Paid ads that appear in your content stream, known as native ads, are designed to blur the line between editorial and advertising, incorporating relevant ads among content feeds. These sponsored ads are carefully placed to have less of a disruptive effect on the reader’s experience, unlike the much-maligned banner ad. Appearing more like supporting content than advertising, these ads are placed with consideration of compatibility with the content they are surrounded by.

IPG Media Lab, a testing group for emergent media and Sharethrough, a native advertising platform provider, joined forces to look at behavior and perceptions towards native ads, recently conducting research using eye-tracking technology and surveys of 4770 participants. Key findings of their research are presented in the graphic below.

Native ads were found to be more visually engaging, drive higher brand lift, are more likely to be shared and are consumed in the same way as the content within which they appear.