The next time you check your Instagram feed (I know you have your phone in your hands, go ahead and check it), notice how many ads there are.
Couldn’t find any?
Try looking a little closer and you’re bound to come across a native ad or two.
These ads – cleverly designed to look similar to the organic content a user sees – are becoming increasingly popular among brands, and for good reason: with a click-through rate of 1%, they perform better than of non-native ads, which come in at around .15%.
Given their strong performance, the natural question is how best to harness them.
Let’s look at how brands can make the most of native ads.
Why Go Native?
Many brands turn to native ads as a way to reach millennials who use ad-blocking technology and are averse to traditional ad content.
Going native allows brands to bypass those barriers. Instead of seeing an advertisement, users see content that doesn’t interrupt their viewing experience.
Instantly Share with Ease
As an advertiser, the idea of a targeted audience promoting your ads may seem like a dream, but it’s something that’s possible with the help of native ads.
Although getting an audience to share your content is no easy feat, native ads make the process much easier by providing content that’s more likely to resonate with a particular audience.
And with 32% of users describing native ads as “an ad I would share with a friend or family member” – compared with 19% for normal display ads – it’s clear how native ads can raise brand awareness in a relatively organic way.
An Un-Interruptive Experience
Scrolling through your Facebook feed for three minutes, you’re likely to come across a number of ads. And even if you noticed them, you’re most likely part of the 85% of internet users that don’t care.
Social media is beneficial to brands in that it provides a layout that was designed for a constant stream of new content.
Slip in a picture of a 20% off discount sale that links back to your home profile, and users probably won’t have an issue.
More Likely to Engage
Brands should understand that when advertising on social media, there is so much competition for consumers’ attention that bland banner ads won’t cut it.
Making the switch to a strategy that includes native ads provides brands with a 9% higher brand lift and 18% higher purchase intent. This reflects how native ads not only get people to your site, but prompt them to make a purchase while they’re on it.
With that said, it’s important that brands understand that the only way they can take advantage of higher user engagement is by providing content that is relevant, entertaining, and useful.
In other words, don’t go around using click-bait types of ads that ultimately don’t deliver when users do agree to visit your site.
When advertising on social media, brands should make sure to pair their native ads with content that is authentic and provides value.
If not, then users will associate the brand as being untrustworthy and a waste of time.
Grow Followers
When you share a promoted tweet, people are going to retweet, favorite and follow your account as a result, growing your followers and audience for even more views on your next post.
When it comes to social media marketing, brands should keep in mind that the long-game is always more profitable than the short-game. By that I mean that having someone become a loyal fan of your content is better than them clicking on an ad one time only to never visit again.
Let’s wrap it all Up
If brands haven’t already hopped on the native ad train, then they should do so quickly. Social Media is growing more and more prominent by the day, and social media marketing is taking a bigger chunk out of marketing budgets.
Native ads gives brands the opportunity to market to their target audience in a way that leaves them much more receptive to their message.
As long as brands make sure to connect their ads with relevant, substantive content, they will see the lasting benefits to their ROI.
