UM’s global brand safety officer: ‘Clients still prefer cheaper, risky environments’
UM Worldwide’s first global brand safety officer has issued a warning to marketers that if they want to advertise on secure websites, they’re going to have to pay for it.
Joshua Lowcock, who is also the agency’s chief digital and innovation officer, said many brands still preferred cheaper, but riskier, media environments despite an onslaught of brand safety scandals over the past two years.
Speaking to Mumbrella about the biggest barriers to improving brand safety, Lowcock said: “Clients prefer the cheaper inventory: not the cheapest, but there is a lot of pressure on price. There’s always that price trade-off; if you want cheaper media, you’re in a more risky environment.
A good issue to raise with brand safety for any advertiser or publisher new to this concept is what will really happen to the advertiser’s brand reputation or “pub test” if they advertise against something that is controversial.
Here, I would underscore what has happened in the offline world when it comes to commercial radio and TV broadcasting or event sponsorship. In the former context, issues were raised about Kyle and Jackie O’s controversial breakfast-show stunts or Sydney’s “shock-jocks” on the AM dial and the fact that the advertisers were put under pressure to remove their commercials or sponsorship of these shows once the presenters were acting in a controversial manner.In the latter context, heavy controversy was raised about the Australian Formula 1 Grand Prix being hosted at Albert Park Lake and it got to a point where most of the major brands wouldn’t sponsor the race with it ending up with Transurban sponsoring the initial race in 1996.
With those situations, it was easier for advertisers to discriminate but online and mobile platforms have made it harder to discriminate.