Thread by @nandoodles

Last year, brand safety companies blocked $3 billion from reaching the news media.

Today, I'm live tweeting this brand safety company's summit to so we can look under the hood together 👇🏽

https://twitter.com/integralads/status/1316065925389578243

IAS claims that 60% consumers hold brands accountable for the environment in which their ads appear. There's an easy fix to this: block all low quality content. IAS doesn't do this bc they make more $$ by charging you per scan - even on the site they know are shitty.

I have no doubt seeing a brand appear in a "positive/neutral sentiment" environment helps, but what happens when your brand safety technology marks white nationalist websites as "positive/neutral"?

I actually 100% agree that messaging-context match matters!

It's just that IAS thinks Cardi B's WAP is negative sentiment and about "wireless technology" so I wouldn't recommend brand safety technology to get this job done.

IAS CMO says "We have the ability to go to the sentiment level and emotional classification level."

Well, their technology classifies Black Lives Matter reporting as negative, sensitive social issues & violence. Who is Black Lives Matter negative and sensitive for? ✋🏻

IAS CMO says “It’s not that positive sentiment is better. Marketing messages needs to be congruent to the circumstance and sentiment it’s being received…”

If true, this builds the case for direct media buys — not applying brand safety tech to programmatic.

IAS has massaged their messaging since early pandemic days when the CEO urged brands to avoid the negative & target "positive hero-related content."

CMO now says: “It’s not that you don’t want to advertise in tragic scenarios, you don’t want to reach them in that context.”

“We have really doubled down on our efforts to help us understand the sentiment of where our ads are running…” - John Marshall from @HP says they’re mindful and strategic about strategic away from COVID-related content.

I hope that doesn't mean the news??

John: "For a long time, we thought we could be 1-to-1 and there was a lot of tech that says they could do that. You end up serving an ad that’s completely irrelevant to someone. How do we make our creative more broadly appealing? Easy to understand? Clear & concise?" 💯

Sargi @HavasMedia: "I don’t know clients w/ overly restrictive keyword blacklists, even in heavily regulated pharma/medical industry. We’re leveraging finance & pharma for lessons.”

I can't live tweet anymore because I've been kicked out of the webinar lol