Forbes offering money-back guarantee for native ads

Forbes announced Monday a money-back guarantee to its native ad product BrandVoice, writes Lucia Moses of Digiday.

Moses writes, “Advertisers have to spend $250,000 in native plus display over 60 days (up from the minimum BrandVoice package of $150,000). If they don’t get a lift in at least one of four metrics (awareness, favorability, recall, purchase intent), they get their money back. The advertiser gets to pick the vendor to measure the campaign’s impact.

“Of course, the money-back guarantee shtick is marketing. Forbes seems to know how to control the risk of its guarantees. It introduced its original display ad guarantee in 2002 to address doubts about the effectiveness of display ads. It ran with more 100 campaigns over several years until Forbes stopped offering it around 2010. Mark Howard, Forbes’ chief revenue officer, said Forbes only had to issue one refund, to a financial advertiser. It was in 2008, at the height of the financial meltdown.

“Howard said the guarantee was a response to the market’s desire for accountability as well as the increased competition. Other publishers charge for native based on views (and at least one, the Daily Mail, guarantees views), and there have been performance guarantees on print ads, but Forbes believes its promise is a first for native.”

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