What we know about native advertising

Source: WARC Best Practice, August 2019

Downloaded from WARC

Provides marketers with information and guidance about using native advertising.

Native advertising is growing in popularity, in part due to growing concerns around the effectiveness
of some other forms of digital advertising. It can help to circumnavigate the rise of ad blocking
software, and marketers and publishers are investing in models that prioritise high quality and
valuable content.

Definition
Like an old-fashioned ‘advertorial’, native ads are often presented as content. They are placed in a way that is
consistent in form and function (i.e. design, context and behaviour) with the online media platforms or publishers
they appear in. In-stream ads, branded content, and paid search can be considered variations of native ads,
though the term is increasingly used to specify brand-funded content published by third-party publishers.

Key insights
1. Native ads are more effective than traditional banner ads

A 2018 study into native advertising by Verizon Media, which owns AOL, Yahoo, Tumblr and Huffington Post,
found that “banner blindness” is at an all-time high. It also found consumers were very open to native ads,
especially on mobile. For advertisers, native resulted in eight times higher click-through-rates and a 25% longer
active view time compared to ‘traditional’ ads. A quarter of consumers were more likely to recommend brands
seen in native ads and 15% were more likely to consider purchase themselves. Native formats triggered greater
subconscious reaction, leading to a 10% lift in positive brand associations – this was even higher on mobile. In-
feed native also proved to be better than bottom-of-the-page native.
Read more in: Native ads lead to greater purchase intent than display and Verizon Media ‘reinvents’
native ads with a new approach to measurement

2. Best practices for branded content add value to native advertising

An understanding of branded content alongside native advertising is needed for a content marketing strategy.
Research by the Financial Times shows that 64% of readers believe the quality of branded content is more
important than the brand sponsoring it. Partnering with a publisher on branded content can offer a much broader
audience than the brand’s own site, potentially helping new people change perceptions that they might have of
the brand. Four things were regarded by the respondents as vital “building blocks” of branded content: it must
be informative and useful, it should not try to sell the brand’s products or services, it needs to be well-written,
and lastly, it should come from a reliant and trustworthy source.

Read more in: Branded content: Creating successful campaigns with ads that don’t look like ads and
Getting branded content right: Insights from Financial Times

3. Transparency is the first priority in native advertising success

There are eight critical elements to succeed with native advertising:

Disclosure about its commercial nature

Governance documents to guide all aspects of content strategy and execution
Collaboration between internal departments, agencies and vendor partners
Planning for sharing and other ways of amplifying the message and extending reach
Ensuring content is portable across platforms
Broad training of everyone touching native in the organisation
Recognising the challenges of creating scale
Addressing measurement according to the platform

Read more in: How to use native advertising effectively

4. Brands should focus on a good ‘fit’ with both platform and device

Effective native campaigns match context, maximise engagement, and drive emotional recall and purchases.
The following three guidelines can help marketers achieve this:

1. Select the right platform and ensure effective integration: content should be personalised for the viewer,
optimised for the device, and related to the context of the page or article.
2. Be overtly transparent: make it explicitly clear that the ad is sponsored content. Transparency leads to
better results.
3. Align objectives: sponsored content should be relevant and valuable, creating a mutually beneficial value
exchange between the advertiser and consumer.

Read more in: The native frontier: How pioneering marketers can navigate the uncharted terrain of the
native ad

5. A clear purpose and value exchange are key to programmatic native success
Creating brand-aligned, differentiated and valuable native advertising experiences delivered programmatically
can be challenging. The following five principles can help advertisers achieve the desired effect:

Have a set of high-quality content resources

Ensure relevance to the publishing partner's content
Elevate the authority of the brand to provide content on the subject
Be honest with labelling – if its paid advertising, say so
Have a clear value exchange for the consumer

Read more in: Five rules for implementing programmatic native advertising

6. Story sequencing aligns native content and distribution with the consumer journey

Native advertising is very good at delivering top-funnel content at scale. Via story sequencing, marketers can
use programmatic native to nurture consumer relationships through their purchase journey. It ensures only those
who engage with the top-funnel content receive mid-funnel content and only those who engage with that receive
bottom-funnel content.

Read more in: Best practice in programmatic native advertising

7. Meeting the challenge of multiple native formats is key to capitalise on programmatic

Programmatic technology addresses one of native advertising's key challenges – scale. However, with the
proliferation of bespoke native formats, marketers need to provide all standard and optional image and text
assets to maximise reach of their native programmatic advertising. They should also keep testing and learning
as new publishers and formats emerge.

Read more in: What advertisers should consider when trialing programmatic native

8. Native advertising offers higher click-through rates than typical display ads

According to research in the UK, native ads produce a 31% higher click-through rate than online display ads and
widen the purchase funnel. In a study for the Association of Online Publishers, 59% of consumers said they liked
the native ad to which they were exposed, with just 14% claiming not to like it. This is down to the use of high
quality content that attracts and engages users in an authentic way. Consumers feel that by clicking through
they are going to experience something of value and use.

Read more in: Increase the value of native ads

9. Relevant and engaging content reduces risk of being blocked

The growing use of ad blockers across the world poses an increasing challenge to brands seeking to reach
online audiences, as well as a threat to the revenue streams of online publishers. As a core part of content
marketing, native advertising is expected to be key to circumventing this issue, with publishers building more
native ad products, and advertisers upping their investment in content activity.

Read more in: Media in 2016: The digital backlash

More on this topic
WARC topic page: Content

WARC case studies: Content marketing (lead media)

Admap: Programmatic native advertising, March 2017

Further reading
Native advertising

ANA pinpoints challenges and opportunities of media evolution

Editorial content in native advertising: How do brand placement and content quality affect native-
advertising effectiveness?

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