This Week in Native Ads 1/13

Axios kicks off this week with a fresh start and smart approach to native. I like this, a well-curated site and content will attract advertisers. Take a look at the campaigns of the week, increasingly we’re seeing more and more brand integration, to brand safe environments. Whether it’s a hub or email.

Notable Stories this Week

Medium gives up on ad sales, calling the system ‘broken.’
and counter to that:
Politicos Veteran’s New Venture Axios Aims to Fix Advertising. All native with a high focus on quality. More here.
Also, why some Publishers are sticking with Medium, for now.
Turner is aiming to provide a one-stop shop for commercial and branded content production that connects marketers with sports fans.

Campaign of the Week

Chase on Meridian. Keep in mind this whole site is a content hub created by Vox. Talking travel, for their travel credit card. Smart. We know from Nudge benchmarks that article + video drives high purchase intent.
Cooley on Dan Primack. Simple supporting of the new Axios newsletter, but also content integration slotted in as a story. I love this as a format.

Datapoints of Note

75% of ad impressions via ShareThrough exchange in Q3, 2016 were on mobile devices. 77% of those were mobile web.
1/3 of Facebookers Visited Branded Pages.
When comparing native pods to traditional pods, Turner found that viewers paid more attention to native content 59% of the time.
When a piece of native content was paired with the advertiser’s 30-second commercial, engagement with that spot was 62% higher.

Trends to Watch/Bleeding Edge

Native content slipping into email, email is just a customized feed of content.
Transparency is the hot topic, UK startup Telemetry (previously valued at hundreds of millions) disappears from the radar.
And challenges with SnapChat.
With brands seeking safe environments and needing measurement, transparency will continue to drive the narrative through 2017. Those that are proactive will get an early leap on the market.

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