The gaming industry has seen an unprecedented surge in popularity, reaching a broad spectrum of demographics and geographies. Gamers are not just the stereotypical nerdy kid secluded in their parent’s basement. Gaming’s allure has transcended its niche origins and evolved into a widespread cultural phenomenon, captivating a diverse audience.

As the gaming industry skyrockets, advertisers are rubbing their hands in glee at the advertising potential. Picture this: engaging with consumers right in the heart of immersive gaming environments. It’s like entering a world where ads are part of the adventure. But hold your horses; there are challenges on this wild ride.

During a recent panel discussion, Getting Into Gaming: Building Ads For Immersive, Interactive Experiences, at ProgIO, industry experts from Roblox, Activision Blizzard, and Super Awesome offered valuable guidance to publishers and advertisers seeking success in gaming advertising. Here are five takeaways from the session: 

Level 1: Prioritize Audience Safety and Privacy

In gaming, prioritizing audience safety and privacy is paramount. 

Richard Sim, Senior Director of Product Monetization at Roblox, emphasized, “We built Roblox on the foundation of safety and stability from the beginning. We take it very seriously, recognizing that we wouldn’t be where we are had we not applied those principles at Roblox.”

A sizable portion of Roblox’s user base is under thirteen, but the gaming platform has a policy against serving ads to this demographic. The company is committed to handling younger audiences with utmost care and responsibility, setting the stage for a secure and responsible advertising ecosystem. As the industry crafts impactful ad experiences within gaming, transparency and privacy are fundamental pillars for creating a great user experience.

Level 2: Innovate Ad Strategy

Advertising within the gaming sector demands innovative strategies to integrate with the gaming experience seamlessly. Publishers and advertisers must reimagine ad strategies to align with the gaming environment. If not, level one will trap them. 

Sim said, “When I talk about building the immersive ad system, I do talk about reimagining advertising, trying to avoid a lot of past missteps such as privacy and transparency.”

Advertising strategies must evolve with the gaming industry to incorporate innovative approaches that respect user privacy and seamlessly integrate into the gaming narrative. You can’t press play without going all in! Advertising in gaming isn’t just about flashing billboards; it’s about becoming part of the gaming saga.

Level 3: Address Measurement and Metrics Challenges

Oh, and measuring success? That’s a whole different boss level. Traditional metrics don’t cut it in these immersive gaming realms.

Jonathan Stringfield, VP of Business Research & Marketing at Activision Blizzard, emphasized the challenges in measuring ad viewability in 3D immersive spaces, indicating the need for more nuanced metrics to provide insights into brand impact and ROI.

“While we work with all the standard ad measurement vendors, we recognize that gaming is newer for advertisers. Therefore, the burden of proof is on us to ensure we have the most empirically accurate measurement,” said Stringfield.

Gaming experiences require reevaluating how success is measured. Advertisers must embrace innovative measurement methods that reflect the depth of engagement and the influence these immersive environments exert on the audience, painting a more accurate picture of advertising ROI.

Level 4: Explore the Metaverse Beyond Gaming

The Metaverse, once primarily associated with gaming, has transcended its initial boundaries, encompassing a wide array of experiences. It now includes music, educational exploration, meditation, and more.

For example, Mattel built Barbie’s dream house in Roblox. Artists like Travis Scott, Ariana Grande, and Lil Nas X created virtual concert experiences. The opportunities are limitless, and the digital media industry should take advantage of it. Barbie’s movie campaign alone is a masterclass for creating an advertising campaign. 

As gaming expands beyond its traditional realms, advertisers must recognize the diverse opportunities within this broader space. The Metaverse has evolved into a dynamic medium beyond gaming, opening avenues for engaging consumers in multifaceted experiences.

“Defining the Metaverse as just a gaming opportunity is an oversimplification,” said Sim.

Boss Level: Integrate Brands Seamlessly and Consider Future Prospects

Successfully integrating brands within gaming and immersive experiences was a focal point of the panel discussion. Kate O’Loughlin, CEO of Super Awesome, emphasized that brand partnerships were integral to connecting with consumers.

“We’re working with Athleta, and we measured how the favorability of a brand increased after they did this cool piece of content,” said O’Loughlin. “Then we also tagged on measurement of purchase intent from shoppers.”

Brand integration is a promising avenue, showcasing the potential to effectively engage a broader audience within gaming and the evolving Metaverse. This integration is not limited to gaming but extends into a wider spectrum of experiences within the Metaverse. Advertisers have the exciting opportunity to craft strategies that seamlessly integrate their brands into these diverse experiences, amplifying brand engagement and forging meaningful connections with consumers.

If publishers and advertisers conquer these levels, they will beat the final boss!

The post Press Play and Level Up: The Future of Gaming Advertising Lies in Immersive Brand Experiences appeared first on AdMonsters.

Those of us who’ve been in the industry for 20-plus years remember when ad clutter was a significant issue with programmatic. Back then, ad networks and open exchanges maintained media quality teams who were tasked with eyeballing sites that wanted to do business with them. 

What Goes Around Comes Around

I remember speaking to one such media quality team member who told me that a human reviews every site in their network to count the number of ad placements. If there were too many ad placements the publisher was barred from selling its inventory through her company’s exchange. This was a key selling point.

And it wasn’t a one-and-done exercise. Her team spot-checked sites even after they had been approved. This was an imperative exercise as sites with ad clutter were widely viewed as inferior, and the ad exchange didn’t want to get a reputation for low-quality inventory. 

Then in 2007, Paris-based Alenty, one of the industry’s first ad-visibility platforms, introduced the concept of viewability. By the mid-2010s, new viewability reports, such as RealVu and Google’s Active View for Google Ads hit the market, and advertisers began to advocate for a way to determine if their ads are in view before they’re displayed.

While ad clutter and viewability are separate issues, there is an undeniable correlation between them, as excessive ads can affect viewability rates and slow down page loads. Consumers with little patience click away from the site, blowing the advertiser’s chance to get in front of them and the publisher’s opportunity to earn some money.

