Photo credit: Max Bender via Unsplash
The industry association ThinkNewsBrands fights against so-called myths about brand safety and advertising with news.
The organization published a multi-study study showing that hard news advertising has no negative impact on a number of performance and brand perception metrics.
Christian Juhl, the former global CEO of GroupMrecently expressed concerns about the reporting in a statement to the US House of Representatives investigative committee.
The press has traditionally been the most important advertiser, but trust in news sites has reached an all-time low, he said.
“Brands are now generally rejecting advertising on news and political websites,” he said.
Juhl claimed Less than 5% of GroupM clients’ total advertising investment goes to news and he claimed that this is a consistent figure across the industry.
“And only 1.28% of our clients’ advertising spend goes to online news sites,” he said.
“This is not just because brands prefer to avoid advertising next to content related to war, scandal and political division. It is also because in these environments they do not have to take advertising risks to reach their entire audience and that alternatives to news – such as sports and entertainment – generally offer better metrics, formats and opportunities,” he said.
However, ThinkNewsBrands believes that by avoiding news, advertisers are losing a significant amount of return on investment and profit growth.
The report debunks the myth of “brand suitability,” which states that placing ads in news has a negative impact on advertising effectiveness and brand perception.
“The thinking around brand suitability is completely out of control and not based on facts,” said ThinkNewsBrands CEO Vanessa Lyons,
“The evidence strongly contradicts the assumption that brands suffer from being placed in news content. The reality is just the opposite.”
The report highlights a study by NASDAQ-listed company Stagwell of 50,000 adults that shows no negative impact of advertising in “hard news.”
The study found that there was no discernible difference in purchase intent, popularity or brand perception when ads were placed next to stories about conflict, inflation, politics or crime compared to ads next to sports or entertainment.
Across eight key brand metrics, including “purchase intent,” “trustworthiness,” and “right values,” the average difference in perception value between “hard” and “soft” news was 1.6 percent.
The ThinkNewsBrands report also includes research from Peter Field showing that advertisers who avoid news lose market share, pricing power (perception of quality) and profit growth.
According to the Field study, brands that advertised on news platforms from 2018 to 2022 achieved 88% higher profit and market share growth than brands that did not.
Lyons said the global studies were supported by Australian data, including ThinkNewsBrands’ own effectiveness research.
“Australian market research shows that news media increases campaign effectiveness and brand recall because it generates high levels of trust, focus and engagement, which transfers to advertising,” she said.
“The evidence is clear. Not only are some advertisers avoiding messages that are based on a myth, they are also significantly limiting the effectiveness of their campaigns.”
Lyons said brand suitability concerns should be addressed elsewhere because social media contains harmful content and misinformation that can actually damage brand perception.
“The irony is that brand suitability measures seem to be the preserve of the news, even though everyone knows that social media is full of torrents of harmful content and misinformation that can actually damage a brand,” she said.
Lyons cited a study by Integral Ad Science that found 70% of Australians would be unlikely to purchase a product or service that advertised unsafe content.
“For the sake of their brands, the marketing and media communities need to rethink their thinking and practices around brand suitability. We urge the industry to take a hard look at this data and invest more in messaging, not less,” she said.
A slide from the ThinkNewsBrands study:
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