysis to help shape future programs
At Permutive’s July 14 Global summit, The great privacy reset, Jana Meron, SVP, Programmatic & Data Strategy at Insider shared her views on the cookie chaos with Michelle Manafy, Editorial Director at DCN. “The sky is not falling,” according to Meron.
Watch or listen to the full conversation (below) for insight into Insider, Inc.’s data strategy. In particular, they explore the reasons why first-party data performs better than third-party. Their conversation also provides practical advice on how to prepare for digital advertising’s cookieless future.
The business of digital media is not dull. It can be a bit like the not-so-well-wish “may you live in interesting times,” though. Keeping up with it all is a big job for digital media executives tasked with keeping their organizations healthy and at the forefront of this industry. A clear-eyed look into what’s next is important in order to keep up with the pace of innovation in this industry. To help, I’ve outlined four trends I’m watching closely during the second half of 2021:
1. Pandemic-era rebound in advertising market
Big takeaway. Knocking on wood, but all digital revenue indicators are trending positive in 2021 through midyear for premium publishers. DCN distributed both its proprietary annual benchmark and first quarter revenue reports in the past month. The reports are only available to participating members. However, I can share the top-line good news: Year-over-year growth was strong. And that’s even prior to the favorable comparisons to the depressed market from the onset of Covid in the Spring of 2020. CPMs have also strengthened in the open market where advertisers are finally putting in more diligence to know where their money and brands are delivering.
Watch this. The largest challenge to the premium publisher business is keeping pace with the massive consumption in the back-half of 2020 due to a record convergence of captive audiences and riveting news cycles. Putting aside what is good for our business for a moment, it’s nice to see outdoor activities once again competing for attention! And for the booming digital audio market, that has some upside as well.
Surprise twist. The Delta variant looks like it may drive many Americans back to some of our early 2020 habits. Clearly, Covid continues to concern all of us personally and professionally. How it impacts economic and media consumption trends is to be determined as we approach the Fall.
2. Privacy and data protection
Big takeaway. 2021 will be the year that killed “tracking” – regardless of how successfully Google protects the soft underbelly of its surveillance business model. Apple will continue to distance itself from Google in an effort to position itself as the consumer champion by carrying the privacy torch. They pressed forward with iOS 14.5 in Q2 with installations now approaching 75% of the market. Why does this matter? It’s the first major operating platform to require consumers to grant companies permission to track them outside of the apps they’re choosing to interact with.
Watch this. This move better aligns iOS with the tracking prevention values long held by the Safari browser and those increasingly held by consumers. Given the market power of Apple, it has triggered a war with Facebook, the second largest tracker on the internet. In fact, Apple’s impact on Facebook’s future revenues was mentioned repeatedly on Facebook’s Q2 earnings call yesterday with future headwinds dominating the press headlines (despite their efforts to talk about the future “metaverse.”) As global regulators have frequently noted, a majority of Facebook’s data (and with that, their revenue) has long been derived from tracking users.
Surprise twist. The Attorney General of California also announced last week that their office had accelerated sending out warning letters to companies that weren’t properly honoring consumers’ opt-out of tracking requests via the Global Privacy Control. This should send fear through Google and Facebook as California law has defined tracking consumers as a “sale of data.” That definition will be mighty uncomfortable for two empires built on exactly that. And the California AG’s moves will accelerate pressure to create a federal law where Facebook and Google already have multiple regulatory issues to deal with. All of this has forced industry to accelerate its “reality check.”
3. Growing consumer revenues
Big takeaway. After a robust 2020, consumer direct revenues — including subscriptions — continue to grow, albeit at a slower pace. Overall, non-advertising revenues grew in the first quarter of this year. And they are trending up to 30% so far this year.
Watch this. Although “subscription fatigue” continues to be a topic of discussion, DCN’s prior research and industry trends have shown nothing short of an insatiable appetite for quality programming. Yes, even when it bears the price of subscription. It doesn’t hurt that making a purchase is now as easy as a thumbprint on mobile.
Surprise twist. Gen Z (yes, the kids who grew up with iOS) don’t seem to mind advertising. DCN will be releasing research in September that shows that Gen Z’ers (16-24) actually have something in common with Gen Y (25-40). Both groups are very open to advertising in their programming. Whether they pay or opt for a free service, the existence of advertising doesn’t seem to be a major factor for younger media consumers.
4. Strong streaming market
Big takeaway. No market has had more of a dichotomy between advertising and subscription-supported models than the red-hot video market. In fact, DCN broke out the “advanced video” segment for the first time in our most recent quarterly revenue report. And it nearly tripled in our first year-over-year comparison.
