Making A Change With Blockchain: Revolutionizing The Advertising and Publishing Industry

in #adtech7 years ago (edited)

24 hours ago, I witnessed one of the most fascinating crowd funds in my life. Brave’s Basic Attention Token (BAT) ICO raised over $35million in just a few seconds! Amazing right? We are surely onto an astonishing time in the history of the financial sector.

Something More Fascinating


For many who follow my blog, you would observe that I write mostly on tech areas and their impact on human lives. From Biotech, Foodtech, 5G, Nanotech, Greentech and artificial intelligence, my articles delve into the fascinating ways technology has been touching various aspects of our lives.
For a couple of months now, I’ve been investing in a lot of cryptocurrencies (Who hasn’t been doing that these days? Lol :) ). Initially, it was just for the thrill of predicting cycles rightly but over time, I started spending more time researching various tokens use cases.
So for the next couple of articles, just like I did for AI, I will be doing a series of how the blockchain is transforming different sectors of the economy.

Creating A Better Deal For Content Creators – Revolutionizing The Advertising and Publishing Industry With The Blockchain


10 months ago, I wrote this article, The Truth is in danger! The Death of Investigative Journalism and What We Can Do About It. {Making Steemit A Journalism Hub}. In it, I looked at the current decay in the publishing industry and how Steemit can help revitalize it.

Since then, a number of blockchain apps have sprung up attempting to solve the age-long problem - capturing and rewarding attention in the right manner.

Battling A Hydra-Headed Giant


The advertising industry is a multi-billion dollar sector and it will be overly-enthusiastic to say blockchain tech is going to wipe it out instantly. Mobile Ads spending is increasing annually. Also, more money is being pumped into Social Media especially video ads.
However, blockchain apps can attempt to chip away small essential niches and slowly become the de-facto way to reward attention capturing.

Perhaps the biggest competitors of decentralized ad options are the “too big to fail” middlemen. Facebook, Google etc. These centralized organizations take a huge chunk of the global market spending so any attempt to negatively affect their earnings will be met by stiff competition.

She tells me that for every $1 an advertiser spends on digital, they get about $.44 of value

The quote above relays the current pathetic situation of the advertising industry. The content publishers who put in massive efforts to create engaging content are given peanuts. With the rise of adblocks, publishers literally have to beg to be able to fund their operational expenses. Content consumers are also not rewarded for the ‘massive eyeballs energy’ they spend every day.

There must be a way out. A solid way of creating a better user experience and ad model for content publishers.

Current Blockchain Offers – The Battle Testers

I saw a picture shared by @andrarchy a couple of weeks ago and in it were the leaders of blockchain startups currently championing the fight for better ad revenue model.

Content Producers and Consumers Should Be Paid Better


A key similarity between Steemit and Brave Browser idea is the belief that content producers and consumers should get the largest chunk of the pie.

Steemit makes it possible for content producers to be paid in Steem and SBD to reward them for their intellectual efforts. Also, Brave Browser not only makes it possible for advertisers to deal directly with Content producers, it makes it easier for content consumers to tip content producers for doing a good job. Steemit does this too through upvotes.
The two blockchain solutions also make it possible for consumers to be paid to watch ads.

Fighting Ad fraud and Creating Trust

One of the major reasons why centralized companies (ad networks) like Google and Facebook still rule the roost is the massive undertaking of risks they perform. It’s very risky for an advertiser to directly deal with a content publisher without fear of ad-fraud. Ad bots clicking and misrepresentation of traffic numbers are common misfortunate occurrences that make advertisers lose lots of money. Thus, the presence of “middlemen” with verifying database systems is highly necessary.

In 2016, ad fraud created by Internet bots cost advertisers $7.2 billion, up from $6.3 billion in 2015.

A number of blockchain companies are creating platforms that will help decentralize the whole process. Cutting out the middlemen and making a risk-free link between advertisers and producers.

Madhive uses a private blockchain to create a data aggregation database to connect advertisers and producers together. This database is secured using smart contracts and cryptographic keys thereby making it possible for advertisers to effectively track their ad points risk-free. This, in turn, helps mitigate ad fraud and helps build trust.
MetaX is also launching a private blockchain that tackles these problems –ad fraud and lack of trust.
They are releasing Adchain - a private blockchain that tracks encrypted ad impressions. These impressions are then validated by the advertisers and producers points upon factual confirmation.

