Could Native Advertising Become the Next Transparency Issue?

Native advertising is a digital name for a practice that39s been around for a long time in the traditional magazine publishing field It has been called quotadvertorialsquot for many years and when applied to traditional magazine advertising it was clearly identified as such at the top of the page But the most important factor was that it was expressly separated from the editorial side of the business It was established as an edict of separation between quotchurch and statequot so that the editorial staff could never be influenced by the commercial side of the business Moreover it was easily recognizable by the reader as an advertisement so the consumer could not be possibly deceived Now there is a different position on how native ads are presented on the web and even more important is that in many cases editorial writers are also producing the native adsWe all believe that the consumer is not so naive to think that written articles with embedded product endorsement implied or otherwise through an established publisher is really not a commercial piece But the FTC has also become concerned so that it has offered guidelines that native ads should be labeled as such In other words full indisputableamp160disclosure The FTC prefers the word quotsponsoredquot to other terms It39s interesting that a recent Polar study also revealed that the name of the advertiser in the disclosure term significantly increases clickthroughratesThere are many ways that native advertising can be labeled in digital form and many are For example quotsponsoredquot or quotsponsorquot or quotpromoted or quotpresented byquotquotamp160And the digital publisher will be primarily responsible But in an effort to attract more advertising revenue and presumably make ads more effective native advertising has created some new opportunities in the business Content studios are popping up either independently or at ad agencies or client inhouse and also on the publisher side In some cases the brand creates the content and in others the partner creates the content amp160There is also a distinction between the native placement strategy and the native creative strategy Within the magazine field some editorial writers are now reporting to the business side and in a few cases they quit because of itamp160The ANA has focused a great deal of attention on agency transparency including media rebates and other forms of financial nondisclosure That39s obviously different and it has been a very important matter for the advertising community and the declining relationship between advertisers and agencies While the parties have not yet come together on a solution or the exact contractual language it is a top of mind issue to save the industry from itself But what about native advertising that is not clearly identified as a form of commercialamp160Is it deceptive Will publishers lose their credibility and integrity with consumers Will the FTC need to take government action Does that also suggest a need for transparency that will focus more emphatically on the vendor Native advertising may reduce digital ad blocking but at the moment it39s not the only long term solution to that problem Another recent development is the socalled content ads that appear as rows of links under web articles Are they labeled as promoted stories and legitimate placements or can they lead to fraudulent websites or dishonest quotclickbaitquotThe advertising business is facing many new issues in the digital ecosystem amp160Every day something new occurs whether it39s content data sharing privacy metrics crossplatform integration streaming consumer habits bot fraud etc etc And each brings new challenges to advertisers agencies and the media amp160Surely there is more to come But let39s remember that we only benefit by facing these challenges together Transparency may be seen as a business issue between agencies and advertisers but let39s also keep in mind that in many cases the consumer really is in charge In the case of native advertising we don39t want to get in the way of thatClick the social buttons above or below to share this content with your friends and colleaguesThe opinions and points of view expressed in this article are exclusively the views of the author andor subjects and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillagecomMyersBizNet Inc management or associated bloggers

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Could Native Advertising Become the Next Transparency Issue?

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Mike Drexler

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Could Native Advertising Become the Next Transparency Issue?

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