Viewability became an urgent issue in 2013 when comScore released a report showing that 54% of display ads weren’t seen by consumers, but advertisers still paid for them. In response, advertisers said they’d no longer buy impressions that were not viewable, and publishers, fearing a significant loss of revenue, began optimizing their sites so that more of the ads could be seen by users. Those efforts had a downstream benefit: reducing ad clutter. Once viewability took hold, concerns about ad clutter went down.

But today it’s back with a vengeance, though it has a new name: Made For Advertising (MFA) websites. The implication of some in the industry is that MFAs are inherently wasteful to marketers as consumers are repelled by sites that are littered with ads. But is that a safe assumption?

America’s Long History with MFA Media

Growing up in the 1970’s I remember the excitement around Pennysaver, a weekly circular that was delivered to our doorstep. In addition to coupons offered by local stores, the circular was the place where things like guitar lessons and gymnastic classes were announced. My brothers wistfully read the classifieds for the things they weren’t allowed to have: dirt bikes, lawn darts and BB guns. In the 2007 movie, Juno, Juno finds the couple who will adopt her baby in her local Pennysaver. 

The truth is some people just like advertising. The ad circular was the first section a former boyfriend of mine reached for when the Sunday paper was delivered. As a postdoc in physics, he couldn’t afford to buy a lot of electronics, but he enjoyed reading the ads because he had a strong interest in technology.

Kerry Rosenthall, a musician, aerobics teacher and avid gardener who lives in Vermont, still likes to read the local circulars. She — like 44% of U.S. shoppers — consults them before doing her weekly shopping.

And it’s not just printed circulars that attract consumers. BeFrugal, a site that offers cashback and coupons for over 5,000 stores sees 1.4 million visits each month, according to Similarweb.

And in 1982, Roy Speer and Lowell Paxson showed the world that Americans would watch advertising as a form of entertainment. That’s the year they founded the Home Shopping Network (HSN) in St. Petersburg, FL, and by 1985 it had expanded nationwide. Today, HSN reaches 94 million households via broadcast TV. Its site, HSN.com, ranks in the top 30 of the top 500 internet retailers and features 15,000 product videos, according to an HSN press release.

Confessions of MFA Shoppers

Rosalie Zuppardo, a researcher who lives in Spencer, MA, likes advertising and even subscribes to Ocean State Job Lot, a weekly online circular. “I have found things that I normally wouldn’t have seen [but were] presented to me in ads, and I think, oh that could be a good idea.”

Zuppardo doesn’t hesitate to click on articles she sees in her Facebook feed if they feature topics she’s interested in, including pet rescue, home decor and skating. Many of those sites are ad-heavy and meet the industry’s definition of MFA, but if the content is compelling, she’s undaunted by the number of ads. If inspired, she’ll buy the products advertised.

Eric Benjamin, a 56-year-old owner of a real estate group in Tucker, Georgia, also likes advertising and freely admits to liking sites that are cluttered with ads. “If I’m online, I definitely look at the ads. If I have time, I’ll definitely go down rabbit holes,” he said. “For me, it’s a time issue, not an ad clutter issue.”

Based on conversations with Zuppardo and Benjamin, one can make the case that there are genuine MFA shoppers out there and that brands that advertise with MFAs may find enthusiastic audiences. However, there are limits to their enjoyment of ads.

Shopper Rules

While some shoppers like advertising — and seek it out with online circulars and clicking on sites the industry calls MFAs — there’s also a lot they really don’t like. All three consumers interviewed for this article say they don’t like pop-ups. Rosenthall likes to cook and the Web is her cookbook of choice, but she says, “If there’s any annoyance or interference from the ads, I get away from the site immediately no matter how good the recipe is.”

Zuppardo and Benjamin say the same thing: advertising should educate and entertain, not get in the way of what they’re doing. “Sites that have too many pop-ups, too many redirects, or slow down my computer are obnoxious. When this happens advertising isn’t helpful. It sets me back and I get annoyed,” explained Zuppardo.

Both she and Benjamin are hyper-aware of the level of fraud and ad scams that appear on advertising-heavy sites and have developed their methodologies for assessing legitimacy. When Zuppardo is interested in an ad, she’ll click, but she’ll always check the About Us section to see if the company’s description relates to the product offered. If it doesn’t, she’ll assume the site has been hijacked and its ads are scams. She also doesn’t trust sites or ads with bad grammar.

Benjamin is wary of any ad that is “clickbaity” or makes promises that are too good to be true. “Sure an ad may promise to buy my house for cash, but how much cash? It’s probably a ripoff,” he said. He’ll click on ads on smaller publications that lead to lesser-known eCommerce sites because he’s found interesting products that way, but his scam radar is always active.

Zuppardo makes a point of reporting all the scams she encounters to Facebook, where she typically sees scammy ads or articles that lead to sites with fraud. And she’ll go back to the post where she saw the article or ad and warn other Facebook users in the comments section. She seems exasperated that Facebook has shown little interest in the file of scams she’s amassed, and has consequently taken it upon herself to educate other consumers, even if she doesn’t know them.

At this point, it may be too early to make any broad pronouncements regarding the worthiness of MFAs. Many sites are scammy, but at least some deliver benefits for consumers and the brands that want to reach them. It’s also clear from my admittedly small survey of consumers that any legitimate MFA must abide by the rules that avid shoppers demand, namely get rid of pop-ups and other annoyances, and be hyper-vigilant about keeping fraud and scams off their sites. And, they must take care to develop content that is worthy of their attention. The MFA shopper doesn’t need a lot of content, but it needs to be quality.

New Guidelines for Defining MFA Sites

In an ideal world, all of these MFA consumers’ rules will be translated into a new set of media quality metrics that help SSPs determine if a site is one they want their ads to appear.  

Recently, the ANA, 4A‘s, WFA, and ISBA came together to create guidelines to help advertisers identify MFA sites so that advertisers can avoid them. Sites that can be categorized as MFA, are those that have one or more of the following characteristics:

• Ad placement and density
• Generic or low-quality content, non-specific content, or content that appears across multiple sites.
• Ads that refresh automatically and frequently
• A high percentage of paid traffic sourcing with little to no organic audience
• Templated and poorly designed website

Add excessive pop-ups to the list above and these guidelines may get the MFA shopper’s seal of approval.

The post MFA Sites: Are They All Bad? appeared first on AdMonsters.

