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Category: Commentary

Commentary; our thought leadership, newsletter notes and long form pieces.

Ziff Davis acquires Mashable for 1x revenue.
Ziff Davis acquires Mashable for 1x revenue.

This Week in Native Ads 11/17

It’s been a tough Thursday for pubs, NerdWallet undergoes layoffs, BuzzFeed is going to miss targets AND Mashable is sold for $200m less that its last valuation. Ouch. We’re also on the hunt for an Account Manager, here in NY. Notable Stories this Week Polar maps a trajectory towards a Cost Per Engaged View for branded content. The writing was on the wall when BuzzFeed opened… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
November 17, 2017
branded content shifts to video
branded content shifts to video

This Week in Native Ads 11/10

Welcome to a brisk Friday morning, it’s a short edition this week. Thoroughly enjoyed this read of how the first banner campaign came to life, ‘we cheered as the first traffic hit our site, which immediately crashed’. I recall as a teenager making my first GIF ad, you couldn’t have too many frames as the file size would be too big, yes I am a digital marketing geek. And I have an ask for… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
November 10, 2017
SnapChat opens up pixel tracking
SnapChat opens up pixel tracking

This Week in Native Ads 11/3

Momentum seems to be building behind the idea, take what Facebook has taught marketers, mixing content + media – and back to the open web. Marketers are dusting off the tools, going, what’s out there? And, according to this ShareThrough study, that consumers are too – demonstrating more trust in news direct from premium publishers. You may recall l last week a dip in programmatic buys. And this MediaRadar data, the… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
November 3, 2017
Advertisers are circumventing publishers audiences via Facebook and influencers.
Advertisers are circumventing publishers audiences via Facebook and influencers.

This Week in Native Ads 10/27

I’m back, with a light tan courtesy of Bermuda! I’m an avid reader – and got through a fair chunk, if you haven’t caught AntiFragile, Nassim Taleb digs into how things benefit from stressors. Pertinent reading for anyone in the industry. ^ Note, you probably only need to read the first 60% to get the key takeaways. Notable Stories this Week Facebook testing moving non-promoted posts out of the news… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
October 27, 2017
flipboard-smart-magazines
flipboard-smart-magazines

This Week in Native Ads 10/13

I was chatting with a smart marketer earlier this week, who was was saying the industry is over indexed on targeting but under indexed on accountability. ^ He’s not wrong! Next week I’ll be taking a break, as I decompress with the family. So catch you, till then enjoy this week in native. Notable Stories this Week Some food for thought from PSFK, why advertising is more from digital to experience first. 80% of global… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
October 13, 2017
Google Stamp
Google Stamp

This Week in Native Ads 10/6

BuzzFeed’s new Twitter show AM to DM announced 1m viewers this week – but unclear as to how ‘long’ people were watching. Even they don’t know! This is the problem of our times. My take -> that’s probably 1million appearances in the stream, which based on Facebook’s CPM would only yield BuzzFeed $150 in earnings. Or another way, cost a brand $150 plus Facebooks margin to buy those ‘views’. Now I’ve stringed… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
October 6, 2017
native-advertising-CONTENT-2017-840x460
native-advertising-CONTENT-2017-840x460

This Week in Native Ads 9/29

AdWeek madness has ensued so I’ve had to put some extra elbow grease to sort through the noise. Before we go too far, this week we announced Nudge 3.0, the next wave of our platform with predictive intelligence of content performance & audience interaction, more here and here. Notable Stories this Week The Financial Times discovers up to $1.3m/month in fraudulent inventory being sold on ‘exchanges… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
September 29, 2017
apple police
apple police

This Week in Native Ads 9/22

[Via Twitter] Hunter Walk shares early data on his Medium earnings. Reminds me of the early days of Kindle Lending, where there was a fixed pool of cash divided by not many reads, so each was worth a lot more. Keen to see how this unfolds. As a reminder, here’s more on Mediums pivot away from ads. Notable Stories this Week This is a great interview with… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
September 22, 2017
robot-reporter
robot-reporter

This Week in Native Ads 9/15

With all this year’s Dmexco attendees en route home here’s this week in native. Notable Stories this Week Predictive recommendations creating new inventory for Facebook. This is part of a wider narrative developing around AI content and the ad revenue created from it. WaPo robot reporter has published 850 articles, 500 articles generated 500,000 clicks (around the election). Jack Marshall at WSJ asked FB why they allow… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
September 15, 2017
Jonah Peretti, CEO of BuzzFeed
Jonah Peretti, CEO of BuzzFeed

This Week in Native Ads 9/1

In the race to its IPO, BuzzFeed caves and opens up to programmatic display. Well, that’s the headline but this is a good step, opening up BuzzFeed to the wider programmatic ecosystem. How soon till people are placing native in those display units ;)? I’m sure more than a few readers are about to, or have already. Notable Stories this Week BuzzFeed just sent out a message to the digital publishing… Continue reading

Ben Young
Ben Young
September 1, 2017