This Week in Native Ads 7/14

I spoke on a Spark Foundry panel yesterday, it was a good reminder that many brands are yet to even get their feet wet in native content. Which segways into the Business Insider story – around how brands are shifting to direct buys than programmatic.

Tied to that, the secret of Google & Facebook: self-serve. Not enough native today is self-serve… that must change.

Notable Stories this Week

Brand safety concerns boost native.
NY Times & WSJ are working together to fight Facebook & Google. It’s called the New Media Alliance.
Self-serve is key to growth. Driving factor in the dollar’s growth of search and social is the low barrier to entry. Self-service advertising portals allow many more small and medium-sized advertisers to participate with little help from agencies or special tech tricks.
The number of advertisers running programmatic ad campaigns declined by 12% Y/O/Y in Q1. The quality challenges are driving advertisers to more direct opportunities.
Instant Articles lets you put an Email Subscribe at the top of the content.
LinkedIn is rolling out native video. Huge for B2B ad dollars.
FB about to open ad gate on Messenger.
CommuteStream offers native ads on transit routes (via their apps). Transit Marketing.

Campaign of the Week

On DigiDay for Wrights Media, How publishers can stop leaving money on the table with content licensing.

Smartest commentary

“Advertisers will keep spending more on native because it outperforms traditional ad units,” he explained. “Audiences look at native ads more frequently than non-native, and buyers are investing accordingly.” – Todd Krizelman, CEO and co-founder of MediaRadar.

Datapoints of note

The number of advertisers buying native formats has leaped 74% between the start of 2016 and Q1 2017.
(30%) of marketers describe their branded content as “inconsistent”.
[And same study] Six out of 10 campaigns are briefed and delivered within just four weeks.

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