When generative AI tools like DALL-E, Midjourney, and ChatGPT-4 hit the mainstream, the tech wowed millions of users with the realism of their results and ease of use. The question of the hour: Will generative AI render human creativity, information curation, and customer support obsolete?

But in advertising and other industries, professionals have anticipated this moment for years. Their questions have been about when it would come and how to navigate the possible outcomes of its implementation. AI-powered search stands to shake up the $500 billion digital ad market, including Google’s $162 billion search advertising business. 

But there’s a lot at stake for users, too. Generative AI innovations promise enhanced efficiency and improved customer service, but there’s a growing concern that the race to implement them could lead to further deterioration in service quality. That would only exacerbate existing challenges brands, agencies, and buyers face.

There are risks in implementing this technology too early or too extensively. There are questions about whether AI, as it currently stands, can provide quality service to real people, including in developing ad creative and messaging that resonates with the right audiences. 

You Can’t Automate Truth and Accuracy… Yet

Big Tech businesses increasingly rely on generative AI, AI assistants, and chatbots for customer service. AI chatbots commonly provide answers faster than traditional search. But that efficiency and those succinct responses come at the expense of the variety of options and voices users find in traditional search and at the expense of a human sense of empathy.

It’s easy to imagine AI chatbots giving users information pulled from controversial sites that many agencies and campaigns wouldn’t consider brand-safe – which, upon close inspection, may already be happening – and inadvertently spreading misinformation and poor advice or even enabling discrimination. If AI search tools gave users more options to verify results, it could mitigate harm and undermine those tools’ efficiency. Overall, AI could improve user experience by better replicating the human element of service and support – getting to the essential root of a challenge and recommending the best solution. These elements are noticeably lacking with current AI tools, even at the highest tier.

We will unlikely see the broad pause in generative AI development that some tech industry leaders have called for. Brands and agencies are looking into use cases for AI automation, from personalized ad creative to identifying keywords and target audiences to suggesting business decisions. For a rapidly growing business, AI has the potential to relieve the increasing strain on customer support teams and to streamline otherwise manual tasks.

However, brands must monetize the development of these tools. That’s why companies are eyeing AI search results as a vehicle for inserting ads or implementing SaaS models to monetize their chatbots. But those strategies raise another concern about degrading the user experience: the possibility that AI chat tools will produce results that disproportionately favor their advertisers or business partners. 

Furthermore, AI reflects human biases in the content it processes, which could disadvantage and harm individuals or entire communities. And with creative personalization, brands, and agencies will need AI tools to deliver on the challenges around standardization of creative audits across ad platforms.

What Users Want Vs. What Users Need

Consumers’ interest in and use of AI chatbots is bound to increase, and brands and agencies will need to respond by weighing their share of and position in the marketplace against their consumers’ user experience. They’ll be calculating how to balance the value of convenience’s broad appeal with their commitment to keeping their consumers safe from misinformation and bias, which can easily erode consumer trust and long-term brand loyalty. They’ll also need to consistently monitor and respond to the maturity level of generative AI. 

At the moment, generative AI chat is in a similar place as the metaverse was last year: Industry leaders believe it will change everything – just not with this current generation of technology. This wave of new tech may not accomplish what marketers and other stakeholder teams need right now. Marketers must underline where generative AI isn’t meeting their needs and what future generations of development should deliver to meet those expectations and their campaign or business goals.

AI and Human Experience Both Add Value

There’s an increasing focus on how AI chat can assist teams rather than replace them. While AI can automate many customer service tasks, cutting costs while allowing for greater scale, cross-channel conversations, and personalized responses, live agents often can solve complex problems more quickly than automation. In marketing, the human touch can be seen as a value add, discouraging clients from trying to lowball them.

Currently, generative AI works best for businesses’ internal usage – tasks ranging from media buying and planning to content marketing and messaging to design and basic copy – then for various public-facing uses. For the digital ad industry, AI is a powerful tool against ad fraud: it can efficiently detect activity resembling a fraud scheme and block those likely fraudsters from an ad platform or alert human teams. Remember that fraudsters are also using AI to evade detection, and legitimate businesses will need cutting-edge AI tools to beat fraudsters at their own game – a significant technological lift.

One interesting side effect of this interest in generative AI is that it’s brought about a newfound appreciation of human talent and comprehension. We see the uncanny valley effect of AI-generated text and images, identify what’s not quite there, and know the human touch’s importance in getting us all the way there. These trends have instigated a shift in focus toward the significance of creative elements of marketing.

The post AI Is Changing Service in the Ad Business. But Will It Reimagine Service? appeared first on AdMonsters.

From the start, Jon Roberts kicked off PubForum Coronado Island with profound insight giving the event great momentum. Much of the audience left with the lasting idea that sometimes unexpected journeys lead to groundbreaking discoveries. 

Don’t be afraid to take risks and try new things, publishers. We see this through Roberts’ unique career journey and his assistance in shifting Dotdash Meredith to focus on improving user experience instead of bombarding users with ads. The strategies he and his team implemented to increase user engagement and better understand the publisher’s audience helped reshape Dotdash Meredith’s revenue model positively.

While his journey from research scientist to a digital media professional might seem far-fetched, this path is more common than one may think. From this crossover of disciplines, we see that data analysis, experimentation, and problem-solving skills from the scientific world are of high value in digital media. 

There’s a science behind increasing revenue and effectively targeting audiences in a cookieless world. According to Jon Roberts, these are your four keys to success:

Take Risk: No Risk, No Reward

If there’s one thing science and data have in common, it’s experimentation. Starting his career focusing on dark matter and cosmic phenomena at prestigious institutions like CERN and NASA, Roberts sees data as the central theme in making a transition from science to digital media. Our industry holds loads of data, and its potential for guiding decision-making and audience targeting is immense. The scale of data available presents a playground for experimentation.

At Dotdash Meredith, Roberts and his team implemented transformative strategies that seemed crazy at first since they challenged the conventional approach. These moves were made when the company was small, so at that time, no risk meant no reward. They took revoked ads from web pages in hopes of enhancing user experience. While this calculated risk initially seemed backward, it paved the way for their innovative revenue model. 