Decentralization of Data Storage and Control

Imagine this scenario: You upload your data to Facebook and save it. A week after, you need the same data on Twitter and it gets difficult to move it in its original form. This is because each social network creates a walled garden over data put into its database making it impossible for others to access it except through provided APIs.

Think about it. Data created by you but owned and controlled by a corporation that leeches off it for massive profit.

Enter Userfeeds.io

Userfeeds believes that the next Facebook should be owned by you. It uses its' blockchain platform to encourage decentralized digital creation and ownership of value.
User controls their feeds (as against the current FB streams) and only allow others access their feeds when they provide an incentive. In order to receive the incentive, the blockchain verifies the hashes inputted into blockchain and acts basically as an escrow.

Fight against fake news


UserFeeds is also releasing an engine that will help public rank contents in a manner that will be used to combat fake news. It’s basically like Google only that its ranking system is publicly available for audit and incentives are earned only by users.

Conclusion


There is no doubt that the current advertising system is in shambles and there exist several beneficial uses cases of blockchain to solve this ache. However, blockchain based solutions are not without their own issues.
Apart from the attendant problems that come with an infant technology, in reality, the blockchain tech is not immune to security risks like hackers et al.
It is however believed that the decentralized nature of the cryptographically-made blockchain will help infuse a breath of fresh air into the decaying ad industry.


Inspirations: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5


Over to you:


Do you use ad blockers? And what's the most ads-infested website you've visited?

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Great post, as someone that does advertising for a living I watched this ICO myself. Ad blockers are huge now but of course there is plenty of ways around them and the main one being good content. I like their concept and Steem is already rewarding its publishers :)

This is a wonderful place to be, i love every of your post, it's so educative. Good job

Great piece as always from you @infovore! Blockchain tech has so many application that its simply astounding!

Thanks man. It's so cool to have you drop by. How are you doing these days?

Thanks for the great piece again, as you know, I'm definitely a fan by now!

Namaste :)

Yes, I know. And I'm always happy to see you drop by whenever I release a piece.

This is an extremely interesting view on paid advertising, especially from my experience and expertise when it comes to buying ALOT ad space with Facebook. Over the last 2 years I have spent over $800,000 USD advertising my products and sales funnels with Facebook.

Early on in my experience we would spend $2000-$5000 a day with FB, which yielded insane conversions. During the Holiday's we would rattle off $20,000-$30,000/day on our e-commerce stores selling various items of apparel.

Now, 2 years later those kind of conversions are unheard of. Facebook has drastically changed becoming extremely more competitive. Lead generation and conversion costs can get very high if you haven't adapted.

Awesome article, i would love to indulge more into this topic specifically with Facebook & Instagram

What an interesting comment is yours brother, as a student of online commerce, and digital marketing, is very rewarding ans instructive to know that Facebook isn´t so good anymore. I was thinking in starting my own page on Facebook to share content, focused on digital currencies economy ( and sorry for my english, i´m from Brazil), Blockchain technology, it´s possibilities and social impact, present and future, nanotechnology and Artificial Intelligence, since i feel that those 4 themes will dominate human society in the 21th century. With your experience, do you still think that is worth to invest my time and resources in facebook?

@rexgeorges just want to clarify that Facebook is absolutely still a catalyst in the industry of social media, and an absolute necessity if you really want to spread your message, knowledge, brand, product etc.

Don't be discouraged from my previous post that insight i provided is based on paid advertising with FB and knowing how to convert physical product into a profitable online campaign that pushes volume.

As for what you want to do you should absolutely start a page on Facebook and share your content and ideas. I will let you know though there are crucial steps you must take to build your page and by no means will you immediately find success. If you initially focus on delivering really good content, then your audience will find you but some money will need to be spent for this to happen.

Absolutely start by creating your page and name. If you want more insight on the other beginning steps please contact me! If this is a subject that people would like more knowledge and insight on I might start writing here on my blog some Beginner Guides to follow!

Hope this helps!

