IAB Europe launches “Brand Builders”, suite of advertising formats

Cristina Blanaru Creativity, Digital & Media

Interactive Advertising Bureau Europe (IAB Europe) launched Brand Builders, suite of six recommended brand advertising formats which offers a new branding environment to advertisers.

In order to understand the current advertising formats landscape and diversity of the European market IAB Europe conducted a “Brand Advertising Formats Survey” which gathered the opinion of over 300 senior publishers, agencies and networks across Europe. The survey highlighted both currently popular formats and those predicted to have a bright future. It also identified formats being sought out by the demand side in contrast to those available from the supply side. This insight has enabled IAB Europe to create a best-of-breed suite of advertising formats – the Brand Builders.

Both static and dynamic (expandable) brand advertising formats are included in the suite to offer diversity to brand advertisers in their campaigns:

Static Advertising Formats:

1.         300×600 – Halfpage (static) (IAB US Rising Star dimension)
2.         728×90 + 160×600 – Wallpaper (static)
3.         728×410 – Landscape (static, new dimension, 16:9 compatible)

Dynamic Advertising Formats:

4.         300×250 → 728×410 Expandable Rectangle (float/slide 16:9)
5.         728×90   → 728×410 Expandable Leaderboard (float/slide,16:9)
6.         160×600 → 300×600 Expandable Skyscraper (float/slide)

The formats within the Brand Builders suite are blank canvases, the only prescriptive detail is the pixel dimension and the rest is to be decided on by the advertiser/ creative agency. Similar sized formats with more prescriptive detail such as the IAB Rising Stars and the BVDW Premium Ad Package can be accommodated within IAB Europe Brand Advertising Framework.

A key feature of the suite is that it offers a 16:9 TV compatible dimension (x410) with the aim of making brand advertising across TV and digital easier. By providing a 16:9 TV compatible dimension the suite is able to support in-page video advertising. By fuelling the increase of high value, high quality inventory for large scale brand advertisers, IAB Europe also envisages an increase in programmatic trading of premium digital advertising

Karim Attia,

CEO nugg.ad & Chairman of the Brand Advertising Committee.

The Brand Builders are the first phase of the IAB Europe Brand Advertising Frameworkwhich has been driven by the Brand Advertising Committee and its Ad Formats Task Force, a multi-stakeholder group with global, regional and local input. The second phase will see detailed formats, including further of the IAB Rising Stars, being accommodated within the Framework at Interact 2014, the essential meeting place where the whole European digital advertising ecosystem gathers, in Paris on 20-21 May

The Ad Formats Task Force’s next steps will focus on mobile in-page advertising formats and in-stream formats.

The Brand Advertising Committee’s other focus is to learn about measurements for Metrics and KPIs that would help to drive long term brand investment into digital media. Its Metrics and KPIs Task Force is working to identify Metrics and KPIs across Europe which are compatible with global initiatives. This also forms part of the Brand Advertising Framework. A Metrics and KPIs Survey is currently in field and we are calling for European stakeholders to complete this survey prior to the publication of findings at Interact 2014

The IAB Europe Brand Advertising Formats Survey was conducted across agencies, publishers, ad networks and trade associations during 2013 asking about usage and trends in ad formats for branding campaigns on PC, tablet and mobile.The Survey covered 23 European markets – Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, UK – and respondents with a pan-European and Global remit.

The IAB Europe Brand Advertising Committee is a multi-stakeholder group with global, regional and local input. The following IABs are represented : INAMA (Croatia), Danske Media, BVDW (IAB Germany), IAB Italy, INMA (Norway), IAB Poland and IAB UK. The following IAB Europe member companies are represented : ABInBev, Aegis Media, AGOF, AppNexus, Audience Science, BBC, CNN, comScore, Gemius, Goldbach Audience, IPG Mediabrands, MEC, Microsoft, Millward Brown, Mindshare, News Corporation, Nielsen, nugg.ad, Orange, Performics, Publicitas, The Exchange Lab, United Internet Media, Yahoo!.

IAB Europe is the voice of digital business. Its mission is to protect, prove, promote and professionalise Europe’s online advertising, media, market research and analytics industries. Together with its members – companies and national trade associations – IAB Europe represents over 5,500 organisations. The member countries are: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey and United Kingdom.