ISBA - The Voice of British Advertisers

Opinion: The Digital Standards Trading Group will be welcomed

Tue, 7 Feb 2012

Bob Wootton, director of advertising & media, ISBA

ISBA welcomes and is very happy to be part of the Digital Trading Standards Group (DTSG) initiative convened and facilitated by recognised industry standards body ABC.

Online is becoming an ever more important channel for advertisers. With the emergence of agency trading desks, demand- and supply-side platforms, ad exchanges and real-time operators within the digital trading space, it is also becoming ever more complex.

With billions, even trillions, of transactions taking place at microsecond speed as individual impressions are traded and served, the opportunity for inappropriate ad placement spirals.

Yet as some advertisers have found to their regret and cost, the spark of a single inappropriate placement can ignite a sizeable PR firestorm. Not surprising, therefore, that the subject commands attention at ISBA’s Digital Action Group, the advertisers’ leadership group in the online space.
 
IASH was set up in 2006 as a cross-industry response to early inappropriate placements. It has worked well overall and has grown its membership and canvass substantially, but more needs to be done in response to growing complexity, scale and pace.
 
In this environment, it might be foolish to promise 100% safety of online ad placement, but if the online industry wants to maintain advertisers’ trust and enjoy their custom, it has a self-evident responsibility to reduce their risk to as close as is practically possible to zero.

Getting all the main players around the table rapidly to agree on standards and best practice has got to be the right way forwards.

http://www.nma.co.uk/opinion/industry-opinion/opinion-the-digital-standards-trading-group-will-be-welcomed/3033867.article