Getting Started with Native Advertising
Native advertising provides brands with a new way to get their marketing content in front of their audience.
Content is a key part of day-to-day life. From the moment we wake up to the moment we go to sleep, we consume new articles, social media posts, photos and videos. In fact, consumers spend 9 hours, 38 minutes devouring media a day.
With so much content in our lives, consumers are used to seeing countless advertisements a day – whether they be in the form of ad copy, imagery or video. Businesses run the risk of consumers being blind to advertisements, and some people even use blocking software to remove ads from websites all together or deliberately ignore promotional material.
Native advertising is designed precisely not to look like promotional material, making it challenging for consumers to overlook.
The trend of native ads is on the rise. In fact, native digital display ads are expected to make up nearly 61% of digital display advertising spend in 2019. To put it into perspective, that accounts for a whopping $41 billion in ad spend.
This guide we will be covering all there is to understand about native advertising including:
- – What is Native Advertising?
- – What Do Native Ads Look Like?
- – What Platforms Use Native Ads?
- – What’s So Good About Native Advertising?
- – How Native Ads Can Benefit Your Business
1. What is Native Advertising?
Native advertising is the use of paid ads that match, or are closely related, to the appearance, feel and function of a platform in which they are displayed.
They’re designed to be non-disruptive to the user experience and the ads are disguised as original content from the platform.
Unlike other forms of advertising, like display ads, native ads don’t look like ads at first glance.
2. What Do Native Ads Look Like?
If you spend any reasonable amount of time browsing the internet, chances are you have probably already experienced the power of native ads without noticing. There are 3 common forms:
A. In Feed Ads
Ads that are shown in your feeds on social networks, like Facebook and Instagram.
In feed native advertising will look different on site to site as they blend into the unique user experience. For instance, Facebook’s in-feed ads can look like the below:
B. Paid Search Listings
Native Advertising on Google SERPs (search engine result pages) are technically native ads. Those top paid search results, as detailed in the image below, are made to look like organic search results and don’t really pop-out as ads – unless you notice the small green ‘ad’ label next to the url.
C. Content Recommendations
Particularly on publisher sites, native ads can be called ‘recommended content’ or ‘promoted stories’. On popular news sites like The Manchester Evening News, content recommendations are often found underneath an article to encourage you to read additional content you might like.
3. How Can I Spot a Native Ad?
If a native ad looks like the usual content found on a given platform, then the reader consumes the content without even realising it. Or, because the content blends with the user experience on the platform they’re on, they are more inclined to consume the content.
Native ads usually have one of the following features:
- – Terms like ‘Suggested Post’, ‘Promoted Content’ or ‘Recommended for You’
- – A small icon, which when clicked details that the content is paid for
- – Social media native ads usually featured the word ‘sponsored’ somewhere in or around the content
4. What Makes Native Advertising So Effective?
Native ads are another marketing method that helps businesses get in front of the right people. A particular strength of the style is that the content is placed instream with the platform’s content – where the audience is most likely to read it.
Native advertising tackles ad fatigue – which happens when audiences get tired of seeing ads. After a period of time, consumers consciously or unconsciously block out advertisements and pay them no attention. Native Ads often go ahead incognito, so they don’t bore the audience. As long as the content is relevant and enticing, native ads can engage a target audience.
5. How Native Advertising Can Benefit Your Business
Regular analysis, optimisation and attention are key to running effective native ads. However, for many businesses, managing any form of paid advertising campaigns can be a full-time job. And that’s where we come in.
Different Gravy Digital have the time and expertise to ensure your native ads (and other styles of paid ads) deliver you the best results.
Contact us today and see how we can help you succeed with advertising native advertising. For a free no obligation consultation, get in touch using one of the following options:
Book a meeting: michaelgoldman.co.uk/
Telephone: 0161 706 0004