Watch this. Apropos to this heading, America can’t seem to get enough to watch from these trusted brands (and DCN members): Disney Plus, HBO Max, Peacock, Discovery Plus, Paramount Plus, and the many other services that have gone direct to the consumer and are reaping the rewards.
Surprise twist. The 10-ton giant of streaming video, Netflix, missed earnings in Q2. It lost hundreds of thousands of U.S. subscribers in Q2, with metrics that looked more like a traditional cable TV company. Maybe it’s a momentary lapse from last year’s stay-at-home streamers. But it could be a sign of migration to the newest competitors. Either way, I’ll be watching.
Trend watching and trendsetting
As someone whose job it is to promote the value of quality and trusted media brands and to call out those who seek to disintermediate them, monitoring trends can be one of the most fluid and head spinning parts of the job. The team at DCN will continue to champion the trusted providers of content that informs, entertains, and delights because that is what consumers expect and what we believe will ensure a healthy future for our industry.
Rounding up these current trends, I see a lot to be excited about – particularly with the next generation – as we continue to learn the lessons, both good and bad, from the pandemic. It’s never a dull business and I can’t wait to see what’s next.
Since the inception of smartphones, mobile games have been one of the most popular app categories. However, there is one major downside to mobile gaming: the influx of bad ads.
Anyone who’s developed a minor addiction to a mobile game – be it a classic title like Candy Crush, Words with Friends, or a modern sensation, such as Roblox or Among Us – is all too familiar with the frustration of an intrusive ad. User expectations around in-app advertising differ for gaming vs. non-gaming apps. That said, all users draw the line at malicious advertising.
Striking the balance
For app publishers, trying to strike the right balance between monetizing your app effectively and not inundating users with ads is always a delicate process. However, that’s especially true for gaming apps. The success of mobile games is entirely dependent on the user experience. Therefore, a malicious, interruptive, or offensive ad can entirely derail the entire user experience. Ultimately, when it comes to advertising in-app, it’s about serving safe, relevant, and brand-suitable ads for your users.
The good news for app publishers is that gamers are receptive to advertising so long as it adds to the experience. When that happens, ads can enhance rather than detract from the gamer’s experience. Moreover, gamers are more than willing to view ads in exchange for in-game goods, such as extra lives, power-ups, new levels, and in-game currency. These ads help game makers monetize their titles. But they also make the game itself stickier, inducing users to play longer and more often.
Caution: Hazards ahead
Aside from an offensive ad creative, users are exposed to a myriad of threats after clicking on an ad. Because gaming apps appeal to consumers of all ages and all levels, apart from strict ad content parameters, app publishers must recognize the hazards of malicious advertising.
Recently, malvertisers have shifted their gaze from the ad itself to the landing page the ad leads to. And gaming users are often the target of malicious or deceptive attacks, both of which come at the expense of the user experience. Threats include cloaked landing pages leading to scams to father sensitive personal or financial data. Here, the challenge is sifting out the bad actors and ads with a fine-tooth comb to ensure that only high-quality ads make their way onto your app.
A virtuous circle
When it comes to in-app advertising, bad ads have an immediate impact on monetization and the ability to work with valued monetization partners. For instance, the top five in-app platforms avoid apps with a low rating. Additionally, low-quality ads lead to bad reviews, low ratings, user churn.
Unhappy users will to switch to competitors’ apps, and at the very worst, apps may be kicked out of the App Store/Google Play. Additionally, app developers may be banned from the digital ecosystem due to ads that violate Apple’s new ATT policy. To safeguard users and ensure high ad quality, app publishers can follow the three ad quality guidelines: Ads must not contain malware, disrupt the user experience, or feature off-brand or offensive content.
Closing the loop on bad ads
Here’s what tools in-app publishers can implement to maintain high ad quality:
Adopt a real-time bad ad-blocking solution to thwart all malicious attempts.
Use proactive low-quality ad filtering to eliminate user experience killing ads.
Leverage automated and manual content management tools to define and enforce ad content parameters.
Identifying bad actors is difficult. But, luckily for publishers, they can use ad monitoring tools to conduct automated, round-the-clock surveillance of their ad networks and root out bad ads before they ever have a chance to show up in their games.
The best philosophy is to block in real-time. This eliminates any lag in response time and saving energy while preventing bad users experiences from appearing. These days, it’s critical to be certain you are part of the proactive new world vs. a reactive, old world.
To convert brands in direct-sold sales conversations, publishers are tasked with proving the quality of their audience and inventory. From prospecting to sales decks to wrap-up reports, we’ve increasingly heard questions about how publishers can use third-party data to support the sales process. The good news is that most organizations already have a lot of valuable data that is leveraged by other teams.
