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When investing in a business, one of the key factors to success is the creation of brand recognition – without it, a business would cease to exist. Enter, the marketing strategy. A large proportion of a marketing budget is often spent on advertising, namely, on the digital landscape. While planning the content and design of an advertisement, as well as ad placement and target audience, are essential considerations in the advertisement delivery process, there are a number of ad safeguarding techniques a business should be wary of. Although advertisements have great potential to help a business grow, the digital landscape also poses a greater risk, and, in the world of digital advertising, this takes the shape of malicious advertisements; malvertisements. We’ll take a look at just some of the things you should be aware of as a new business when it comes to implementing an advertisement strategy.
Auto Redirects
Most people have become accustomed to pop-up adverts and spammy notifications, but this doesn’t stop hackers across the internet from taking advantage of online users. One online phenomenon is auto redirect ads, which, via a misleading advertisement, infiltrate online websites and publications via unsecured ad slots and urge the viewer to take action, often with an impeding message that fills the screen. As a result, the viewers’ attention is directed elsewhere, meaning the business trying to attract attention, loses it, and the online digital publication loses reputation. As a business, it’s therefore worthwhile checking that your publishing partners for advertisements have measures in place to prevent such malicious advertisements from causing harm, which would often take the form of digital preventative software.
Ad Hijacking
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Unlike auto redirect advertisements which distract attention away from perfectly good adverts, ad hijacking is where someone, often an affiliate, poses as the brand themselves and implements a brand replica advertisement. Once displayed on a search engine or website, users fall into the trap of clicking on the ad which not only allows the hijacker to earn commission, but the brand to lose out on the trackability of such clicks and return on investment. As a brand, keeping an eye on conversions from affiliates that you’re not aware of is a good way to monitor and stop the problem. Though, most publishers will have software available that will prevent such ads from hijacking their website, which might mean the brand’s advertisement might not be displayed out of precaution if it has been flagged as a bad ad previously.
Why do advertisements need safeguarding?
The purpose of an online advertisement campaign is to gain attention and traction; this is exactly how a business is able to penetrate the digital market and form a sizable consumer base. Yet, auto redirect ads and ad hijackers have the capability to devastate this attempt. By deflecting attention away from a safe and reputable advertisement, malicious ads can bring harm to viewers by forcing them into a tricky situation. This not only causes harm to innocent viewers, but also diverts traffic away from perfectly good, branded advertising and in fact, harms the reputation of a brand and its publishing partner.
Designing and implementing an advertising strategy takes a lot of time and money. It’s for that reason that the safety of such adverts is paramount, otherwise, a business’ hard work could go to waste.
