IAB Native Ad Guidelines "Cheat Sheet"

The Interactive Advertising Bureau gathered insights and commentary from industry professionals to set out guidelines for Native Advertising. The full IAB Playbook can be found here: http://www.iab.net/media/file/IABNativeAdvertisingPlaybookFINAL.pdf

This document attempts to define six forms of native advertising, proposes questions that advertisers should ask themselves to make sure the Native formats meet marketing objectives, and provides disclosure guidelines to ensure that consumers do not confuse paid advertising with traditional content.

The IAB notes that this is an evolving form of advertising and there is no consensus definition of what is Native. The IAB has trouble defining the Core Six Formats  and how they fit marketers needs since each of these formats can be altered and defined by the media company or technology provider. Marketers and media companies should speak in the same language when talking about the formats in relation to the questions that every marketer should ask. 


"Publishers and advertisers aspire to deliver paid ads that are so cohesive with the page content, assimilated into the design, and consistent with the platform behavior that the viewer simply feels that they belong." 

"Native is decidedly and overwhelmingly a form of brand advertising and, as such, will enable marketers to better use digital marketing to meet the full range of their communication needs, from branding to direct marketing."

The Core 6 Formats:

In Feed Units - Generally paid posts within a newsfeed. The posts look like the preceding stories (for content producers) or "friend" posts (Twitter & Facebook).

Paid Search Units - Posts correlating with a search inquiry. 

Recommendation Widgets - Content recommendation engines that say something along the lines of, "If you liked this content then you may want to try this content."

Promoted Listings - Common on shopping sites but also used in search applications such as Foursquare, they are basically the same as Paid Search and Recommendation Widgets.

In-Ad (IAB Standard) with Native Element Units - IAB Standard units with content feeds or media company branding inside.

Custom/"Can't Be Contained" - Specialized display ad units that are non standard and fit the media company's site.

The Core 6 Questions for marketers to ask to ensure that a unit will meet the brand's objectives:

1. Form - How does the ad fit with the overall page design? Is it in the viewer's activity stream or not in-stream?
2. Function - Does the ad function like the other elements on the page? Does it deliver the same type of content experience or is it different?
3. Integration - How well do the ad unit's behaviors match those of the surrounding content? 
4. Buying & Targeting - Is the ad placement guaranteed on a specific page, section, or site, or will it be delivered across a network of sites? 
5. Measurement - What metrics are typically used to judge success? Are marketers using top-of-the-funnel brand engagement metrics like awareness and views or are they using more transnational metrics such as sale, download, register, etc?
6. Disclosure - Is the disclosure clear and prominent? Does the audience know that it is an ad?

Recommended IAB Native Advertising Disclosure Principles (Simply put): Regardless of context, a reasonable consumer should be able to distinguish between what is paid advertising vs. what is publisher content.

Sample disclosure statements can be found in the original document.

Effective Formats for Mobile

Why Marketers Just Can't Crack Mobile by @AdAge 

This article from AdAge: (http://adage.com/article/news/marketers-crack-mobile/293249/?utm_source=digital_email&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=adage&ttl=1401113818) talks about how mobile is the "next frontier". Basically, that consumers are spending more and more time on their phones but advertisers are very slow to catch up to them with their spending. 

"Mobile is, without a doubt, the first screen for a great many users. Consumers spend 23.8% of their time with media on mobile devices each day, according to eMarketer, compared with 37.2% with TV. It may soon surpass TV as the screen claiming the most consumer time."

"And yet ad spending remains almost the mirror image. Advertisers spend 17¢ on TV for every hour of U.S. adult consumption of the medium; they pour 83¢ into each hour spent with print. For mobile, it's 7¢, according to eMarketer."

"Advertising, like any institution, can move glacially. Brands and agencies are just getting comfortable with SEO and banner ads, tactics now becoming obsolete."

What this says is that first movers are going to figure out the formats and tactics that work best, prove excellent results, and then when the mass market copy cats those tactics consumers will have already been bored with it and performance metrics will tail off. 

"What marketers expect from the device is shifting markedly as well: They want engagement, not simply impressions."

Currently, the most popular and least effective form of mobile advertising is the mobile banner. Everybody realizes that it is not working and are looking for new ways.

Smart publishers are implementing sponsored content. In stream Native content that blends with the mobile publisher's site. But what if your most effective messaging is not in words but in pictures and videos instead? 