However, just because your organization is collecting data doesn’t always mean that it’s being used successfully. This can be due to lack of alignment on organizational strategies or data living in siloed or complex systems. Often, it’s simply about having a lack of time to understand how to effectively leverage the data. Most ad ops teams are plugged into a variety of data sources that can also provide valuable insights and compelling stories to support the sales process.
Ad sales teams can increase direct sales by using data to zero in on the right buyers and showcase value in pitch decks. They can also use it to effectively package inventory and report on campaign performance in a meaningful way to clients.
Finding the perfect buyers
Prioritizing the right buyers is one of the largest challenges for sales teams everywhere. Leaning on existing relationships or brand recognition can work up to a point. However, informing your prospecting with additional data sets allows you to quickly identify the right prospects to approach and shed light on new market segments. One example of this can be found in a publisher’s programmatic data. With normalized advertiser data, sales teams can identify the biggest spenders on open exchanges for more detailed buyer analysis.
Once those potential buyers are identified, it’s important to understand compatibility to ensure you can tell a story that aligns with a brand’s goals. This typically comes in the form of media quality data from verification vendors that measure metrics such as viewability thresholds, fraud rates, and brand suitability. Based on specific brand goals, content alignment and risk tolerance, publishers can further narrow their list to only include prospects that match up with what their inventory has to offer.
Highlighting inventory and audience value
As a premium publisher, it’s not enough to simply tell buyers that you know your audience. Advertisers only pursue direct deals if they’re confident that the inventory purchased is reaching their ideal audience. First-party data can be helpful here. It allows you to discuss content engagement, demographics, traffic and other metrics that showcase site performance and your user personas.
However, this story becomes even more powerful when combined with third-party measurement and contextual data such as overall viewability, engagement metrics, invalid traffic rates, and more. All of these use established industry standards such as those supported by the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB).
The biggest challenge here is understanding how to line up these data sets. They you can decipher which metrics are going to resonate most with buyers who want an objective truth. More specifically, which metrics gives them the confidence that delivered impressions will reach these users consistently. When used in conjunction with data-driven prospecting, data used during this stage of the sales cycle can provide an opportunity to easily show clients how you can meet their needs.
Advertisers also want to understand where their creatives will go and how they might perform. Creating compelling, tailored packages using all of the available first- and third-party data can level up your pitch. It also helps ensure that expectations are clear going into each campaign.
Telling the performance story
Now that you have the client, how do you retain and expand the relationship? Traditionally, campaign wrap-up decks include run dates, traffic drivers, top-performers and other KPIs. This is a great place to leverage data from different sources to drive home how quality, engagement, and context help brands meet their goals.
Third-party data enables you to confidently highlight benefits such as:
You serve zero fraudulent impressions
Your campaigns met the client’s viewability thresholds
Campaigns were served alongside content that positively supports the brand’s image
Make goods won’t be necessary due to successful targeting
Whether campaigns meet buyer expectations or not, third-party data sets can serve as a retention tool and allow you to speak the same language as your customer. Your team will be able to outline what worked and what didn’t, while including data-driven recommendations for the next campaign. This strategy will give buyers more confidence in your ability to course correct and maximize their return on ad spend.
TLDR: It’s important to infuse your sales strategy with data
Gone are the days where the only sources of buyer friction came from viewability discrepancies and buffering requirements. Yes, those still remain. However, buyers increasingly value inventory that is brand suitable, fraud-free, and in-geo. This makes inventory scrutiny and sales conversations more complex. But the right data can cut right through that to increase conversions and drive business.
Imagine that you’re driving down the highway and many of the billboards you pass are facing in the wrong direction. Advertisers paid for their messages to be displayed. However, some percentage of these ads have no chance of being seen.
If you were an advertiser, would you be willing to pay a higher price for only those that were guaranteed to be viewable? Or would you rather pay a lower price to buy all the billboards and roll the dice? Perhaps this is a simplistic way to look at the programmatic landscape, but I hope it makes the point. Ads that have a low probability of becoming viewable have little or no value.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is King
continue to enforce such a low requirement for viewable impressions? The MRC deems that an impression counts as viewable when only 50% of the pixels are in view for one second. If your answer is that “it is what it is,” then perhaps we in the industry should raise our expectations. Let’s consider setting a higher standard for ourselves and our advertisers, AKA, the lifeblood of our businesses.
