Leading native advertising platform Outbrain revealed its latest enhancements earlier this week, via its first Outbrain Unveil online event.
Outbrain’s co-CEOs, Yaron Galai and David Kostman, opened the 45-minute prerecorded presentation, offering their thoughts on the unprecedented events of 2020.
Galai said: “2020 was like a technology time machine. Trends that we saw developing slowly through the years became a reality almost overnight. Working, learning, gaming, shopping, dating, and socialising all moved online, all across the world. That had a massive impact on businesses and how they sell, market and grow.”
Kostman commented: “2020 also highlighted the need for free and open press, which is something we’ve always cared about at outbrain. With the crazy speed of meaningful global events, we have become even more reliant on trustworthy publishers in new sources. Facts matter more than ever. We’ve seen traffic on trustworthy publisher sites surging; a 60% increase in pageviews during the height of the pandemic. Wherever the audience goes, advertisers are sure to follow.
“Outbrain has always been committed to the open web and to helping publishers engage their audience and grow revenues. Over the past 14 years over growing the business, we’ve created an advertising alternative to Google and Facebook that actually supports publishers’ journalism rather than undermines it.”
The 2021 Product Preview section introduced viewers to a trio of new features for the Outbrain platform, including new interactive ad experiences, enhanced auto-optimization tools and ‘Native Awareness+’, an new native ad format that significantly increases viewer engagement.
Digiday executives Jim Cooper and David Amrani also joined the event to discuss the current state of the digital advertising industry and the ad sector’s impressive and agile response to the disruption caused by Covid-19 restrictions. Outbrain’s Salma Echahly closed things off with a short session on the increased importance of social purpose for brands and the concept of ‘advertising for good’.
You can watch the full Outbrain Unveil event here.
