Lessons advertisers can learn from oyster season

31st July marks the start of oyster season in the UK, and it is said that if you eat this delicacy on the day, then you'll make plenty of money the rest of the year. Widely recognised as the epitome of refined seafood, oysters are also a healthful food which is low in calories and high in micronutrients such as vitamin B12.

You might be wondering why an ad tech blog is writing about oysters. Well, just as oyster aficionados understand the importance of quality and its impact on the eating experience (not all oysters are made equal), advertisers should also be paying very close attention to the quality of their site lists in order to ensure that their campaign outcomes actually impact key business goals.

Here are some lessons that advertisers can learn from oyster season.

Provenance and premium inventory

Oysters are all about “provenance” – where they are from – because the very essence of an oyster reflects the place in which it was grown. The shape, the colours of the shell, and even the colour of the flesh are influenced by where and how an oyster is grown. Most importantly, an oyster will take on the character of the waters in which it was grown and reflect it in the complexity of flavours that we enjoy as we eat them.

Similarly, the quality of your ad inventory determines the success of your campaign. In display advertising, premium inventory is characterised by reputable publishers, sites that offer good user experiences and an audience that aligns with your campaign. Just as you wouldn’t buy oysters from an untrusted source, advertisers shouldn't be buying ad space on low-quality sites.

Without running audits on your site list, there's a high probability that a percentage of domains on your list consist of made-for-advertising (MFA) sites. These sites undermine the integrity and effectiveness of your campaigns by prioritising ad revenue over user experience and content quality which can lead to your brand being associated with low-quality or irrelevant content, harming your brand's reputation. To make matters worse, these sites are becoming more prevalent with the rise of AI which enables companies to effortlessly create thousands of sites filled with low-quality content.

Key takeaway: you need a granular understanding of the content and placements within which your media is served to ensure good campaign outcomes.

The consequences of poor quality

We don't need to tell you what happens when you consume low-quality oysters – at best, you've just dropped a lot of money on a poor dining experience and worst, you're in for a nasty case of food poisoning. In display advertising, poor-quality inventory can result in:

1. Reduced ad performance: Low-quality inventory often results in poor visibility and engagement, leading to lower conversion rates and affects potential brand awareness. This diminishes the overall performance of the campaign.
2. Poor user experience: Running campaigns on low-quality inventory often results in disruptive ad placements and high ad density environments - which appear intrusive or irrelevant to users, leading to negative user experiences. This can result in ad fatigue, further reducing ad effectiveness.
3. Misleading success metrics: The lack of reliable and transparent metrics from low-quality inventory makes it challenging to measure campaign success accurately. For example, made-for-advertising (MFA) sites often produce a lot of clicks, but this could be due to forced clicks and disruptive experiences. On the flip side, quality inventory produces engagement which is far more accurate due to intentional user engagement

Key takeaway: without a high-quality site list, you run the risk of wasted ad spend. In a time when budgets are reduced and you're told to do more with less, it's crucial to review your site lists.

Sustainability matters

Sustainable practices ensure that oyster populations remain healthy and that future seasons can continue to provide high-quality seafood. This involves careful monitoring and responsible harvesting.

Display advertising contributes to notable environmental consumption and carbon emissions through data centres, servers, and devices used to deliver and view ads. Considering that 41% of overall ad spend goes to waste, it is crucial for advertisers to support sustainability efforts by making more productive and non-wasteful media buys by running campaigns on high-quality inventory. By adopting sustainable practices, the ad tech industry can reduce its carbon footprint and help combat climate change. Further, consumers are increasingly aware of and concerned about environmental issues. Brands that demonstrate a commitment to sustainability can enhance their reputation and build stronger relationships with environmentally conscious consumers.

Key takeaway: advertisers must prioritise sustainability in their media buying strategies and opt for environmentally conscious platforms and vendors.

Tools & techniques

Tools like freshness indicators and trusted certifications help buyers ensure they’re getting top-quality oysters. These are developed through a combination of scientific research, regulatory standards, industry best practices, and technological advancements.

In display advertising however, developing a top-quality site list is significantly trickier as there are no industry standard "indicators". The problem is that quality is ultimately a subjective decision and highly dependent on human judgement. This results in issues such as:

1. No one can explain why certain sites are on the list, and not others
2. These lists can be hard to change due to internal bureaucracies
3. Many sites on the list no longer exist, or may have changed significantly since the initial assessment
4. It is difficult to balance quality and campaign objectives (which are frequently DSP performance metrics like 'Viewability' and 'CTR')
5. Campaigns end up lacking insights on how quality leads to positive business outcomes, and advertisers aren't able to prioritise or consider how they can improve it

Advertisers can utilise ad tech tools like PIQ (Picnic Inventory Quality) to combat low-quality site lists and ensure that digital advertising reaches the intended audience through high-quality inventory. PIQ is a data platform that measures media quality across the web that enables advertisers to make more informed decisions about the media they are buying. The platform also surfaces opportunities to improve the overall quality of a brand’s campaign without impacting budget or performance.

Key takeaway: take subjectivity out of the equation and use technology to determine a high-quality site list.
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Interested in improving your site list? Reach out for a free PIQ audit.