Viewable impressions are more valuable to advertisers, command higher CPMs, provide a better ROI, and increase publisher income. So, let’s find a sustainable way to increase supply without jeopardizing the quality of our content, degrading user experience, or resorting to disruptive devices.
Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose
You spend hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars annually creating exciting, informative, entertaining, beautiful, provocative, and inspiring content for your audiences. Your goal is to engage readers in this content so they spend more of their most precious resource, time, on your site. They read your stories and move from the home page to below the fold with deeper dives into your content. And ad units scroll into view and are revealed during these engaged user sessions.
Intuitively we already know that an ad you can see is worth more than a non-viewable one. However, logically, one that is viewable while you are engaged in consuming content that is of interest is even more valuable than the billboard you cruise past at 70 mph.
When I was a magazine publisher, ad buyers regularly asked for their ads to be placed “far forward on a right-hand page.” They believed that these were more likely to be seen than those within stories in the magazine. The reality was then as it is today: that an ad adjacent to content where a reader is engaged is far more likely to be seen and effective.
And the cookies came crumbling down
While Google’s recent announcement has given all of us a reprieve, we know that the times are a ‘changing. So how do we respond now that publishers have bought some time and tech companies have a longer runway to build alternatives?
There is no question that there will be dozens if not hundreds of “better” data mousetraps in the marketplace during the coming months. Yet the fact is that we already have many of the tools necessary to enhance the value of our websites for advertisers. Your sites already have the right target audiences. You capture their attention and interest with your content. And they’ve come to right place to enjoy that content. Maybe the missing link is that some of your billboards have been installed facing the wrong direction.
So, here’s the big idea. Serve ads only to readers when they are engaged in content and continue to serve them viewable ads for as long as they remain engaged. It can be done. It is being done on hundreds of sites. (Check out Inc.com or Rightmove to see.) You can do it too. And when you do, your programmatic ad revenue will increase by 20-40%.
About the author
Bruce Brandfon is Chief Media Officer of Duration Media. Prior to that he was EVP of Webspectator, and before that VP and Managing Director at Publicitas. Before joining Publicitas, Bruce was VP and Publisher of Scientific American. He has also held leadership positions at The Philadelphia Media Network, Newsweek, and Time Inc. Bruce is Director of the Board of Advisors at Planet Forward, and an Adjunct Professor of Media Studies at Westchester Community College.
Facebook is a peculiarity, even among its fellow ad-supported media giants. Their ability to collect data from their two billion plus users, and package that data for advertisers, is second to none. Facebook’s business model is inherently more insulated from many market fluctuations that affect other advertising platforms because of Facebook’s network effect. Every new Facebook user adds new data to the system. That gives Facebook even more advertising data to sell to advertisers.
Yes, Apple’s iOS14’s App Tracking Transparency (ATT) changes, and Google’s plan to phase out third-party cookies, now delayed until 2023, will have an impact. However, the amount of user data being collected within Facebook and the value of that data is gold. And that’s even without tracking users across third-party apps and websites.
With Facebook’s vast internal network and collective data, Facebook ads aren’t going away. Instead, Facebook is adopting new privacy standards and will continue to play a significant role in the growth of small and niche businesses. Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg stated that as a business, he believes Facebook can manage through the changes. He thinks it may emerge even stronger if it becomes harder for small businesses to navigate data targeting without Facebook. Here at MediaRadar, we decided to take a closer look.
Niche industries and ad targeting
Facebook reported revenue of $26.17 billion for the quarter, which was up 48% compared with a year prior. Facebook attributed the significant increase in revenue to a 30% year-over-year increase in the average price per ad and a 12% increase in the number of ads delivered.
The biggest spenders, accounting for 7% of ad spend, were entertainment brands, more specifically streaming brands such as HBO Max, Disney+ and Amazon Prime. One could assume, based on these numbers, that ad spend from large companies like these services accounts for Facebook’s success. Instead, what truly sets Facebook apart is how it caters to very niche audiences.
When looking at our data, of the percentage of retail industries that advertise on Facebook, a startling 62% fits into the “other” category which is made up of hyper-focused retail categories. Mind you, MediaRadar tracks over 7,500 product categories, and over half of them are incredibly specific.
Niches such as leather goods, herbs, telescopes, or cheese shops are not relevant to a majority of users. However, Facebook pinpoints who needs to see these types of advertisements the most. In addition, Facebook targets people with ads from industries that other platforms don’t. And, since they target users ads from plenty of market subsets, Facebook’s reach and revenue adds up.
Facebook is quite aware of its niche marketing prowess, and takes pride in it. In prepared remarks for the Q1 earnings release, COO Sheryl Sandberg chose to highlight someone who runs a yoga studio, and how Facebook helped her get the word out, as opposed to highlighting a major brand. It shows the value of their marketing strategy, and how appealing to the everyday consumer is what attracts advertisers to the platform.
