But the weekly rant that seemed to resonate the most among media
and marketing types was his Aug. 3
takedown of so-called native advertising (which has racked up
1.9 million views to date -- a surprisingly high number for such an
inside-baseball topic). From his ad-free HBO perch, Oliver took on
those who would champion a form of advertising that, in his view,
mimics editorial content in a cynical attempt to fool
consumers.
And he named names. Sprinkled into the segment were sound bites,
cherry-picked from other media outlets, in which various execs
talked up native advertising. BuzzFeed founder-CEO Jonah Peretti,
Time Inc. CEO Joe Ripp, and New York Times Exec-VP of Advertising
Meredith Kopit Levien each made (unwitting) cameo appearances --
and all got brutally served by Oliver.
(If you haven't seen it, please stop reading and watch it
right
now.)
Later that week, Oliver was
interviewed live on stage by Cosmopolitan Editor-in-Chief
Joanna Coles at a Hearst company event, and he doubled down on his
outrage, calling native advertising a "trust parasite," and saying
of Ripp, who famously took down the wall between church and state
at Time Inc., "I guarantee that 50% of his staff is fucking
furious."
This much is clear: Oliver sees publishers' embrace of native
advertising as a betrayal. His argument seems to be that the ethics
behind native are inherently suspect.
OK, got it. But let's move beyond that for a moment, if we can
-- because I've got some other issues with native, thank
you very much:
NATIVE ADVERTISING BASICALLY FORCES BRANDS TO COMPETE IN
A MUCH LARGER ARENA.
Is your "traditional" ad -- say, a TV commercial -- so damn great
(so funny, so beautiful, so whatever) that it stands out vs. other
commercials? Hooray, congratulations, etc. Doing great TV spots is
incredibly hard, so good on you.
Now let me ask you this: Is your stealthy "native ad" so damn
great that it stands out vs. not only other ads, but among all the
other editorial content it's meant to mimic?
MOST BRANDS DON'T REALLY HAVE MUCH TO SAY BEYOND "BUY
THIS."
The conceit behind much native advertising is that every brand can
be a "storyteller" and should engage in quasi-editorial narrative
to subtly extol brand values (or whatnot) and increase consumer
"engagement." Fine. If that's true for your brand, more power to
you. Have at it. Godspeed.
But I still believe that, for most brands, the consumer calculus
is much, much simpler: I'm hungry -- thanks for reminding me
that you're delicious, Snickers! I've gotta fix the porch door --
so thanks for reminding me you exist, Home Depot! I'm on a tight
budget -- so thanks for telling me you're having a sale this
weekend, Kohl's!
I DON'T QUITE GET WHY BRANDS WANT TO SOUND LIKE
SOMETHING THEY'RE NOT.
I'm sure you already know that Advertising Age does some native
advertising. For instance, a recent native-ad post at AdAge.com,
titled "Breaking Down Big
Data to Build up Business," sponsored by big-data purveyor
Quantcast, focused on how Quantcast customer
Zendesk uses data; a video embedded in the post starred Zendesk
execs Michelle Carranza, Brad Morris and Bill Macaitis talking
about big data. (It was labeled, twice, as "Sponsor Content" --
including a big, impossible-to-miss mustard-colored banner atop the
post -- and ended with an also impossible-to-miss "About the
Sponsor" section. It used totally different design and typefaces,
too.)
If you've got a voice, speak in your voice. Or, you know, if
your customers believe in your product, maybe invite them to speak
on your behalf -- in their own voices.
That makes sense to me. That I get.
Going to, say, BuzzFeed and asking them to gin up yet another
listicle on your behalf -- something so BuzzFeed-esque and
non-advertise-y that some readers might not even realize a sponsor
was behind it?
That I don't quite get.
The more a brand dresses in the particular editorial drag of the
site it's advertising on, the less I get what the brand stands
for.
IF PUBLISHERS DON'T LIMIT NATIVE-ADVERTISING
OPPORTUNITIES, THEN NATIVE ADS JUST BECOME A DIFFERENT SORT OF
CLUTTER.
In other words, the break-through-the-clutter specialness of native
becomes less special when there's a glut of native.
But I suppose when that happens, someone will just rebrand
native advertising (which, back in the day, used to be labeled
"special advertising section" in print, you might remember).
We'll all agree to call it artisanal advertising or maybe
brand-to-table content, and we can have this debate all over
again.
Simon Dumenco is the "Media Guy" media columnist for
Advertising Age. Follow him on Twitter @simondumenco.