Take a look at CheckM8's Page Roll format for phones, tablets & desktops: http://goo.gl/FevXa1 
**scroll to view the Aveda video. It only plays when in view of the user and pauses when out of view. Notice the branding "leave behind" when the video ends and collapses. 

CheckM8 also developed a more effective video banner that responsively adjusts to the device (desktop, tablet *& phone). See what Tim Tebow has to say about T-Mobile:  http://goo.gl/l8AN1Y

Will NHT kill Open Exchanges?

I attended 212 Interactive Advertising's (@TwoOneTwoNYC) Video Panel yesterday evening and got some great insight into where video advertising is going.

1 - It is getting significant enough that the problems and warts are coming to the surface and need to be addressed. People caring about the problems and the discussion around the problems are a significant step in growth.

2 - Non viewable ads and Bot traffic are so significant that it has it's own acronym: NHT Non Human Traffic. Its a problem that is getting agency attention as they need to solve it to attract TV dollars. 

3 - It is Ari Bluman's (Chief Digital Investment Officer, North America, GroupM) stated goal/directive that none of his clients will buy inventory on an open exchange by the end of 2014. All programmatic video buys will go to private exchanges since those premium publishers can be personally responsible for making sure the traffic is human, the ads are viewed and the content is appropriate. 

4 - Nobody mentioned directly buying or selling video inventory. Everything was centered around programmatic. 

5 - Natalie Bokenham, SVP Managing Partner UM, talked about how one of her top clients can't get enough digital video advertising inventory. The ROI on those campaigns have proven well worth it and they have a lot more buying to do before she sees that leveling off. 

Premium Audience, Premium Environment & Standard Ads via Programmatic?

Interesting video during which Gregg Colvin, US COO at Universal McCann, and Donnie Williams, chief digital officer at Horizon Media talk about paying more to get better ads in front of high value audiences on high value sites. 



The discussion starts with Apple's approach to building the equity in their brand by telling the story of how people use Apple products and how Apple products improve people's lives. How cool Apple is. They do not talk discounting or value. 

They then go into "tentpole" events like the Super Bowl or even Times Square advertising which is the canvas for brand building to a massive audience.

Gregg Colvin from Universal McCann talks about creating premium experiences for audiences in these premium environments. 

In a surprising finish they talk about premium ad buys going programmatic since this would lead to standardization and the lack of unique messaging approaches. Who wants to talk to a premium audience in a premium environment with a standard storytelling method? What happened to premium environments? Don't standard ad approaches get ignored? Audiences skip commercials and New Yorkers never look up while walking through Times Square. 

WTF do People think Native Ads are?

I had the pleasure on attending the Native Advertising Round table, a panel discussion on digital native advertising. Aside from one publisher, it was made up of technology providers each with their spin on the subject. What I heard was jaw dropping idiotic.

Since the panelists were CEOs and founders of companies in a very complex industry, our industry, and they had enough credentials to speak at this meeting let me first give them the respect they deserve as very smart people with innovative ideas and approaches. But what they had to say was downright stupid.

Let me first provide my own definition of native advertising. Native advertising is an ad placement that is unique to a publisher's property. That's it. If we need to distinguish between content and display advertising then we can do that although, at its core, native is unique to a property regardless of its form. If you don't agree with my definition then please Google the definition of Native.

"Native is the New Black" is because it solves the problem of ad blindness. Audiences are ignoring the standard billboards they see on every page. Native ads not only stand out but they also do a much better job of associating the advertiser's brand with the quality of the publisher's brand. 

In our industry we are automating everything and Facebook and Twitter have come out with or are launching exchanges for their native ad units. They can do this since the scale they provide allows for audience targeting. Programmatic native platforms will only be offered by the supply side since the creative an advertiser submits must be unique to the channel - since the ad formats are unique to the channel. Anything that scales across many sites is not unique to a channel and thereby not native. Once an ad format is standardized you may want to submit it to the IAB for their stamp of approval so that Double Click can add it to their formats in DFA & DFP.  

The absurd comments that I heard during this round table included:  "Retargeting is native advertising". WHAT? If an ad follows you from site to site then it is not native. Standard ad sizes are not native. If you want to argue that a specific targeting methodology is native to a channel you may have a point but retargeting is not that since it does not live within the publisher. The round table talked about Zappos shoe ads following them from site to site.

Everyone around the table agreed that the future of native advertising is standardization. I slapped my forehead. Again, if it is the same for more than one publisher, then it is not native to that publisher. 

