Tag: ad avoidance

Totino’s To Sponsor Pre-Super Bowl Show On Twitch

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Frozen pizza brand Totino’s is trying a new way to get in on this Sunday’s Super Bowl buzz without blowing millions of ad dollars: they are sponsoring a pre-game show on popular videogame streaming site Twitch. The General Mills-owned brand is sponsoring a three-and-half-hour long game show featuring celebrity gamers, hoping to capture the audience sitting down to watch Twitch before the big game begins.

What Brands Need To Do
As the leading channel for gameplay streaming, Twitch provides brands with a great platform to connect with Millennials. By sponsoring the pre-game show, Totino’s is trying to capitalize on increased Super Bowl Sunday viewership on Twitch, which reportedly sees a 10-15% spike in time spent on game day. In order to reach consumers on those streaming platforms, brands should consider seeking sponsorships with social influencers or planning their own livestream events.

For more information on how brands can reach consumers on ad-free services, check out the Ad Avoidance section of our new Outlook 2016.

 

Source: Digiday

 

Amazon To Develop Original Kids Content Starring American Girl Dolls

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Toymaker Mattel has announced a partnership with Amazon to create four live-action specials based on its American Girl dolls. Amazon may also produce a new kids series starring those dolls if the specials prove successful with the audience on Amazon Prime. This is not the first time a streaming service has ventured into kids content. Last year, Amazon Studios greenlit six pilots of kids programs, while Netflix expanded its kids content lineup with three new original series last week. Similarly, HBO struck a deal with Sesame Street for an exclusive window on new episodes last year.

What Brands Need To Do
Today, consumers have increasing options to avoid ads across all media types. It is getting harder for brands to reach their audiences when content consumption has shifted away from traditional TV to ad-free subscription services. This Mattel-Amazon deal provides a great example in how brands can develop branded content via partnerships with content creators to reach audiences that are otherwise unreachable.  

 

Source: Engadget

Header image courtesy of americangirl.com

Samsung Adds Ad-blocking To Its Default Mobile Browser

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Samsung has joined Apple in supporting ad-blocking capability in its mobile web browser. The company started pushing out an update for Samsung Internet, the default browser on Samsung phones, to devices with Android Marshmallow starting today. With the updated browser, Samsung users can now download third-party content-blocking apps – some of which made their debut last year on iOS 9 – and get an ad-free experience in Samsung Internet.

What Brands Need To Do
Samsung’s addition came nearly five months after ad-blockers flooded the App Store’s top chart when iOS 9 was released in September, but for Samsung users, it’s better late than never. Android devices now boast over 1.4 billion users worldwide, and Samsung is the No.1 seller of Android phones. Bringing ad-blockers to Samsung devices will no doubt give their usage a further boost, making it harder for brands to reach mobile consumers. Therefore, brands need to provide added value to their marketing in order to earn consumer attention.

For more information on how brands can fight the increasing usage of ad-blockers, check out the Ad Avoidance section in our Outlook 2016.

 

Source: AdAge

IPG Media Lab Releases Outlook 2016

Posted on by Lab Team

Check out our brand new 2016 Outlook here.

Every year here at the IPG Media Lab, we round up the ideas that excite us: the market trends, new technologies, and consumer shifts that are changing the ways we evaluate, buy, and consume media. And today, we are happy to present you with our Outlook 2016 – “At Your Service”– which examines the rising challenges and opportunities for marketers in the age of media abundance and how brands can deliver true value and become “lifestyle” brands in order to break through.

Take a look and let us know what you think @ipglab on Twitter or contact our Client Services Director Samantha Barrett ([email protected]); we’d love to hear from you.

Check out our special interactive Outlook webpage here: https://ipglab.com/outlook2016/

Would You Trade Full-Screen Mobile Ads For $5 Off Your Sprint Bills?

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Sprint is experimenting with a new way for customers to save on their bills – by downloading an app that temporarily turns your home-screen into an ad. Working with startup Unlockd to create an Android app called “Boost Dealz,” Sprint’s prepaid subsidiary Boost Mobile will now offer their customers $5 off their monthly bill when they install the app, which displays full-screen ads after users unlock their phones. It’s unknown whether ads will be presented every time one unlocks their smartphone, though odds are that they would be presented frequently.

What Brands Need To Do
What Sprint is attempting to achieve here is an interesting flip-side of a recent market trend where consumers are increasingly choosing to avoid ads by using ad-blockers or ad-free subscription services. By offering ads in exchange for a monthly discount, Sprint is making a straight-forward value proposition to its customers to let them decide whether they will opt in to see the ads. Regardless of how many customers take Boost up on this offer, it provides a good example in how brands of all types can circumvent the rise of ad-blockers by offering added value.

 

Source: CNN Money

Header image courtesy of Boost Mobile

New Browser Brave Points To An Interesting Direction For Ad-Blocking

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Look out, online publishers. There is a new ad-blocking tool on the market. Earlier today, inventor of Javascript and Ex-Mozilla CEO Brendan Eich debuted open-source browser Brave that blocks all tracking ads by default. Available now for Mac, Windows, iOS, and Android, Brave automatically strips out programmatic ads that use browsing history for targeting. And Eich says in the near future Brave will instead insert what it deems as acceptable ads where the blocked ads used to be, and split its ad revenue with the publishers.