Analyze your practices and closely examine ad placements. This can help you identify bad ads. At one point, Dotdash Meredith had to remove a ton of ads from their webpages. This move initially hurt their revenue but helped shape the advertising landscape overall. 

Unravel the Floor Pricing Strategy

Floor pricing can be very complex, which is why it is important to think strategically. According to Roberts, the first step is to break down the value of all the slots to learn what the market will pay. Different domains have different values. Different content drives a different value and then different slots. 

When you look at those features and floors by grouping your inventory that fallsl into these buckets, you can see valued inventory and then push the price up to see how the market responds. 

“We intentionally let 15% of the ads go to house ads because that actually makes us more money because it pushes up what people pay,” Roberts explained. “If you let people buy that 15% of inventory for what they’ll pay for it you get all the long tail scammy advertisers of the internet buying them for pennies. If you put the floor at $10, for example, the people who would have paid $5 for it end up paying $10.”

Develop a Real Understanding of User Intent 

Understanding user intent in the present moment is far more valuable than relying solely on historical data. It’s time to say goodbye to the cookie-based approach and hello to an intent-based approach.

Roberts encourages publishers to think more keenly about intent-based targeting, as it harnesses real-time users’ behavior on content from their tailored ads to match their behaviors. Users’ interests and actions are in constant flux, so present behavior must be at the forefront. 

When you work with the right advertisers, on the right content, with the right message, you will see your engagement go through the roof. If a consumer is on a page doing one thing and the ad on the page is relevant to what they are doing, they will surely click it. 

Historically, contextual targeting doesn’t scale, so you have to talk about the context on the page and feed the user’s intent. 

Think Outside the Typical Measurement Box

Another thing that Roberts highlights is that targeting is easy, but measurement is hard, and while calling targeting easy may be a stretch, getting the targeting to work is relatively straightforward. Getting it to run through all the pipes is more of a challenge because the businesses are so reliant on cookies at this time.

At DotDash Meredith, they are experimenting with some SSP and DSP partners, and learning just how deep the cookie logic is in the weeds. This is where measurement is critical Roberts says, “If you can run a campaign on a cookieless market but can’t explain to your boss that it worked and you cashed out, what’s the point?” 

“We just have to acknowledge that we could never measure everything. If you go through the list of ways clients are looking to measure the efficacy of campaigns, you’ll see first click attribution, or even 30-day lookbacks,” Roberts explained. “But you also have sales lift, brand lift, foot traffic to store. The industry has told itself that deterministic tracking of Internet ads is the only way to do it. So, therefore, if you can’t track, it doesn’t exist.” 

Work with your Privacy Sandbox teams. Targeting is a piece of that, and much of Privacy Sandbox is about measurement and attribution, PPID for frequency capping, and the attribution API to have anonymous but full attribution. These are all tools that need to exist to solve the measurement problem. 

From being a physicist to transitioning into the media industry, Robert’s story is a testament to the power of multidisciplinary thinking and applying scientific principles to solve complex problems in new domains. He has used his expertise in data analysis, experimentation, and understanding complex systems to pave the way for innovative approaches to user experience, targeting, and measurement in the digital media landscape. 

As the ad tech landscape continues to evolve, the infusion of scientific thinking has the power to drive the industry forward.

The post Identifying the Broken Publisher Revenue Model to Create New Opportunities appeared first on AdMonsters.

Currently, MFA sites account for at least one in five online impressions, consuming 15% of global programmatic ad spend and generating 26% more carbon waste than legitimate publisher sites.

Major brands are paying for advertising on these low-quality sites, almost certainly without their knowledge. The number of these sites is likely to increase as AI-generated content continues to be more commonplace and as the industry phases out the use of third-party cookies. This is because MFA sites rely in part on outdated contextual targeting tactics to bring in clicks. 

What are MFA Sites? 

There is no standard definition of what makes an MFA site at this time, but there are several key identifiers. MFA websites will be full of “filler content,” such as AI-generated nonsense, clickbait, unnecessary slideshows, and interlinked websites. This content provides a negative user experience and is unlikely to result in anything more than a negative brand impression of advertisers that appear on such sites.  

A major reason these sites are increasing in popularity is that they deliver the near impossible: lots of eyeballs at dirt-cheap prices. While they masquerade as legitimate sites, those eyeballs don’t translate to quantifiable business outcomes for buyers. It feels as if they should be labeled as fraudulent, but unfortunately, most of these sites do not meet current industry standards for invalid traffic (IVT). 

MFA sites also have higher carbon emissions than their legitimate site counterparts — approximately 26% more. This is because they are generating a substantially higher number of requests per impression to SSPs and resellers than other sites, which increases waste.  

How do MFA Sites Negatively Impact Publishers? 

MFA publishers are able to game the system to acquire the clicks they need to continue generating advertising revenue. The sites may be full of scammy content, but they aren’t considered fraudulent as of now because they operate within the existing rules set in place to ensure media quality. 

Low-quality media has been in existence since digital media was created, but the MFA problem is increasing the volume of low-quality media exponentially. Unfortunately for publishers, in the supply chain, MFA site content appears to be brand safe and is cheap, making it difficult for buyers to avoid.

There are solutions currently in place to seek out higher quality media, such as buying via private marketplaces (PMPs), but it is tricky to avoid this content entirely. The result? MFA publishers are taking a large share of the advertising revenue pie away from legitimate sites with trusted users. 

Why Should Advertisers Steer Clear of MFA Websites?

The biggest problems for advertisers whose content appears on an MFA site are the quality of the clicks they receive and the negative effect on their brand reputation — both of which can hurt an advertiser’s bottom line. 

Click quality is undermined by MFAs because they pack many different advertisements onto one page, which can lead to a buyer’s ad getting lost in the shuffle. MFA sites sometimes also place ads in positions where they aren’t visible, but can generate accidental clicks. In this case, a brand’s click rate will increase but the consumer is unlikely to actually spend time on their site. 

Brand reputation can also take a hit when consumers see an ad on a website that feels like a scam site. MFA content is often unnecessarily sensational, leaning into tabloid-style stories that many advertisers would rather not be associated with. 

How Can We Put a Stop to MFA Sites? 