CheckM8 is a rich media technology company that specializes in custom or Native ad formats. The ad units that we build can be unique to a publisher's or a channel. I say "can be" since the minute the same format is used by two of our partners it is not native.  

That is all. Thank you for reading. I appreciate your comments and feedback. Maybe even a healthy discussion.

Future of Digital Advertising - Storytelling with Engagement

Much has been made about the investment in the collection and application of user data to get the right ad to the right people. This is coupled with software platforms that make buying digital advertising at scale extremely efficient (in theory according to my ad operations friends). This is all fine and good but the piece that we are missing is the human element and ability to tell a story and engage a consumer. 

Compare digital advertising to every other form of advertising media. There are classic TV commercials. We have all cut an ad out of our favorite magazine. There are plenty of radio jingles that have stuck in my head. Newspapers and roadside billboards have had their moments but have been limited in their ability to connect with an audience. Direct mail is, well, for direct response.

Digital advertising has not and, I will be bold enough to say, will not have a standard IAB unit that people will remember as great advertising. It does not matter how targeted the ad is. It does not provide a canvas for the advertiser to tell their story in an engaging way. 

What does?

Content Marketing - Sponsored stories. This is the winner for mobile as incorporating advertiser content within the stream layout of a mobile page has proven most effective. It is targeted and relevant not based on user data but as complimentary to the content and publisher environment in which it is delivered. 

But what if my story is not best told through words?

Big, Splashy Ads. Everybody "hates" these because they get in the way of the audience visiting the site but they notice them. And they do give a great canvas for advertisers to tell their story with photos, videos, and interactive elements that consumers can engage with.

Take a look at these can't miss home page take overs:

• H-Unit: http://goo.gl/aFJN24
• Theater Unit: http://goo.gl/HfHBmD
• Cascade: http://goo.gl/ki29U3
• Window Blinders: http://goo.gl/plxaed
• Video-Stitial – Served before page view: bit.ly/1pZIbwY

The bottom line is that standard digital advertising will be as effective as highly targeted direct mail. Probably more so. Winner for the IAB Standard units, data targeting and exchanges. 

If an advertiser wants to make a connection with a consumer they are going to need to create custom content that fits with the channel where they are reaching their audience. If their story is best told with words it will be with custom content. If it is visual and interactive it will be through reach out and grab you ads. This is how the digital medium will best be leveraged since it offers advantages that no other medium does giving it the potential for advertising that will be remembered. 

The New, New Thing in Digital Advertising

The New, New Thing is Native Advertising.....which is comical since it is not new. It is the current, current thing. 

Digital advertising is in a constant state of change since it is new and as an industry we are still figuring it out. It does not help that the screens we deliver it on change rapidly.

5 years ago the hottest cell phone was the Motorola Razor. The iPhone did not exist. Since then we ahve had an explosion in mobile traffic which encompasses Iphones, Androids, iPads, tablets, mini tablets and now "phablets". Publishers have gone from redesigning their site once every 4 years to creating 4 new sites every year or taking a responsive design approach where a site designed once renders to a multitude of screen size devices. 

The New, New Thing is adapting the old way of doing things to the new advertising environment. This includes efficiency through automation for standardized ad buys and custom ad solutions for premium. 

Native advertising is nothing new. As long as there has been print, there has been content written on behalf of advertisers for paid placement. There have been special ad sizes and approaches that have attracted the audience's attention and built the name recognition that leads to sales in other places. 

"I know that half of my advertising works, I just don't know which half." - Native compliments display. Native gets people buying online and leads to sales. Publishers and advertisers know this and will continue to use native and big, splashy ads because they know it works for their entire campaign.

The New, New Thing is adapting it for all the different screen sizes. Take a look at some of CheckM8's work: 

Here are some of our most recent cross screen work:

·         Aveeda Page Roll for phone & tablet (scroll to view, pauses when out of view): http://bit.ly/1f6gSig

·         Bottega Veneta Theater Unit (desktop example): http://goo.gl/HfHBmD

·         Shinola Expandable E-Commerce Ear for tablet & desktop (mouse over the right hand button in the masthead): http://goo.gl/VgS02R

·         Mercedes Benz Video Page Peel (desktop): http://bit.ly/1g0v9ww

The basis for this post came from an article on Ad Exchanger: http://www.adexchanger.com/the-sell-sider/the-current-current-thing/ @adexchnager by Jim Spanfeller @jimspanfeller