If publishers and CMOs can’t work together, native advertising won’t survive
For native advertising to work to its full potential, marketers and publishers need to start communicating more effectively, and stop just throwing money around. Otherwise, campaigns are doomed to become simply “more noise for people to ignore on the internet”, argues Alexandra Tselios.
One of the biggest complaints I hear from marketing directors when discussing native content is along the lines of “I had an article published on XYZ site and got nothing out of it”.
Alexandra Tselios
Often, when you probe deeper into this assessment you find three glaring issues:
- Unrealistic expectations of the result one or two articles can deliver.
- Misunderstood messaging tones for either that publication’s audience or the product or services mandate.
- Unclear measurements around what success would look like for that article. It has to be more than just click through rate (CTR) and views.
Usually this results in the publication shrugging away the problem (“Hey, I published it – job done”), the media agency or PR agency trying to explain the minimal metrics (if any), and the marketing team justifying why that one piece of content didn’t really convert.
Will native advertising (advertorials) survive? Only if they’re interesting.
Huge difference between advertorials and native advertising mate.
Mitch, aside from rhetoric and jargon, in plain English, how do you define native advertising?
@paul E
Native advertising is purely the traffic driver used to deliver the user to the content (Think editorial placement or even Outbrain).
The actual content itself should be referred to as Branded Content
Couldn’t agree with this article more. It’s very well written and picks up on the nuances and difficulties in aligning both brands’ and the publishers’ interests.
As a publisher, it’s incredibly difficult when a CMO tries to dictate the content or message. We know what sorts of content will resonate with our audience and CMO’s need to trust and publishers on this to find a middle ground that delivers on both parties needs and goals in a way that engages and educates/entertains the readers.
We had one instance where a CMO pushed back on the content we submitted for approval as they deemed it too risky for the brand. While we argued it would deliver their messaging in a more humorous and authentic way, ultimately it was re-written as they were paying and the ones with final approval. Unfortunately, it resulted in an article that read very much like an advertorial and the brand asking why it didn’t perform as well as expected amongst our audience.
I think to achieve a good outcome in future for native content, there needs to be open lines of communication and a level of trust between the brands, agencies and publishers.