At the bottom of the main articles on most UK Tabloid websites, you’ll often see links to other articles, with spammy sounding names. That’s likely paid placements from Taboola or Outbrain.
However click-baity the headlines are, they clearly work. Those two companies are set to merge to create a $2bn a year conglomerate.
However, the quality of ads hasn’t gone unnoticed by some.
Raju Narisetti is the former CEO of Gizmodo Media Group, and now heads up a programme at Columbia University, and he’s not a fan of the current adverts.
“Most publishers that have resorted to Taboola and Outbrain have really undermined their brands because the quality of the ads is so despicable. They’ve sold their trust and the credibility of their brands by putting those modules all over their websites,” Narisetti
Is this finally an opportunity to buy media that doesn’t come with a ‘Big Blue Brother’ gatekeeper who decides what you can and can’t say in your advert?
As long as the publishers continue to accept the advertising dollars, then it;s certainly possible.
“We’re very small and we have a huge mission of getting advertisers a chance to have an alternative to the three monopolies [Google, Facebook &Amazon].”
Adam Singolda, CEO of Outbrain
Is this an opportunity to secure double the amount of attention using just one platform? Or have we all been fooled into cheering a monopoly play by two ‘runners up’ in the media vendor space?
Experts agree that only time will tell.