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Bridging commentary on the art & science of content; content marketing, branded content, native advertising and the analytics, attribution and intelligence that powers it.

How to Produce the Best Native Content, from Some of the Best in the Business

  We recently hosted our second native ad talks, this time talking Content Production. Moderated by Lucia Moses, our panelists were Adam Aston (Editorial Director the NY Times T Brand Studio) and Joe Lazauskas (Editor, Contently). During the evening, they shared insights, on how to produce the best native ad content. What was clear from the conversation is that everyone around the table wants the best work. This boils down to a few things, clear objectives, getting the right talent,… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
May 20, 2015

How to Produce the Best Native Content, from Some of the Best in the Business

We recently hosted our second native ad talks, this time talking Content Production. Moderated by Lucia Moses, our panelists were Adam Aston (Editorial Director the NY Times T Brand Studio) and Joe Lazauskas (Editor, Contently). During the evening, they shared insights, on how to produce the best native ad content. What was clear from the conversation is that everyone around the table wants the best work. This boils down to a few things, clear objectives, getting the right talent, being a good client and giving it the time it needs. What follows is a synopsis of the discussion. In the end is a link to the video & audio, with time stamps to particular topics. How to be the dream client Adam talked about how the stars aligned for the creation of the Orange is the New Black piece, the key things for as he put it the dream are to: – Come to the table with clear goals for the content – Realize this is a quality game; give your team the time to gestate – Provide constructive feedback – Bring data and/or topic areas to the table, it helps – Be comfortable with the article mentioning competitors, it has to draw people in   The flipside of this too is publishers doing their part; both panelists spoke to this from their experience as Editors.   How publishers get the best work Involving brands in the content creation process does put a spanner in the works, so publishers have to reflect that. – Hire the best talent – Don’t just throw your team at the whim of the brand, maintain editorial standards – Be upfront around your code of ethics or conduct to establish how you produce native – Continual feedback with client, not just at the end – Develop understanding of different markets regulations for marketing messages – Develop processes for clearing data & image rights for advertising purposes, some industries are more regulated than others – Arm yourself with data to make recommendations   Watch the full video or audio to get the whole conversation, or review the timestamps for key parts of the conversation. If you’d like to attend future native ad events, follow @giveitanudge on Twitter.   Thanks to PowerLinks for sponsoring the talks.   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMQ6ZwU6mEE <soundcloud embed> — You can jump ahead to particular topics, at these timestamps: 4:15 Quality is key 5:15 having your goals set in the beginning 5.55 How to hire for native 9:26 How to protect journalists 15:12 The dream client 16:12 Orange is the new black setting the standard 18:18 How quizzes actually help a brand articulate a message 20:00 Once produced… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
May 19, 2015

This Week in Native Ads 05/15

  Campaign of the Week: The 30-Minute Recharge: NYC We call it the city that never sleeps for a reason: Life in the Big Apple unfolds at breakneck speed. Down streets, through subways, and on buses, everyone’s in a rush to get to the next big moment Why we like it: In response to the Shot on a iPhone campaign, Samsung takes us to local spots to unwind and shows… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
May 14, 2015

This Week in Native Ads 05/08

Campaign of the Week: The Worlds First Digital Taco If you’ve ever angrily swiped through your emoji collection looking for a happy little cartoon taco, you know the feeling of frustration that comes with discovering that taco emojis haven’t been invented yet. Thank the heavens, then, that justWink, American Greetings’ unexpected and bold greeting card brand, just launched their very own Apple Watch app with the ability to send your friends digital tacos (they call it a… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
May 7, 2015

How do you separate out the value of the publisher and the value of the content?

When dealing with paid content, a big question is, what am I getting for my money? This often distills into two components 1) The value of the publishers audience. 2) The value of the content produced. Nudge measures native ad content day in/day out, so we are often having this conversation. We also see how different content performs on the same publisher and sometimes how the same content performs across different publishers. Here are some of the learnings. How to… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
May 5, 2015

This Week in Native Ads 05/01

  Campaign of the Week: Quaker – My Morning Routine The morning happens to be the most rushed part of the day, and squeezing time in for breakfast isn’t always easy. Quaker offers a convenient and wholesome breakfast solution with new Quick 3-Minute Steel Cut Oats – available in Original, Brown Sugar & Cinnamon and Blueberries & Cranberries. Why we like it: Using some popular bloggers, Quaker has a new campaign providing recipes to… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
April 30, 2015

How to measure native content

Paid content has thrown a real spanner in the works. Brands were already skeptical of some of their display metrics, which is why viewability came about. Now imagine all those banners turning in to paid content, it opens up flood gates of questions. Your content which has been produced for a specific objective is out there in the wild. On sites you can’t always see to people who you don’t know, on analytics you can’t access. So, a few things… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
April 27, 2015

Nudge Content Analytics API

The Nudge API provides full content analytics, available via individual metrics but most commonly generated dashboards. How it works The process involves: Tagging your content, either piggybacking your current javascript and or adding ours in directly. Campaign creation, housing each piece of content within a campaign. Content registering, telling Nudge to measure a piece of content. Recall of data, accessing the data & dashboards as required. To request access to the latest documentation visit here.    … Continue reading

Izac Hancock
Izac Hancock
April 24, 2015

This Week in Native Ads 04/24

  Campaign of the Week: Rise of the Machines: The Future has Lots of Robots, Few Jobs for Humans The robots haven’t just landed in the workplace—they’re expanding skills, moving up the corporate ladder, showing awesome productivity and retention rates, and increasingly shoving aside their human counterparts. Why we like it: Nokia has enlisted the help of Wired to create a sponsored content hub around the hashtag #MakeTechHuman.  This article introduces the… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
April 23, 2015

This Week in Native Ads 04/17

  Native Ad Talks 23 April at 6pm RSVP here If you’re in New York please come along for a couple of drinks and practical tips to take away on 23rd of April at 6pm.  Featuring Adam Aston, Editorial Director at the New York Times and Joe Lazauskas, Editor in Chief at Contently, we dig in to how to win at native through producing great content. RSVP here.   Campaign of the Week:… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
April 16, 2015