Similarities to other platforms – and differences
Facebook’s reliance on niche marketing is strengthened by the fact that they are quite similar to other platforms in areas such as retention and campaign length. We found Facebook had a 34% retention rate between 2020 and 2021, similar to the overall industry average. As for campaign length, 44% of campaigns lasted one month or less, while 38% of campaigns lasted from two to four months.
The advertiser overlap rates between Facebook and other major forms of media is also a reason to point to niche markets as its success. In reviewing the data, we saw there was a 34% rate of overlap between Facebook and major broadcasters such as NBC and Fox, and those numbers are slightly lower when looking at podcasts and Snapchat.
The key stat for Facebook here is that nearly half of their advertisers are exclusive to their site, including nearly 60% of retail advertisers. While advertisers have the same buying patterns as everyone else, Facebook also attracts a lot of brands that aren’t selling on other platforms, and that makes them even more valuable.
What can we learn
Facebook’s success with niche markets provides a valuable lesson for us all: know your audience. No matter how big or how small, it’s important to make sure you market to your customers in ways that your competition cannot. With their vast network effect and their ability to package granular advertising data, Facebook’s dominance will only continue to grow regardless of whether they are able to track users across third-party apps and websites. But of course, they’ll need to ensure that they get privacy buy-in from their users, particularly as policy and user preference around this topic evolve .
Fake news is often driven by deeply ingrained partisanship. Its proliferation is also fueled by financial motivation, of course. New research, Market Forces: Quantifying the Role of Top Credible Ad Servers in the Fake News Ecosystem, found that that the top-10 credible ad servers alone account for 67% of fake news and 56% of and low-quality ad traffic. Further, Google delivers 48% of the ad traffic on fake news publishers and 32% on low credibility sites.
Methodology
To conduct this research, Lia Bozarth and Ceren Budak at the University of Michigan used a web API tool to simulate peoples’ browsing behavior. Their research identified fake news sites as those filled with pseudoscience and false facts. They also found that low credibility publishers are often hyper-partisan. The API tool initiates a browser session, navigate to the site’s homepage, scrolls through the page, and focuses the mouse on each ad’s iframe. Bozarth and Budak then filtered the collected data by the top 50 ad serves. In all, 84% of their ad data was served by the top 50% ad servers.
This methodology allowed the authors to measure ad server usage of high-quality sites, fake, and low-quality news sites. Three-quarters (74%) of all publishers (high-quality, fake and low-quality) have one or more ad servers displaying ads and 26% of all publishers are ad-free. The findings also show that fake news publishers often have fewer ad servers on average compared to low-quality and traditional news sites. Further, the median number of ad servers for fake and traditional sites is six and eight ad servers, respectively.
Ad server quality
Consumers navigating to fake and low-quality news site are at potential privacy and security risks. Fake and low-quality news publishes have a higher tendency to serve more ads and to partner with riskier ad servers when compared to traditional news media with similar popularity and age skew. Importantly, while fake news publishers use riskier ad servers, they are also dependent on credible ones. According to the findings, the top credible ad servers play a substantial role in delivering ad revenue to fake news sites. For instance, 6.7% of all fake domains are dependent on top-10 ad servers.
Impact on ad server revenue
Bozarth and Budak also provide a weighted ad traffic analysis to illustrate the role top credible ad servers play in providing revenue to fake and low-quality news sites. They found that full 61% of fake news ad revenue is estimated to be supplied by the 10 credible ad servers.
In terms of revenue to the ad servers, Bozarth and Bodak estimate that the top-10 firms, in aggregate, generate $24,500 to $28,600 monthly through fake news sites. That’s an average of $985,700 to $1.15 million of revenue or approximately 0.1% to 1.0% of the top 10 ad servers’ their annual revenue.
While the authors support ad servers blacklisting fake and low-quality news sites, that may not be the best answer. Profit-driven fake news sites banned by top-tier ad servers will partner with less reputable ones without hesitation. Further, owners of blacklisted websites will also migrate to new domains. It becomes a game of “whack-a-mole” unless there is an ability to detect these sites before ads are served. Additional research is needed to clearly identify fake and low-quality news sites. Criteria like the type of advertisers on these sites and their CPM or CPC rates to identifying profit models by category sectors. Each additional factor identified as a predictor of fake and low-quality news site can help inform ad servers about the content qualify of news sites. And this, in turn, supports sites that provide better consumer experiences and higher quality information.