There’s a task in The Apprentice where the candidates have to make some adverts – usually TV, but...
In 2005 Bill Gates declared:
“The future of advertising is the internet”.
When asked about building big brands online he said:
“That is the thing that traditional advertising is better at…. but as it moves to the digital realm it will be hard to talk about what is and isn’t internet advertising.”
With UK advertisers spending £11.55bn a year online, it’s fair to say the gap between online and offline has not only been closing financially, but also creatively as new formats develop and old formats are redesigned for new distribution channels – vertical video for example.
Whilst TV, print and OOH were once considered the creative and brand formats, the world of online advertising has upped its game in the battle against ad blockers. Nobody wants poor digital advertising – consumers don’t want annoying interruptive ads and publishers (reliant on ad revenue to keep content free) certainly don’t want people leaving their site due to bad ad experiences. The answer is twofold – creativity and ensuring the UX is seamless. Research has found that 78% of UK adults dislike ads that are not suitable for the device they are using.
With this in mind, the fine folks at IAB UK have brought the industry together to produce a creative best practice guide. It started life, as most things do, with a good moan-up about all the bad ads we’ve seen and happily manifested itself into a useful guide of things you can do to make sure your creative is as good as humanly possible!
James Murphy from @TANmediaUK recommends you understand the different types of native formats and what works creatively well and where. For more Creative Best Practice advice go to our new hub: https://t.co/8pN4vBRwdL pic.twitter.com/oMeL2rZ5pZ
— IAB UK (@IABUK) June 25, 2018
The aim of the project was to produce:
“A simple and actionable set of guidance to help you ensure that your digital advertising not only looks great but also works beautifully on the platform that it is served.”
You’ll find my missives on why you should select the right native format for your campaign and the value exchange between brands and consumers here.
Digital content creation best practice
Native distribution best practice
You’ll also great advice on creative best practice across a range of channels: native, content, video, mobile, audio, performance and search. The full guide is here.