What Brands Need To Do
While Brave is certainly not the first browser to come with ad-blocking features, its innovative approach of replacing intrusive ads with sanctioned ones points to an interesting direction for web browsers and web business models. It remains to be seen whether future browsers would start absorbing certain functions of ad exchange platforms and become the gatekeeper for consumer data and privacy. But one thing is clear with the introduction of Brave – consumers are getting smarter with their personal data and seeking new ways to avoid being bombarded by ads. Therefore, brands need to start providing real value with their brand messages in order to earn consumer attention or risk being blocked.

 

Source: Re/code

How Publishers Are Dealing With Ad-Blockers

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
In recent months, ad-blocking has become a hot topic among advertisers and online publishers, thanks to Apple’s decision of adding ad-blocking Safari extensions in iOS 9. According to a report from Adobe and PageFair, ad-blockers have claimed 198 million active global users as of June 2015, and that number is expected to double by the end of this year. Therefore, it is no surprise that some major online publishers have started taking active measures to fight off ad-blockers with varied degrees of aggressiveness. Here’s a roundup.

• Forbes and GQ are among the most forceful in their stance against ad-blocking. The two sites have been preventing ad-blocker users from accessing their content completely, instead displaying a page asking them to disable their ad blockers or join their memberships.

• Slate is taking a slightly gentler approach, nudging its readers to turn off their ad-blockers or sign up for membership with a subtle banner at the bottom of its pages. The publisher is also reportedly working on eliminating intrusive ads on its site.

• Huffington Post is working with parent company AOL’s user experience team to monitor its sites and remove ads that are deemed intrusive or dissatisfactory, while also making sure its native ads are clearly disclosed. It has also set up a task force to learn about ad-blocker usage on a global scale.

• Bloomberg also aims to fight ad-blockers by focusing on improving the ad experience for readers, cleaning up its ad placement and design with more white space, less animation and more lower-case fonts.

• Imgur is hoping to make a case for disabling ad-blockers on it site by delivering true user value with its native ads. The image-sharing site is pairing advertisers with its in-house creatives to ensure the messaging and design are fit for its site.

What Brands Need To Do
As online publishers experiment with various ways to combat ad-blocking and attempt to reclaim their lost ad revenues, brands also need to figure out a communications strategy that will get their brand messages across and not blocked. While denying access may work wonders in the short-term (Forbes cites 44% of users complied and disabled their ad-blockers for access), it is hardly a sustainable approach. Instead, brands need to work on winning the consumer trust with more than just annoying pop-ups or intrusive interstitials. Actively working with content partners to create branded content that are entertaining, engaging, or informative would be the key to convince today’s consumers to turn off their ad-blockers.

 

Source: Digiday

Kik Partners With MediaBrix To Incentivize Ad Viewing

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Kik, a messaging app popular among teens, has struck a partnership with MediaBrix, an in-app ad platform, to help it deliver brand messages in a fun way. The plan is to reward users with Kik points, which can be used to unlock special emojis, stickers, and other exclusive Kik content, when they opt to watch an ad or play a branded mini game on Kik’s platform.

What Brands Need To Do
With the rise of ad-blockers and subscription services, it is getting increasingly difficult for brands to reach consumers, who mostly see traditional ads as a nuisance to be avoided. But Kik’s approach to in-app ads here points to a new direction where brands can earn attention by creating branded content that is part of the user experience. For brands looking to reach today’s elusive mobile audience, encouraging brand interaction with value offers and rewards is a good way to go.

Source: AdWeek

Header image courtesy of MediaBrix’s press release

Best Of The Lab 2015: How To Cope With The Rise Of Ad-Blockers

Posted on by Lab Team

Welcome to the Lab’s year-end review, looking back at some of our best and most popular posts from 2015.

Ever since Apple added support for content-blocking Safari extensions to iOS 9, ad-blockers rocketed to the front pages and become a hot topic among advertisers and online publishers. While the scope of its impact may still be up for debate, one thing is undeniable: today’s tech-savvy consumers are starting to realize they can avoid ads by using ad-blockers. How will your brand cope? Here are some actionable suggestions from the Lab.

Fast Forward: Ad Blocking in iOS 9 Safari & What You Need to Do
Popular Ad-blocking Extension Adblock Now Allows Whitelisting
Why Ad-Blockers On iOS 9 Might Not Be What You Think
How Adblockers Are Messing Up Retailers’ Websites

 

Mozilla Debuts Content Blocker For iOS

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
On Tuesday, Mozilla launched an iOS content blocker named Focus by Firefox, promising to block out all tracking codes on mobile webpages. It will most certainly wipe out the ads as well, given that most online ads today have some sort of tracking code built in.

What Brands Need To Do
Following Apple’s decision to allow ad-blocking extensions in iOS 9, a handful of ad-blocking apps have been making waves among mobile users. While it is still debatable how much damage it will do to online publishers and advertisers, there is no denying that today’s consumers are becoming increasingly aware that they are being tracked, and that personal data holds value to advertisers. Therefore, publishers and ad tech providers will have to figure out new ways to acquire the audience data they need for retargeting and analytics. For one, offering consumers added value to incentivize them to volunteer their personal information and data is a good way to bypass the rising trend of ad avoidance.

Source: VentureBeat