An attempt to define Native Advertising.

Everyone is talking about Native advertising.

It's the solution to the problems media owners, brands and users have with the modern web experience.

It's the way to get around ad blocking, it's the way to connect with "Millennials"     (AKA people in the contemporary world), it's the FUTURE.

But what on earth is it? 

Like many new terms we've grown to love it without bothering to define like disruptive or content marketing or growth hacking. We've used it freely a way to inject a sense of modernity to a conversation, it's a way to speak the magical lingo of our advertising bubble, but not say anything precise.

When judging a case about pornography in 1964, Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart  famously declared that the concept was hard to define, but  "I know it when I see it." Native advertising remains the opposite, we don't even know we're seeing it when we do.

This is an attempt to define what it is and isn't. This is not a Havas Company position, it's not a formal declaration, it's my own personal journey to express the actuality of Native and the philosophy behind it.

Let's make a Venn Diagram.

Circle One is " Site Specific Advertising" 

The idea is that ads in this circle are "creative" that was made specifically for that location and context. 

Toilet media is a classic case, there is no other place these ads for horse race betting could work without adaption. You can't take this copy and use for a print ad, it needs these 5 precisely measured toilet stalls. 

Ambient ads are often site specific like this.

But even traditional media like print can run ads that work only for that page and day, like this.

And of course it can live online. Things like Instagram Ads, Tweets for Twitter, even ( and to a lesser extent) a Facebook in-feed ad is site specific, so long as you can't merely place on another website. If the supply specs are unique, it's custom.

Circle Two is " Content Marketing" 

Content Marketing is arguably the very worst term we've ever made in advertising. Marketing conveys a plethora of ways to get people to want and buy something, and content is "stuff". Again we need to define it with examples of what it is. 

Sometimes Content marketing is when a brand makes something that is valuable to the audience, it could be like this, the first Michelin Guide from over 100 years ago. 

This is another example, this is a show from the UK paid for entirely by a large British Grocery store. They were allowed to place a set number of products from that store and used the show to drive traffic in-store, but with nationally broadcast TV that people loved. ( We used to call both these examples Branded Content, but that term fell out of fashion for no reason, we also once called it AFP- Advertiser Funded Programming if it was on TV)

We've also got things like Apps that offer things that help, this is EcoDrive from Fiat, it's free of charge and gives you advice on how to drive. We used to call this Branded Utility, but we don't any more.

And then we've other forms of content marketing, we've got people like Red Bull who put their footage online and people love it. It's sort of "brands as publisher", we've got many brands like Nike, Go Pro and Red Bull  and LVMH with Nowness, making stuff that people love.  Arguably this is "branded utility" but with the utility being to entertain.

So how does this define native advertising?

Well, I see it as the overlap.

If what you are making is philosophically aligned to "content marketing", so it's designed to add some sort of value to peoples lives and it's designed to be good enough to share and therefore not be totally reliant on paid media. If what you are making involves making something then it's half way to being content marketing.

But it also needs to be aligned to site specificity. To my definition, it needs to be something that was designed and produced with one placement or context in mind. 

So a checklist.

Native Advertising is not.

- Sticking a video of behind the scenes footage on YouTube, isn't Native, it's not designed for YouTube. Placing this video on Facebook isn't either.

- An Instagram ad isn't native, it's just site specific, neither is a promoted tweet or a brand funded documentary.

Native Advertising is about co-creating with a key production partner or distributor.

Native advertising is about paid media to ignite, then shares to drive. 

Come to think of it. Maybe Native Advertising is just another word for Advertorials that people like and share?

Thoughts?