One minute, you\u2019re reading a dense political explainer about rumblings in Washington, or checking the weather in your zip code. Before you know it, you\u2019ve clicked on a headline about pool noodle hacks that will completely change your life.<\/p>\n
If you\u2019ve spent more than 15 minutes online, then this is probably a relatable experience. It\u2019s clickbait, otherwise known as \u201cmade for advertising\u201d inventory, a term used to describe websites that earn most of their eyeballs through sponsored placements tied to chumbox ads. Using content recommendation platforms like Taboola or Outbrain, these publishers place ads on legitimate news sources like USA Today, goading people with patently ridiculous headlines to click through to their sites.<\/p>\n
Once users click, they\u2019re taken to these sites that are rife with ads\u2014hence the \u201cmade for advertising\u201d moniker\u2014but lacking in substance (unless you consider \u201cVintage Photos of Women Getting Tattoos\u201d to be particularly informative).<\/p>\n
….Jill Casey is director of publisher platform partnerships at Xandr, which operates both a supply-side and demand-side platform, and can be found on the ads.txt of many of these sites. Case said it\u2019s not a supply-side platform\u2019s place to determine publisher quality.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe try to stay sort of agnostic to what people on the internet might like to read,\u201d she told Marketing Brew. \u201cBrands may not want to think that\u2019s where people are, but a lot of the internet is celebrity gossip and things that feel clickbaity…Consumers keep these sites alive, and brands want to be cost effective, so they go there.\u201d<\/p>\n
Others don\u2019t see it that way. Joshua Lowcock, EVP and chief digital officer at media agency UM, said, \u201cThe supply side of the ad tech ecosystem has been incredibly poor at vetting sites,\u201d which is why he thinks clickbait sites manage to stay afloat.<\/p>\n