Native Ad­ver­tis­ing

Native ad­ver­tis­ing, which can be trans­lat­ed as “ad­ver­tis­ing in a familiar (natural) en­vi­ron­ment”, is a form of ad­ver­tis­ing in online and print media in which the ad­ver­tise­ments can barely be dis­tin­guished from the actual editorial pieces. In this way, you get the reader’s attention without them being disturbed from their content. Ideally, users will not even notice that it is native ad­ver­tis­ing, but instead will think the ad­ver­tis­ing texts are regular content.

Implicit with its very name, native ad­ver­tis­ing refers to a dis­ci­pline in which ads take on a more natural ap­pear­ance, most often one that reflects an editorial look or feel; here, a context-intensive approach is often taken, meaning that the content ideally matches the en­vi­ron­ment in which it’s placed. Both the platform’s design as well as the expected behavior of its users are the most important focus points with this style of ad. These points should be adapted and addressed as much as they possibly can.

What makes this form of ad­ver­tis­ing special is the way in which published content is mixed with ad­ver­tise­ments. The original content and the ad­ver­tise­ments should ideally blend together so well that the user ex­pe­ri­ence remains almost identical, re­gard­less of what is being looked at or read. As is the case with content marketing, the user remains the focus point here, and the content of the ad should speak to their perceived needs.

The im­ple­men­ta­tion of native ad­ver­tis­ing and the visual and content design of native ad­ver­tise­ments is strongly dependent on the platform where the ad­ver­tise­ment is being used. Ac­cord­ing­ly, the following different forms of native ad­ver­tis­ing can be recorded:

• Native ads in the editorial en­vi­ron­ment (content marketing included)
  
  The classic form of native ad­ver­tis­ing is direct in­te­gra­tion into the editorial context of a website. For this purpose, ad­ver­tis­ing texts are adapted to the same style as ordinary editorial pieces and mixed in with other articles, or listed in a “You might also be in­ter­est­ed in the following articles” list. In both cases, it is important to mark these ads as a “Sponsored Post”, “Ad­ver­tis­ing” or “Ad”.
   
• Social media ads
  
  Paid ad­ver­tise­ments in social media networks like Facebook or Twitter can also be assigned to native ad­ver­tis­ing. These ads are fed into the timeline or news feed in the same style as standard con­tri­bu­tions.
   

• Native ads in the context of search engine marketing
  
  Paid ads (SEA) in search engine results also follow the native ad­ver­tis­ing concept. However, this also requires a link to in­for­ma­tive content and a suitable keyword set – otherwise the natural effect is quickly lost.
   
• Ad­ver­to­ri­als
  
  Closely related to native ad­ver­tis­ing are ad­ver­to­ri­als. However, these PR texts primarily focus on the brand or product and the incentive to buy (not the benefit to the customer).

At its core, native ads are nothing more than paid ad­ver­tise­ments, which, in contrast to more tra­di­tion­al banner ad­ver­tise­ments, match their sur­round­ings in terms of both looks and content. The effort involved in native ad campaigns is much higher when compared to display ads; this is due to the most important component involved in the dis­ci­pline: content, as well as dis­tri­b­u­tion and op­ti­miza­tion being much more labor intensive than for a simple ad­ver­tise­ment.

The basics of native ad­ver­tis­ing: the content

Native ad­ver­tis­ing just can’t work without in­ter­est­ing, in­for­ma­tive content, so it’s important for ad­ver­tis­ers to create content them­selves or outsource this task to marketing agencies. Just as is the case when de­vel­op­ing a classic content strategy, it’s crucial to ensure that all the material is tailored to a specific target group. Many different formats are at users’ disposal: whether it involves using photo galleries, videos, music or de­vel­op­ing tutorials, the type of website in question always de­ter­mines the type of website that’s to be created. Following this, it’s important to provide creative, premium content. Neither the brand nor the company should be the focus point here; instead, it’s important to make sure to always add value for the reader, as such content is shared by users, which increases the potential for going viral.