Advertisers can avoid MFA sites by purchasing ads via PMPs, using supply path optimization (SPO) strategies, and up-to-date contextual and quality controls. It is also crucial for the entire advertising ecosystem that advertisers fund legitimate publishers rather than MFA sites.

SPO strategies help eliminate intermediaries so buyers have a closer connection to the publisher. This can help them see which investments are going to lead to tangible results. They can take this one step further by keeping their contextual and quality controls updated since MFAs rely on outdated systems to dupe advertisers into buying low-quality content. 

Advertisers can set up exclusion lists to prevent bids from reaching sites that are known MFAs. They should also actively seek out high-quality content sites, even if the cost of advertising is more expensive. 

Ad tech partners can help reduce traffic to MFAs by blocking these sites from premium programmatic deals. Unfortunately, the existence of MFAs is so pervasive that some in the industry worry that eliminating MFAs will do nothing more than send inventory to competitors. Ad tech partners must put pressure on MFAs to improve their user experience or remove this inventory completely. 

Ideally, the industry can come together to set standards that keep MFA sites at bay or these sites will continue to steal ad dollars from reputable publishers and damage buyers’ brand reputations.

The post What Are Made for Advertising (MFA) Sites and Why Are They a Scourge on Ad Tech and Sustainability? appeared first on AdMonsters.

Meet Viewify, a cutting-edge SaaS solution that harnesses the power of machine learning to dynamically optimize ad auctions, resulting in an average ad viewability of 80% or higher.

Viewify is a first-of-its-kind platform designed to help publishers instantly elevate ad viewability above the crucial 80% threshold. This achievement is directly linked to improved CPMs and increased revenue streams. The best part? It promises to offer publishers immediate results without bearing the burden on their end, as Viewify’s integration is streamlined and hassle-free, requiring just a single line of javascript.

With Viewify, gone are the days of complex billing structures tied to ad loads or refresh counts, or the controversial revenue-sharing schemes adopted by many other solutions in the market. Publishers only incur charges when the tool loads on their pages, regardless of the number of ads present, granting them the freedom to concentrate on creating exceptional content, driving user engagement, and maintaining a seamless user experience.

We spoke with Deke Hooper, CEO of diDNA to delve deeper into the features and benefits of the SSP’s new offering, Viewify. We’ll explore how this tool is reshaping how publishers implement and utilize ad tech while unraveling the broader implications for the advertising ecosystem. 

Yakira Young: In what ways can publishers witness an instant enhancement in their viewability metrics by utilizing Viewify?

Deke Hooper: The core technology that makes Viewify so effective is how it optimizes two important (yet often overlooked) metrics: lazy load and ad refresh.

When lazy load is deployed incorrectly or not deployed at all, all ads on a page load immediately, regardless of whether they are on the site, driving down viewability and reducing CPMs based on those signals. 

Enabling Viewify, which includes diDNA’s Enhanced Lazy Load with header bidding through methods like active tab monitoring and viewport proximity, allows for more efficient resource allocation by only triggering auction and render requests for ads when the user’s viewport is close to the ad location, resulting in improved performance by reducing unnecessary network requests and rendering.

Ad refresh acts similarly. While it’s a fantastic revenue opportunity when not set up correctly it can have the opposite effect by refreshing out-of-view ads, reducing viewability, and hurting the overall monetization goals. Intelligent Ad Refresh is part of Viewify that considers Google policy for TTLs, runs tests in the background, and identifies the highest revenue correlated to refresh, with smart timers that optimize by device and ranges.

YY: How does Viewify offer publishers the flexibility to tailor their approach, whether at a granular or global level?

DH: Publishers using Viewify typically fall into one of two categories:

1. Ad Ops and Programmatic Teams who want a tool that works out of the box, maximizing time to value and leveraging diDNA’s smart presets to optimize ad inventory.
2. Teams who want more control and want to customize and build their own rules to find incremental revenue opportunities.

Viewify users typically fall into the first category in the current media landscape. They’re under pressure to do more and hit ad revenue targets with fewer resources. Viewify is a trusted solution to quickly and easily get more out of their existing inventory and automatically do the work for them. 

For teams that want to dig deeper, a powerful customization layer built into the Viewify Editor gives ad tech pros ample opportunity to test and optimize specifics to their site. Users can manually set refresh ranges, lazy load settings, ad render settings, and more, and can be segmented by device type, geo, and user, among others.

Here’s a concrete example: let’s say you’re a publisher who runs a mix of programmatic open market and higher-value direct campaigns. You may want to increase your refresh time on the direct campaigns, or even disable refresh entirely. Doing so generally leads to a higher click-through rate and lower average CPCs, two common KPIs for direct campaigns. To make that happen with Viewify, you simply enter the line item and customize the settings yourself. All other line items would continue to operate with the global settings while optimizing the specific campaign as needed.

YY: We noticed a senior programmatic director in the sports industry expressing his conviction that Viewify is indispensable for his publication. Are you receiving similar feedback from other publisher partners?

DH: We’re hearing a ton of positive feedback from early adopters of Viewify. From positive viewability data and revenue trends to ease of deployment and getting started, overall feedback has been extremely productive.

We implemented Viewify on one of the largest gaming publisher sites in the country last month. The day we turned it on, average viewability increased by 86% and has held steady ever since. Fill rate has increased by 14%, and we’ve seen an average CPM increase of 24%.

One thing to keep in mind is that the core tech that powers Viewify has been packaged as part of our “full stack” monetization program for years now. Thousands of publishers have already benefited from the tool, and we hope for thousands more in the future.

YY: What sets Viewify apart from other solutions in the market?

DH: Simplicity, time to value, and how it increases the value of existing ad inventory.

Simplicity: A single line of javascript installed in the site’s header is all a publisher needs to start. It can be set up and ready to go in less time than it takes to read this paragraph. Once installed, the smart presets are enough to get started and start seeing results instantly. The default settings work so well that many publishers do just that: install Viewify, set it, see the results, and forget it.

Time to value: Viewify integrates directly with a publisher’s existing header bidding strategy and starts optimizing the ad auction the second it’s turned on. Viewability increases within minutes, followed by CPMs and ad revenue.

