Native.ad was founded in 2013 and as per its name, its business is focused on native advertising, but with a model based on payment by results over payment by impressions.
Sector: Advertising
Based in: New York, Miami, Mexico, Madrid
Regions covered: LatAm, USA and Spain.
Founded by: Gorka Muñecas, Javier Lasa
Are they rocket scientists? Of course! They are achieving change in native advertising through great ideas.
Who are you major backers? Our major backers are 500startups, Miguel Valladares, Cisneros Group, Onza Venture Capital, Inception Capital, and key angel investors from the advertising industry.
What’s the track record? Native.ad is a startup founded in 2013 that specialises in native advertising. After two financing rounds from international funds, Native.ad already has offices in New York, Miami, Mexico, and Madrid. We are leaders in Spanish.
Currently we are in a funding round for expansion in the US, Brazil and LatAm, and to continue to develop new capabilities.
Native.ad has developed an ad-server that distributes branded content into the editorial spaces of online publishers with the same look and feel and the same user experience as the rest of the publisher’s articles and provides real time engagement and social amplification metrics.
In this way, brands can plan branded content campaigns by target and pay only when the content has interested a user, since the payment method is Cost Per Engagement (CPE).
We created Native.ad with the idea that brands can provide value and not just audience interruptions. We knew that the native advertising revolution could only be achieved by the hand of publishers. We are working very hard with publishers so that they trust our technology and assist them in creating a profitable as well as pleasing user experience.
What do they say? That we are a disruptive model ready to change the way native advertising is sold. The CPM/CPC model was designed for display, not for content. Our proprietary CPE model is becoming a new standard. Agencies love it because guarantees content consumption.
What does this mean? That we are breaking new ground with our monetisation model which advertisers and publishers feel is the future of native advertising.
What makes your company different to its competitors? Firstly, we think that the traditional advertising model should be based on results, not on impressions that no one may have noticed, or on clicks that may not go anywhere. Our model of payment by results (post per engagement) is the only model that shows true content consumption.
Secondly, our SSP (supply-side platform) technology solves the problem of scalability of native advertising. Our technology gives to the publisher the ability to manage all the native inventory. With our technology you can create a new position in minutes and you don’t need to know programming.
First clients: Ad networks like Media Response, Lisvon, Pulpo Media, Adsmovil; and editorial groups like EFE, Televisa, Caracol and Terra.
How could your company change the world? It’s already doing it. Internet users that access publishers that already use our native advertising SSP experience a less intrusive advertising experience with quality content that is able to stir emotion, inform, and bring value.
Who do you compete with? Our competitors are traditional ad agencies and publishers that think that disturbing the user is a valid option to then try to sell something to. We want the opposite. We want to tell good branded stories that create a positive feeling as the message is backed by a trusted publisher.
Who should be worried? All companies that think advertising must disturb and can’t be interesting to users should be worried, because we are demonstrating that our native advertising campaigns and our technology engage the audience.
If you could choose any investor globally who would it be? We would choose Jeff Bezos because he knows how to arrive at a market, change it completely and turn it into something better for brands and users. This completely aligns with Native.ad’s main goal.
If you could poach any member of staff from any company in the world who would it be? Meredith Levien, executive vice-president of advertising at The New York Times, because she has been able to make native advertising a profitable model for her newspaper with excellent quality for her readers. She knows how to create a perfect combination for all the members of the value chain – the advertiser, the publisher and the user, and she would for sure have a lot to add to Native.ad.
Thirdly, our content recommendation system is the only one specialised in Spanish. Our system selects the best content for the audience of each publisher.
