David Ocamb’s Post

'Made for Advertising' sites and activities are increasingly in the spotlight as we as an industry ramp up discussion around the health of the advertising supply chain - thanks to Megan Graham at the The Wall Street Journal for featuring my thoughts in this piece, alongside friends Chris Kane, Shiv Gupta, and Mark Zagorski. While bad advertising experiences may be commercially viable in the short-term, in the longer run all they do is erode consumer confidence in online content. Yet, it's difficult to agree on even the most basic definition of what MFA is: after all, if your main engine of monetization is through advertising, aren't all sites 'made for advertising' in a way? From where I sit, the only way to solve this problem is by cleaning up the supply chain and finally deviating from the 'need reach and scale at lowest cost' approach that has dominated the previous decade of digital advertising. #madeforadvertising #mfa #advertising #supplychain #mediabuying #inclusionlists #adfraud https://lnkd.in/eVzzrK2C

There’s a damaging belief that catches out a lot of advertisers. “The more we put into ads, the more we’ll get out.” So, what happens? The ad budget gets blown up, everything else falls away. More money pumped into campaigns and… disappointment usually follows. When the reality is, taking some of your ad spend and putting it into creative will drive more (and better) revenue. There’s no golden rule, but a good starting point is 10% of advertising budget being reserved for creative. It’s a small cost that drives a big return. Holding firm on it year after year, ring-fencing creative budget, will keep performance high and consistent. The best of both worlds.

One topic making headlines in media and advertising is made-for-advertising websites. But when it comes to identifying MFAs, does a one-size-fits-all approach work? This article shares three industry-backed trust signals publishers can implement to stand apart from MFAs. https://hubs.li/Q02zG1Hm0 #advertising #marketing #auditedmedia

When The Wall Street Journal repeatedly reports on MFA aka "made for advertising/arbitrage" aka "low quality" media, I get the sense that this time Pandora is not going back into the box. I believe the industry narratives don't focus enough on the systemic issues & misaligned incentives, and the friction in changing them (more on that below), but first I'll call out two quotes from this piece that are really telling: Mark Zagorski says "You don’t buy 25% of your inventory if it doesn’t work.” Perhaps in a perfect/rational/effective market, that would be true, but that is not what we are dealing with in the ad/adtech industry. Chris Kane artfully squashes this myth by calling out how these low-quality sites simply create an “illusion of performance." That is exactly right, and I'll elaborate further: Marketers must rely on proxies to their business outcomes in their measurement & buying. In the pre-digital era, when media channels were fairly homogeneous, effectiveness wasn't perfect but many marketers could achieve positive ROI while maintaining a healthy ad-supported media ecosystem that worked for users too. In our current era, with a massively fragmented digital media landscape, the difference in quality/effectiveness/value between impression/channel A can be 100x that of impression/channel B. Flattening those, with an over-reliance on averages, and downward pressure on costs, while ignoring quality, has led to the situation we're in today. IMO, the only way out is a return to an emphasis on quality (in this context media quality matters most, but data & creative quality are just as important to achieve maximum effectiveness) and an acknowledgement that premium/valuable media is finite and cannot just be viewed through the lens of costs and easily-gamed vanity metrics. #QualityMatters #PayAttentionToAttention https://lnkd.in/epN3d9du

There’s an old concept in advertising called the “Rule of 7”: someone has to see an ad seven times before they decide to buy. While this might not be exactly accurate in the digital age, there is a kernel of truth there: you can’t just put an ad out once and expect to see a return. You have to get your message out there again and again, building familiarity with potential customers. Read the full article: Advertising Takes Time ▸ Link in comment

I'm sure we have all seen the sketchy, clickbait advertisements online trying to get our attention. Well, the advertising industry is fighting back! Made for Advertising websites, or MFAs, are the latest challenge for creatives and businesses. The digital marketing consulting firm Jounce Media said in a report that these kinds of sites have a “user-hostile experience that eliminates the effectiveness of advertising". The goal of advertising is to build a connection with the public through visuals that, whether through print or video, are tactics to evoke interest in and engagement with something being marketed. However, if MFAs are creating a poor experience for users and not being truthful to consumers or brands, it makes me question what purpose they truly serve. Check out more on this topic below! #PRAD564

"Video is the most popular advertising format, thus attracting increasing attention from both brands and agency marketers. If context is king, then contextual video is the paradigm" 🚀 https://bit.ly/3SgGYXb #4dcontext #contextualtargeting

Why most advertising sucks. Bad ads have these 2 things in common: 1. Failure to grab attention Nobody cares if it’s boring. A great headline is key for a good ad. 2. It’s not relatable People buy from people they like. Make sure you know who your ideal client is.

Looking for creative ways to reach your audience when digital limitations exist? We recently partnered with a client facing strict regulations on their digital marketing tactics. Leveraging our mobile OOH planning tools, we designed a campaign that seamlessly integrated with their existing strategy, supporting the entire customer journey. In-house marketing teams with clear paid media goals are our dream collaborators! Together, we can identify gaps in the sales funnel and use unique traditional advertising, like mobile OOH to bridge those gaps, driving tangible results. #MobileOOH #ProgrammaticDOOH #MarketingStrategy #MarketingAgencyGrandRapids #AdvertisingCampaign

First impressions matter. In advertising, this also holds true. An impression, also called view or ad view, refers to the display of an ad to a user while looking at a webpage. Infinity Digital Media will make sure you make a good first impression.