Finding the right platform for your content

The next step is make sure that content is displayed on the proper platform. There are many different providers that make use of native ad servers in order to place their customers’ content on all relevant channels. These providers preside over special ad­ver­tis­ing networks intended for native marketing purposes, and convey relevant editorial websites to ad­ver­tis­ers. Servers take on the automated display and scaling of the re­spec­tive entries.

Many systems go so far as to au­to­mat­i­cal­ly match their native titles and teasers to the target website of their audiences. Together with the right design, native ads are able to blend in and match their sur­round­ings, adopting the look and feel of the partner website. In effect, the native ad imitates the “look and feel” of the partner site and is ef­fec­tive­ly embedded.

Op­ti­miz­ing native ad­ver­tis­ing campaigns

As is the case with other ad­ver­tis­ing campaigns, there’s more to this ad­ver­tis­ing method than simply dis­play­ing ads; op­ti­miza­tion also plays an important role. Depending on the provider, it’s possible to use a large number of different an­a­lyt­i­cal functions with the help of the native ad server. Tracking in­di­vid­ual campaigns and ads and eval­u­at­ing them is essential for those wishing to optimize campaigns and exhaust budgets in the most efficient manner. To this end, op­ti­miz­ing every­thing from in­di­vid­ual content elements to teasers and titles is now the name of the game. Some providers also provide various methods for carrying out quality control methods. With the help A/B testing, heatmaps, and other options, it’s possible to track content and find out valuable in­for­ma­tion based on these findings.

Even if native ad­ver­tis­ing is con­sid­ered to be a lot of effort, it still has some decisive ad­van­tages over classic web ad­ver­tis­ing, which speaks to the use of this kind of ad. These ad­van­tages include:

• Native ads are perfectly tailored to the user’s reading habits
• Ad­ver­tis­ing can be optimally aligned to the target group
• Potential customers are reached at the right time and right place
• Also offer the reader use­ful­ness in terms of content
• Subtle, un­ob­tru­sive ad­ver­tis­ing form
• Par­tic­u­lar­ly effective on mobile devices

Through the natural in­te­gra­tion of ad­ver­tis­ing, native ad­ver­tis­ing offers a high chance of not only being seen by the user, but also clicked on and perceived as positive. Thus, it clearly stands out from classic ad­ver­tis­ing formats like banners or pop-ups, which are not only annoying to users but also often over­looked. However, native ads not only promise a higher click rate, but often also have a positive effect on the image and ac­cep­tance of the brand or company. Another advantage: due to its in­for­ma­tive, en­ter­tain­ing character, good native ad­ver­tis­ing content is often shared by consumers with friends, ac­quain­tances or social media followers.

Marketers are not on their own when it comes to dis­trib­ut­ing created native ad­ver­tis­ing content: Different providers have spe­cial­ized in native ad­ver­tis­ing, and providers will differ primarily in which target platforms are used, which tech­nol­o­gy is used for pub­lish­ing native ads and how the service is billed. The more well-known native ad­ver­tis­ing providers include the following:

• Taboola
• Outbrain
• Plista
• Ligatus

Even though native ad­ver­tis­ing has un­doubt­ed­ly es­tab­lished itself as a practical and effective form of ad­ver­tis­ing, it is still con­tro­ver­sial. Critics often refer to native ads as stealth marketing that de­lib­er­ate­ly misleads users. Sup­port­ers, however, are relaxed about this ac­cu­sa­tion and refer to the fact that native ad­ver­tis­ing content is always clearly labeled as such by pub­lish­ers.

A more decisive question for ad­ver­tis­ers and pub­lish­ers is the question of what effect native ad­ver­tis­ing content has on visitors. By hiring an ad­ver­tis­ing provider, there is often a lack of control and overview over which pages the ad­ver­tis­ing content is published on or which ads are placed on which pages. Therefore, both ad­ver­tis­ers and pub­lish­ers run the risk that native ads have a negative effect on their image and cred­i­bil­i­ty. However, al­ter­na­tives like banner ad­ver­tis­ing and pop-ups also have this problem – and are perceived by many users as much more intrusive and annoying.