More valuable ad inventory:  We’ve seen a direct correlation between viewability and CPMs. Low viewability indicates a lower-quality website in both the programmatic ad auction and with higher-value direct deals and PMP campaigns. The overall goal of Viewify is to make inventory more valuable and thus drive up CPMs and revenue. We’ve found viewability to be one of the biggest opportunities to make a significant and immediate impact. Many publishers have viewability numbers in the 40-60% range. Bringing that up to 80% can make a big difference.

The implementation structure and terms are a new approach to the traditional ad tech platforms. We offer qualifying publishers a 30-day free trial to test the tool without taking on risk or long-term contracts. Once a publisher sees the results from Viewify, it’s really hard for them to hit the same performance metrics without it.

Our goal here is to offer publishers flexibility and transparency – neither of which are historically very common in the ad tech space.

YY: How do you envision the trajectory of Viewify over the next five years?

DH: Viewify is the first of a number of SaaS-style tools that complement our roadmap in the next one-five years. We want to be part of moving the industry towards giving publishers more control and customization over their toolkits.

Our new tools will follow a similar structure, focusing on simplicity, speed, and customization. 

YY: Is there any additional information or insights you would like to share about Viewify?

DH: The Viewify engine determines why, when, and how often ads will show based on performance, user behavior, and auction signals — creating a unique user experience every time. 

Minimum thresholds for high-value direct deals, open market, and PMP campaigns are typically 70%. By increasing viewability, publishers can access premium advertisers, ultimately increasing brand value and ad revenue. In addition to optimizing programmatic and open market campaigns, implementing Viewify will help a publisher’s direct sales team sell on higher core metrics, increasing deal sizes and driving more ad revenue.

The post Publishers, Get the Flexibility and Transparency You Need With Viewify appeared first on AdMonsters.

Attention metrics are gaining traction, but one fundamental aspect that continues to hold significant value for advertisers is viewability. While advertisers recognize the importance of capturing users’ attention, ensuring their ads are viewable remains a top priority.

Viewability refers to the measurement of whether users see an ad. In the past, publishers could generate revenue solely by placing ads on their websites, irrespective of whether those ads received any views. However, the landscape has transformed dramatically, and advertisers now emphasize viewable impressions. Publishers need to comprehend how the costs of impressions are measured to monetize their digital ad inventory effectively.

To be considered viewable, an ad must meet specific criteria. According to industry standards, an ad is viewable if at least 50% of its pixels are visible on the user’s screen for at least one second. 

But how do you measure viewability correctly? 

vCPM: The Cost of a Thousand Viewable Impressions

Calculating the value of viewable impressions is where vCPM (viewable cost per mille) comes into play. vCPM represents the cost of a thousand viewable impressions, indicating the number of people who see the ads on a web page. It provides advertisers with a clear understanding of the value they are getting from their advertising investments.

While CPM measures the cost per thousand impressions, regardless of their viewability, vCPM focuses solely on viewable impressions. By leveraging vCPM, advertisers can make informed decisions and allocate their budgets more effectively, optimizing their ROI.

To bid on vCPM, advertisers must be aware of the ad’s visibility percentage and the count of viewable impressions, as these factors determine the resulting vCPM. The total vCPM is determined after deducting any portion of the ad that remains outside the screen, rendering it invisible to viewers.

Attention Vs. Viewability

As the industry ushers in the cookieless era, publishers and advertisers also preach the importance of attention metrics. While creating viewability for your ad is essential, some argue it’s losing relevance because it “simply represents a measure of an opportunity for an ad to be seen – not whether a viewer actually saw an ad.” 

Attention metrics grew in prominence because of the lessening popularity of identifiers and the increased difficulty of gaining consumer attention because of the oversaturation of ads online. Brands measure attention metrics through viewability, creative size, interaction, ad position, time of day, publisher or program, audibility, page clutter, device frequency, and eye tracking. Viewability metrics are still vital to understanding attention metrics, so brands need robust measurement tools for viewability. 

The Publisher Benefit

Enhancing viewability and vCPM is a crucial objective for publishers aiming to maximize ad revenue. Several strategies can help improve viewability metrics: 

• Ad Placement Optimization: Placing ads in strategic positions on a web page, such as above the fold or within the user’s natural line of sight, increases the likelihood of viewability.
• Responsive Design: Implementing responsive website design ensures that ads adapt to various screen sizes and resolutions, allowing for a seamless user experience across devices.
• Ad Formats and Sizes: Choosing ad formats and sizes that align with the website’s layout and content enhances visibility and engagement, driving higher viewability rates.
• Page Load Speed: Optimizing page load times reduces user abandonment and increases the chances of ads being viewed before users navigate away from the site.
• Ad Fraud Prevention: Implementing robust ad fraud detection and prevention measures safeguards viewability by eliminating fraudulent or non-human traffic that artificially inflates impressions.

By implementing these strategies, publishers can elevate their viewability metrics, positively impacting vCPM and attracting higher-quality advertisers to prioritize viewable impressions.

Understanding the concept of viewability, measuring it through vCPM, and implementing strategies to enhance viewability benefit publishers in terms of increased ad revenue and ensure advertisers receive the value they seek from their digital advertising investments. As the industry continues to evolve, keeping a keen eye on viewability will be instrumental in driving success for both publishers and advertisers in the digital advertising ecosystem.

The post What is vCPM and How Does It Relate to Viewability? appeared first on AdMonsters.

The streaming era of television has drastically changed how consumers watch content and, therefore, how advertising works. There are many streaming channels now — the doors that Netflix opened — and plenty of consumers have subscriptions to several platforms. But how are they able to afford them all? 

For the past fifty years, the video industry used a dual revenue-stream model. This meant that TV networks and pay-TV operators shared the revenue consumers paid for subscriptions and the revenue generated from ads. Then the rise of Netflix’s ad-free platform birthed the streaming dynasty, opening a gamut of questions about the future of advertising in television. 

Meanwhile, Hulu and other streaming services began offering ad-supported options at a lower price, which also led to the rise of the FASTS, and the popularity of the option showed that it was viable. It begged the question of which ad-supported tier would become the industry standard.

