Why Brands Are Pushing for Clean Advertising

It’s been almost a year since The Times revealed that some of the world’s best-known brands, such as San­dals and Mer­cedes, were unknow­ing­ly fund­ing extrem­ist groups and pornog­ra­phers when their adver­tise­ments appeared along­side ille­gal, vio­lent, or hate­ful con­tent. Since then, more brands have pulled spend on dig­i­tal adver­tis­ing and avoid cer­tain plat­forms. Accord­ing to recent research, this is a pri­ma­ry con­cern for many UK brands, with many “demand­ing increased indus­try reg­u­la­tions, bet­ter mea­sure­ment online and more trans­paren­cy to clean up the dig­i­tal adver­tis­ing ecosystem.”

In the past year, 83 per­cent of chief mar­ket­ing offi­cers (CMOs) at large UK brands became more anx­ious about brand safe­ty, and 95 per­cent made a sig­nif­i­cant over­haul of their dig­i­tal strate­gies. A lack of trust and trans­paren­cy has made brands more cau­tious when choos­ing which sup­pli­ers and agen­cies they’ll work with. In fact, 93 per­cent of respon­dents indi­cat­ed that they are re-exam­in­ing all their rela­tion­ships, and will choose to work with firms that can prove their track record on brand safe­ty and transparency.

The bright side in all this is that CMOs are tak­ing more con­trol over their dig­i­tal strat­e­gy, result­ing in high­er indus­try-wide stan­dards. By focussing on pro­vid­ing clean adver­tis­ing, brands can be assured that their ads aren’t fund­ing unwor­thy or dan­ger­ous caus­es, free­ing them up to direct their ener­gy into more impor­tant areas of their dig­i­tal strat­e­gy, such as improv­ing the cus­tomer expe­ri­ence by pro­vid­ing high-qual­i­ty non­in­tru­sive creative.

What about your brand? Have you been affect­ed by a brand safe­ty issue? Has this raised con­cerns about where your ads are placed? What are you doing to ensure you aren’t caught out?