Contextual relevance rules when it comes to Mirriad’s in-content advertising solution
“What we do is contextual in-content advertising,” Mirriad CEO, Stephan Beringer, tells The Drum. “It’s sophisticated and comes down to getting the intersection between brand narrative and content narrative right. Basically, it needs to make sense and it needs to be enjoyable.”
This triangulation between brands, content creators and audiences, is at the core of Mirriad’s in-content solution. Ensuring brand safety, creative integrity and viewing experiences are protected, are essential to the success of any in-content advertising.
Preserving Creative Integrity
Creative integrity is deeply enshrined in Mirriad’s in-content advertising solution. That’s why our approval process means that no content can be embedded into without the consent and approval of the publishers. Mirriad’s Academy Award-winning background in Hollywood VFX—creating the special FX for Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan in 2011—means we’re able to deliver seamless, cinematic quality brand insertions that match the quality of the content they’re immersed into.
Even though we’re able to drive new revenue with existing content inventory, you won’t find a new iPhone popping up in an episode of Dad’s Army or Friends, because that technology didn’t exist at the time. Equally you won’t find us turning Gone with the Wind into a dystopian Blade Runner style ad-scape. Basically, any embed needs to make contextual sense within the content.
“We and our clients are convinced that advertising is more efficient when it is delivered in the right place and in the qualitative context,” say France Televisions when asked why they trust Mirriad with their content. “The quality of the user experience is at the core of our innovation strategy, and the augmented reality is revolutionising the product placement market.”
Ensuring Brand Safety
With limitless creativity at scale in content across the entertainment spectrum, whatever you can imagine for your brand we can deliver—as long as it doesn’t compromise the creative integrity of the original content.
Mirriad’s in-content solution is engineered to identify the most impactful and effective moments for brands to appear in content. Our AI-targeting capabilities, which include the ability to scan content for emotional register, are protected by almost 30 patents, meaning we can literally do what no one else can.
“When we wanted to promote our prime products in our LG Signature range to audiences in premium content, we chose Mirriad,” says Jong Hoon Kim, Head of Brand and Media at LG Electronics. “They executed our campaigns in a contextually relevant way and at scale. This will revolutionize advertising.”
We work closely with content creators and publishers to seamlessly embed brands into content and culture, connecting brands with people in a way that is contextually relevant, so it feels organic and native, helping it resonate. This lets brands connect with consumers in skip safe and brand safe environments, allowing advertisers to supercharge campaigns by creating previously untapped reach and relevance in the content their audiences are already choosing to watch.
Better Experiences for Audiences
In content advertising has to be seamless. If a placement doesn’t make contextual sense, and it’s jarring for audiences, then it simply doesn’t work. Since Mirriad technology works with and not against the content, it doesn’t disrupt the viewing experience for audiences and is part of Mirriad’s solution to ad fatigue, ad blocking and rampant ad avoidance in general.
The effectiveness of Mirriad’s in-content solution is evident in the consumer results, where 95% of audiences say they like the Mirriad format (Global averages Kantar and Toluna 2018-2019). Surveys conducted by Kantar show audiences preferred Mirriad’s in-content placements to spots in ad breaks, while 90% of audiences said the placements were a natural fit, and 81% said it made a brand more appealing. Only 9% said they would rather watch a TV ad spot—but we’re working on winning them over too.
The Future of Advertising
With audiences spending six hours per day in video on average (316 minutes in actual content, 19 minutes in video ads according to Thinkbox research), broadcast and video content itself represents the single biggest opportunity to reach them. Just 5% of that time is ad space, while an incredible 95% is actual content. Which raises the question: why fight for scraps in this 5% of overcrowded ad space, when Mirriad’s in-content solution has thousands of in-content opportunities in its inventory ready to embed brands into.
The increased attention and affinity created by Mirriad’s in-content advertising makes every aspect of a brands marketing more effective. By combining our ability to deliver incremental reach with our focus on driving attention and affinity, Mirriad enables entire media plans to work harder, allowing brands to scale in content across the entertainment spectrum (music, TV, Film, VOD etc.) and across platforms.
“What we do is contextual in-content advertising. It’s very sophisticated and comes down to getting the intersection between brand narrative and content narrative right. Basically, it needs to make sense and it needs to be enjoyable,” continues Mirriad CEO, Stephan Beringer, when addressing Mirriad’s responsibility to safe guard the relationship between audiences, brands and content creators.
“That’s what we do. And that’s what we’re good at. We will never, ever leave that path, because the north star is always the viewer.”