One of the original appeals of streaming was ad-free content, but as the streaming medium became oversaturated, ad-supported tiers became a tactical revenue stream. As the streaming wars waged on for three years, lower-cost ad-supported plans “have provided consumers with the ability to afford more services with their entertainment wallet.” 

The growth of ad-supported plans has grown exponentially over five years. By the end of Q1 of 2023, ad-supported streaming made up one-fourth of SVOD subscriptions. 

The Big Four: “Ad Avoiders,” “Ad Takers,” “Ad Managers,” and “Ad Oblivious.”

The popularity of ad-supported subscriptions is undeniable, but the statistics vary based on the streaming platform. For example, two out of three subscribers that signed up for Peacock in Q1 of 2023 chose the ad-supported plan. On the other hand, only one-fifth of subscribers signed up for the ad-supported tier on HBO Max and Netflix.

But why are consumers making these choices? 

Antenna, the subscriber measurement company, created four consumer categories to understand consumer choice: Ad Avoiders, Ad Takers, Ad Managers, and Ad Oblivious. 

Ad Avoider: This segment of subscribers always chooses an ad-free plan. Platforms presented them with an ad-free and ad-supported tier, and they always chose the former. 

Ad Taker: This segment was presented with both options and chose the ad-supported tier. 

Ad Manager: They mix and match both ad-free and ad-supported tiers.

Ad Oblivious: They have not yet signed up for a service where advertising was an option.

Ad Choice Segmentations (All Subscribers) 

This idea of ad choice in CTV is a fairly new concept. Three years ago, 64% of U.S. video streaming subscribers were Ad Oblivious because platforms never presented them with a streaming service with an ad-supported subscription tier. Now the number is down to 32%, a significant drop. 

The upcoming years will be vital for determining the future role of advertising in subscription-supported streaming. This is the first time the CTV industry is offering this amount of ad-supported streaming content, and platforms will need to take this time to understand if consumers bought into the value proposition of advertising, especially as one-third of subscribers remain Ad Oblivious. 

If you put aside the Ad Oblivious segment and focus on the two-thirds of subscribers who made a choice, 58% of Americans chose advertising either some or all the time they had the option. However, Ad Avoiders are the largest single segment at 42%. 

The Ad Manager portion, in which subscribers filter back and forth between both options, might be the way of the future. The Ad Manager portion is small, but there is room for exponential growth. 

“By definition, a consumer can’t be considered an Ad Manager until one has made the ad choice at least two times. If we isolate only the consumers who have been faced with the ad choice two or more times, a fascinating story emerges: 71% of these Americans have chosen advertising at least once. And nearly one-in-two are Ad Managers. Consumers are not only learning to choose whether or not they want ads, but they are also learning to decide on a service-by-service basis,” wrote Antenna. 

There’s room for both ad-free and ad-supported services in the future. The data shows that it depends on the platform. 

The post The Subscription Economy, The Streaming War, and Ad-Supported Media appeared first on AdMonsters.

Kroger Precision Marketing made waves in the ad tech industry as a pioneer in retail media. And, they are determined to expand their  impact further. 

Last week, Kroger’s retail media operation announced the  launch of an in-house self-service ad platform. The platform was designed to ease advertisers’ ability to activate, measure and optimize their campaigns and improve their customers’ overall experience. 

But that’s just the beginning. Plans are in motion to expand the platform’s capabilities to service their entire retail media service portfolio which means a more unified marketing strategy for brands. We spoke with Michael Schuh, VP of Media Strategy at KPM, to understand the origins of the new platform, how they put consumers’ needs first and plans for future-proofing their ad platform. 

Andrew Byrd: What motivated Kroger to develop its proprietary self-service ad platform?

Michael Schuh: We created the in-house ad platform because we’re obsessed with optimizing the customer experience. We designed our diverse portfolio of ad products to help brands engage with our customers no matter how they consume media. We’ve been on a journey for five and a half years since launching KPM. 

Our parent organization at 84.51°, the data science company of Kroger, gave us an incredible foundation of data science that we’re excited to deploy on our platform. It will improve the content that our customers see when they visit Kroger.com or the Kroger app. The scale and speed with which we can deploy that data science to improve customer experiences will only increase as we build in-house capabilities versus leveraging third-party partners.  

AB: Regarding creating a great consumer experience, the ad tech industry is in a privacy reckoning. How are you thinking about that when creating the ad platform? I know that with your retail media network, you have plenty of customer first-party data. Still, I’m curious how you deal with transparency and privacy protection concerning your customer data. 

MS: We built our ad platform to be consumer-first. We empower and encourage our customers to make informed choices about whether they wish to receive tailored ads and personalized offers. We provide clear information about how customers can opt out of such advertising. Most customers feel that personalized offers and fuel points make their shopping easier. That’s why our loyalty program has a high participation rate: 96% of Kroger sales are connected to loyalty accounts.  

AB: Can you explain how advertisers create and launch campaigns on Kroger’s ad platform?

MS: As a self-service advertising platform, advertisers will have lots of flexibility to control the process. Initial capabilities will allow clients to: 

• Reach relevant audiences using search-based insights and custom ad groups.
• Design, iterate, and activate creative messages within the platform.
• Customize and save multiple creative templates by brand and product.
• Optimize all campaign elements, including budgets, messaging, and flighting.
• Build reports and boost performance against deterministic retail data – including sales lift, household penetration, and unit lift.  

The new platform will also pave the way for greater interoperability with other media activation and management software. Advertisers using third-party management tools like Pacvue and Skai will still manage inventory through those platforms.

We’ll own the platform and deploy capabilities like data science, onsite inventory, and new inventory types. We will then surface new capabilities to help brands activate across our entire suite of ad products.

We’ll start to onboard existing clients over the next couple of months. We’ll have beta clients on the platform within the next 60 days or so. Then we’ll move to our full launch. We’re already working on features and functionality to enhance the platform. We will connect with third-party bid management platforms – like Pacvue and Skai – to help brands buy across onsite display and search.

AB: What are the future plans for Kroger’s self-service ad platform? Are there any upcoming features or expansions on the horizon?

