With the proliferation of new technology and industry standards, native advertising is experiencing a surge in popularity. Dale Lovell, chief digital officer and UK managing director, ADYOULIKE, discusses with ExchangeWire how native advertising is changing and how it can help both publishers and advertisers deliver relevant, compelling ad experiences.

ExchangeWire: Proving how technology is evolving native advertising, ADYOULIKE made headlines last year with the announcement of the IBM Watson integration – how is semantic targeting changing native?

Dale Lovell: Globally, ADYOULIKE is the largest native advertising supply-side platform (SSP) available. Our DNA technology platform allows for all content to be customised and distributed across devices.

Using IBM's ground-breaking Watson artificial intelligence (AI) software, we’re able to create better semantic targeting for our clients and partners. Watson is truly an integral part of our latest advertising platform. Watson scans all the pages in ADYOULIKE's global network of premium publishers and analyses them in the same way as a human mind would: looking contextually for topics, sentiment, and semantics rather than just scanning for simple keywords.

This means our platform delivers native content in the most relevant and targeted way. By looking at where, why, and how existing editorial content on each site is framing topics, it ensures that advertisers are dynamically delivering the best and most appropriate native content.

How are you defining ‘deep native advertising’?

'Deep native' refers to native advertising’s evolution. As technology improves, people are becoming less and less patient with non-native content. But we’ve found that they will read content that interests them, branded or otherwise. This means that it’s becoming more and more important to integrate seamlessly into a publisher’s existing content – this way the user has a smooth and pleasant experience while browsing. In order to do this, you need to go deep – putting content into context for the best results.

We also believe that the more appropriately placed sponsored content is, the more successful it will be. We aim to target ads to the relevant audiences and environments, which means higher ROIs for advertisers and a better experience for consumers.

What other roles does technology have to play in native advertising and how it is changing and adapting?

So called ‘fake news’ has been an obvious challenge for the industry. There have been many examples of poor brand safety practises across digital; and brands are right to raise concerns. We’re constantly taking measures to combat the issue. Our IBM Watson partnership helps with negative and positive targeting options. With the ability to analyse thousands of pages per second, IBM Watson is able to provide marketers and publishers with detailed feedback, enabling the industry to take control instantly. It also helps publishers set a blacklist to prevent any adverts appearing on pages that aren’t appropriate.

But we have also just integrated our entire network with Integral Ad Science (IAS) for brand safety controls. This technology not only helps deliver more relevant and targeted campaigns for advertisers, but alleviates any fears around brand safety too.

Are advertisers fully sold on the power of native advertising? What are its limitations, or its perceived limitations, from the advertiser perspective?

Our partnerships with publishers and advertisers tell us that the industry is aware of the increasing shift towards native. For example, our partnership with Sizmek enables advertisers and agencies to deliver personalised native advertising campaigns across the StrikeAd by Sizmek platform. The inclusion of ADYOULIKE to StrikeAd’s native inventory opens up a new network of publishers, meaning that StrikeAd can advance their native advertising reach across devices, while ensuring personalised and targeted ads.

From the publisher perspective, does native drive better yield?

In-feed native advertising has become a necessity for online publishers to drive branded content amongst non-branded stories, and it also enhances the customer’s experience. We’ve found that people will click on what interests them – it doesn’t seem to matter whether this is branded or non-branded content. By having robust native content, publishers are able to deliver both advertiser returns, but also compelling and relevant ad experiences.

For example, our recently announced partnerships with Trinity Mirror means that advertising units compatible across device will also be used by publishers’ in-house solutions teams to power their growing native advertising requirements.

Are industry standards keeping up with the pace at which native advertising is growing and evolving?

The digital advertising sector continued growing in 2016, with brands shifting their digital spend towards native. According to a study, native advertising is expected to represent 30% of total global ad spend by 2020, and grow to be worth USD$85.5bn (£67.1bn).

Obviously, a lot of ad tech companies and publishers have been facing questions on data transparency – this is going to continue being a growing topic. I will say that the industry is making every possible effort to ensure transparency and appropriate content – brand safety is key to ad tech vendors who need to protect their clients.

The great thing about native advertising is that it’s a format that can, and will, evolve alongside changes in digital as a whole. The industry is good at maintaining standards: the quality of creative and execution has to be exceptionally high across the board these days for success.