Bidtellect’s inaugural quarterly report analyzes our platform activity in order to provide advertisers with important insights and trends in the Native Advertising industry. Bidtellect’s platform processes over 5 billion Native auctions daily across 6.5 million distinctly targetable placements, and this number continues to grow quarter over quarter. We collect data from the start of an auction through post-click consumer activity including but not limited to the metrics captured in this report.
What’s the difference between Affiliate Marketing and Brand Partnerships?
Bidtellect’s Quarterly Native Report Q3 2016: Engagement Is Key To Your Native Advertising Success
1. 1
THE LEADING
NATIVE PLATFORM
B U I L T F O R C O N T E N T M A R K E T I N G . B U I L T F O R R E S U L T S .
NICOLE KAPNER | Sr. Manager of Marketing and Communications
2. 2
Bidtellect Quarterly
Report Q3 2016
Engagement Is Key To Your Native
Advertising Success
As marketers wade deeper into Native
Advertising, they need to have a better
understanding of how to drive the best results
and engagement across devices, formats,
success metrics and content categories.
3. 3
Introduction
Bidtellect’s Quarterly Native Report was created to provide advertisers with important insights and trends in the
Native Advertising industry. Bidtellect’s platform processes over 5 billion Native auctions daily across 6.5 million
distinctly targetable placements, and this number continues to grow quarter over quarter. We collect data from
the start of an auction through post-click consumer activity including but not limited to the metrics captured in
this report.
4. 4
Native is Cross-Device
CTRs were an average of 200%
higher on mobile than desktop in
Q1-Q3 2016, showing that
consumers are actively clicking on
content on mobile devices. But
what actions do they take once
they are there?
Mobile CTR Desktop CTR Comparison
Q1 Q2 Q3
165% Higher CTR on
Mobile than Desktop
220% Higher CTR on
Mobile than Desktop
220% Higher CTR on
Mobile than Desktop
5. 5
Desktop is Winning Engagement
Although CTRs were higher on
mobile than desktop, mobile is
not where the deeper
engagement is happening. Post-
click engagement is significantly
greater on desktop than mobile.
On average in 2016 year-to-date,
page views were 130% higher on
desktop than mobile, and bounce
rates were 37% lower on desktop
than mobile.
Bounce Rate Desktop Comparison
Q1 Q2 Q3
MobilePage Views
130% More Pageviews
(Desktop vs. Mobile)
33% Lower Bounce Rate
(Desktop vs. Mobile)
160% More Pageviews
(Desktop vs. Mobile)
33% Lower Bounce Rate
(Desktop vs. Mobile)
110% More Pageviews
(Desktop vs. Mobile)
45% Lower Bounce Rate
(Desktop vs. Mobile)
6. 6
Marketers Primary Native
Campaign Objectives
Demand for Native has increased
so rapidly and marketers are using
the more common and less
sophisticated metrics such as CTR
to measure campaign success.
When using new formats,
marketers tend to stick with what
they know, but as Native
continues to grow, Bidtellect
believes that post-engagement
metrics will become more widely
adopted.
CTR
Q1
Q2
Q3
Conversions Engagement
54%
60%
78%
11%
13%
13%
35%
27%
15%
7. 7
Different Formats Generate
Different Levels of Engagement
In-feed placements generate
higher page views and lower
bounce rates than the In-Ad and
Recommendation Widget units.
These are the most premium
Native unit driving the highest
consumer engagement. On
average in 2016 year-to-date, In-
feed page views were 147%
higher than in-Ad and 163%
higher than RW, In-feed bounce
rates were 19% lower than In-Ad
and 30% lower RW.
In-Ad
In-Feed
Recommendation Widget
In-Feed Comparison
Q1
Page Views Per Visit Bounce Rate
In-Feed Performed
160% Better
In-Feed Performed
170% Better
In-Feed Was
5% Lower
In-Feed Was
27% Lower
Q2
Page Views Per Visit Bounce Rate
In-Feed Performed
130% Better
In-Feed Performed
170% Better
In-Feed Was
22% Lower
In-Feed Was
22% Lower
Q1
Page Views Per Visit Bounce Rate
In-Feed Performed
150% Better
In-Feed Performed
150% Better
In-Feed was
40% Worse
In-Feed was
30% Lower
8. 8
Travel
How Are Consumers Engaging
Across Publisher Categories?
As people are planning their
winter and holiday vacations they
were actively engaging with travel
based content in Q3. Law, Gov’t &
Politics and News based content
were also highly engaged with in
Q3, correlating with the
Presidential Election in November.
Engagement score is expressed
through a simple score, 0-10.
Engagement Score*
9.6
Careers 9.4
News 9.2
Business 9.1
Law Gov’t & Politics 9.1
Personal Finance 9.1
Home & Garden 9.0
9. 9
Key Takeaways
Post-Click
Engagement Metrics
For marketers trying to reach
their audiences on mobile
devices, they need to
transition away from CTR as
a success metric, and toward
post-click engagement
metrics. Consumers are
clicking on content on their
mobile devices, but are less
likely to engage further on
mobile than desktop. For
marketers to get the most
out of their cross-device
content marketing and
Native advertising strategies,
they need to optimize
against these post-
engagement metrics.
In-Feed
Placements
In-Feed placements drive
the most consumer
engagement compared to In-
Ad and Recommendation
Widgets. All three formats
are extremely valuable, but
including In-Feed
placements in your Native
plans will ultimately drive
the best results with
consumers.
Plan
Ahead
Creating and distributing
timely content to your
consumers will produce the
highest levels of
engagement. Don’t wait for
the days or week before an
event, reach them in the
weeks and months leading
up so they are fully
educated.
Post Engagement
Metrics
Post-engagement metrics,
across devices and formats,
will become increasingly
critical for marketers as they
seek more meaningful ways
to determine how
consumers are interacting
with their content.
10. 10
*What is Bidtellect’s Proprietary Metric Engagement Score?
Bidtellect’s Engagement Score is the industry’s only post-click engagement metric, designed to determine how
engaging a given piece of content is. The proprietary algorithm tracks, measures and optimizes against
pageviews, time on site, bounce rate and user sessions.
Pageviews, Time on Site, Bounce Rate and User Sessions Generate Engagement Score
About Bidtellect
Bidtellect is the leading paid content distribution platform providing marketers with one platform to execute Native campaigns across all formats
and devices including text, imagery and video. Marketers leverage Bidtellect’s proprietary real-time optimization algorithms, first- and third-
party data targeting, advanced KPI optimization and a team of industry experts, to drive real results for paid content distribution campaigns to
deliver smart advertising. Bidtellect delivers access to the world's most expansive Native ecosystem of premium placements in order to achieve
unparalleled scale.
The company is headquartered in Delray Beach, Florida and was launched in 2013 by the digital media industry’s most successful ad tech
pioneers.