MS: As part of this first release, we will maintain our relationship with bid management platforms like Skai and Pacvue. We’ll continue to innovate with partners to enhance our suite of metrics. Part of the reason advertisers are investing in retail media is because of the ability to close the loop and improve performance. It is not limited to performance metrics. We can also show how a campaign drove new buyers or category share. The new platform will increase how we optimize these metrics. 

Retail media is not just about setting the campaign and forgetting it. This platform will enable brands to see real-time data and optimize between different ad placements, creative types, or products. The result is a better customer experience with the brand content. 

The post Kroger Precision Marketing’s In-House Ad Platform Finesses Customer Experience appeared first on AdMonsters.

You can’t control the cards life deals you, but you can control how you play the game. 

Mike Richter’s experience is a testament to that as he navigated his childhood in NC, pursued a hairstylist and make-up artist career, and ventured into the ad tech industry. His mantra, “that every moment we live through leads us to the path we are on right now,” has kept him thriving through hardship and success. 

In this current era — marked by a recession and a two-month break in Europe — Richter is still working toward defining the next chapter in his book, but he is optimistic about what the future holds. 

“Part of what has helped me build my superpowers is going through adversity,” said Richter. “We all have superpowers. Everybody’s collection of superpowers is unique to their experiences and what they’ve learned from them. My superpowers come from my experiences. They come from me learning through the path that I’m taking and the steps I choose to take. It informs me of how to move forward in the future and allows me to be me.”

Andrew Byrd: Can you give me a little background on where you grew up, your childhood and how that influenced you today?

Mike Richter: I always refer to myself as a first-generation Southerner. I was born and raised in Charlotte, North Carolina. My dad and mom came from the North — the Bronx and Philly. 

I always pushed convention and worked against the status quo, even as young as two or three. I would have fun fashions where I would not leave the house if I didn’t have two different color crew socks and so on. 

Especially so in high school, as I discovered that I was gay. When I came out of the closet, I joined GLSEN. I pioneered the initiative that formed the first GSA in Charlotte, North Carolina; most schools in the city now have one. I constantly work to try to make the world a better place or a more accessible place for others that experience similar adversity. 

AB: Did the adversity halt you from coming out? 

MR: No, I dealt with that adversity for a long time. Did that adversity lead me to be more apprehensive about coming out? A little bit. But it also gave me the thick skin needed to come out to my mom and dad, who were super supportive. 

Today, as I stand in Paris on the eve of my 35th birthday, I feel so much more accomplished than I ever thought I would be at this point in my life. I loved all the experiences that I’ve had despite some of the adversity I went through. 

AB: How did you start working in ad tech? 

MR: Just like everyone in ad tech, it just happened. Nobody chose to work in the ad tech industry that I know of because nobody goes to school for it. It’s something that you discover and become part of, and it’s an industry that, once you become part of it, it’s one that you generally don’t want to leave. Because it’s exciting, and it’s fun, and it’s different, and the people are amazing. And it’s something that I’m thankful to be a part of every day.

I originally went to school for marketing, but I never finished. Then I started to pursue a career as a hairstylist and makeup artist, but that career was halted after dealing with a significant change. I was diagnosed with HIV, and I felt lost. Maybe if I had been aware of some of the various programs we have today, I would have made a different decision, but life turned out the way it was supposed to. Every moment we go through in life leads us on the path we’re on right now, and that was mine. I eventually decided to go back to school and finish my degree. As I was finishing, I got the opportunity to start selling ads at a local television station.

Thank you to those that believed in me during that time and gave me the chance to start my career. A special shout-out to Tiffany, you know you are. From there, one thing led to another, and I learned about the local TV and digital industry. Then, one random day, I saw that the company I worked for had opened up a new division called Premion in New York City. I put my name in the hat for it and joined the team. From there, it has been a super fun rollercoaster of nonstop UPS downs, twists, and turns.

AB: I wanted to ask how you started working in CTV, but you’ve been working in the TV space since the start of your ad tech career. As someone who has watched it develop over time, where do you see the space evolving over the next few years? 

MR: CTV first came out because people wanted to change how they consume TV. People were unhappy with how they consumed TV for several different reasons. They could not control what they were watching, it cost too much money, or they saw more ads than content on some other channels. So, the control started with new technologies that allow people to watch video on demand, also known as VOD, which opened up a whole new world for the audience. It gave them a choice of when and how they could watch their content.

In the early 2010s, technology was already out because the first Roku was sold in 2001, but took over a decade before this started taking off. Twenty years ago, they didn’t have the means to support the vast consumption that people will utilize today. In addition, smart televisions and devices weren’t easily affordable. Now they are, which allows people to access them and start consuming television how they want to see it, either with fewer or no ads, and choosing the content they want. But many people still need access to a high stream, high capacity, or high-speed broadband. 

People look at CTV versus traditional TV and the difference in how it’s delivered. What about the difference in how it’s packaged and accessed, not through the hardware or the pathways, but the packaging in which we pay for it?

Do I see CTV continuing to take off? Yes, that’s inevitable. But that’s not the important factor. The important factor is how we distribute it. That’s what governs how we advertise within apps and how we monetize it.

AB: As you know, change is constant in the ad tech industry and the recession has forced many to change their career path at a sudden notice. I know it took a lot of vulnerability to share your story on LinkedIn. What do you make of this time in the industry and your own personal experience with it? Where are you hoping this time takes you? 

MR: I’m grateful to be fortunate enough that despite losing my job, I am hopeful about the future. I can support myself and Finn and take the time to live in Europe for two months to take a break. I am still determining what to make of this time. It goes back to what I said earlier. You can’t control the path that you’re on, but you can control the steps that you take.

The thing I love most about this industry is the people. I’ve made some fantastic friends, some of whom I call family, but this industry is like a family. This industry will show up and put back into you what you put into it. After making the announcement on LinkedIn, I started talking to mentors and friends who gave me advice, guidance, and confidence that helped lift me up.

And so to all of my friends, colleagues, former team members, future team members, and partners in the space, thank you. Thank you for contributing to every step in my career, from the debut to the end, but it’s not over yet. This is simply a cliff-hanging chapter, and it’s not the end of the book. Be on the lookout for new ventures ahead because exciting things are in the works. 

The post Ad Tech Veteran Mike Richter: The Power of Community and the Power Built From Experience appeared first on AdMonsters.