Why native ads? Native ads can be defined as ad units that fit into the look and feel of the publisher website. The word ‘native’ refers to the ad fitting natively into the site.
Examples of native ads include promotional posts in your Facebook feed, the top few ‘sponsored’ links on a Search Engine Results Page (SERP), and the ‘recommended for you’ section at the end of the article you’re reading. Native ads blend in naturally with the platform. In this blog post, I will explore this topic and present a strong argument for using native ads.
The State Of Online ADS
Publishers and advertisers have seen a decline in user engagement with display banner ads. Users are failing to ‘see’ and react to these ad units and click-through rates are falling. The entire media industry is feeling the sting as advertisers are seeing a decline in their campaign metrics and are paying less for these ads; publisher revenues are taking a hit.
As the results of these ads become less and less impressive, publishers and advertisers naturally try other ad units to generate revenue- they use more aggressive ad units such as pop-ups and plasma banners, which come with the unpleasant side effect of interfering with the user experience.
Too many of these types of ads are contributing to the expansion of ad blocking. Why? Because quite simply, users do not want to see them. The media is going crazy with ad blocking stories at the moment as these display ads are damaging the user experience.
Finding The Right Solution
There is a clear need for a different ad solution to enable brands to engage with their users and not send them away with an unpleasant experience. Publishers yearn for user engagement and the ability to monetize from it.
Matching the look and feel of the host site is all well and good, but in reality, it’s only half the battle.
Ads need to be relevant or else they will not be effective. Ads need to be in line with searches conducted by the user, keywords, content of the actual articles/page, the location of the user, their browsing history and more. Many solutions fall short of the mark- they hit one target but not the other.