"I was thinking in starting my own page on Facebook to share content, focused on digital currencies economy" why dont you use steemit ?

hahahahahahahaha! Nice suggestion brother! I will do it also

Wow.. Thats lots of money on advertising. It's amazing how FB had a huge impact on the success of companies early on. Now the conversation rates /$ are poor.
Thanks for dropping by, man. Really enjoyed your insight on the issue. You should write about your experiences more often.

First off just want to say this has been my favorite article I've read since joining steemit and you got a hard follow from me @infovore!!! It's refreshing to see an outlook on this industry because a lot of people don't really understand this niche.

Early on when I first found success with FB ads there certain styles of ads I was running that contained viral content, and Facebook's algorithm couldn't really track the conversions like they do now. I'd have ads go so viral they would reach over 1,000,000M people and have engagement through the roof. Most ads had over 500,000 likes, etc.

Facebook's Ads Manager (which is their internal interface where you manage paid ads, etc) has now drastically changed. Don't get me wrong, it's still a super powerful source and my main revenue driver but to experience the changes and see it first hand with serious money on the line is eye opening.

You can still find ways for cheap conversions and be super lucrative, but need to know what you're doing. You need to watch your ads like a hawk because at the end of the day you set the budget and FACEBOOK technically can spend that budget however they want once your ad is approved.

Blockchain can be integrated into any sphere of life and vice versa. Now it's like a historical choice of man - to be honest and transparent about your work without any capacity to drive out of track

Hhmn.. I like this perspective. Thanks for dropping by.

One massive complaint around the BAT is that 99% of tokens sold during the ICO belong long to less than 200 unique wallets. They may have generated a lot of money, but it seems heavily monopolized already.
https://www.reddit.com/r/BATProject/comments/6euenv/explain_to_me_how_this_token_even_has_a_future/

I agree with you. I remember prepping for days on how to get a share only to be disappointed when the big boys swoop in.
I think it's an interesting idea and it will cool to see how it plays out. There were a lotta doubters of Steem during the pre-july 2016 days too

That was a wonderful read.
Facebook advertising can be very expensive trying to discover your audience, how advanced are these new innovations at delivering content to the right people without the 'facebook pixel' approach disseminating the passive information they gather on everyone ?

I do use an ad blocker but I am selective about its use. I have found that trying to use eBay has become so slow while it loads their adverts that I recently started using an adblocker. Incidentally I am sick of eBay's email spamming as well.

Thanks for the compliment.
You're right. One needs to constantly test various conversion tips in order to find the sweet spot with FB ads. One need to remember that the massive success FB enjoys is a culmination of years of siloing hard-to-find-elsewhere data of Internet users.

I do believe with time blockchain companies will evolve truly decentralized options of reaching out to potential consumers.

@infovore WoW... Excellent post !! Have to go to work now, but will come back to this post to fully absorb all of the insights & research You've compiled into this one post. Will also go back and read Your previous posts, especially the ones You suggested in this post.

UpVoted, ReSteemed & Following... Thanks Again !!

Have a Great Weekend !!

Thanks. Would love to get your feedback when you do so. Hope you had a great time at work? And do have a splendid weekend too.

I work with a few companies that are simply sick of Facebook and Google advertising. The fees continue to rise while the behind the scenes algorithms are constantly tweaked so as to force the advertiser to pay more to reach the same people they did previously. It is maddening and it is sad at the same time.

Maddening that it is allowed to happen but these are walled gardens, so to speak. They control, 100%, what happens within their little sliver of the overall Internet.

Sad that people continue to pay more in hopes of reaching real people. Has anyone looked into the ratio of fake Twitter and Facebook accounts versus real people? It is rather interesting. Same thing for Google. You can be charged full price per click whether that click was a mistake on the part of the visitor or not. This is particularly sad in the fact that when it is obvious the click was a mistake (less than a second or two on the site, or the page didn't finish loading) you lose that money and Google/Facebook, etc giggle all the way to the bank.

At least with Blockchain technology, there are ways to verify everything. Google and Facebook and the others don't like that as it removes their curtain of mystery.

Awesome post, thanks for excellent work! For the question, I always use some type of ad blocker simply because nowadays most current sites like Facebook and YouTube and general browsing. YouTube is specialy annoying since most of the ads are on the middle of the video we are seeing. I get that the content creator's need it for their income but I think there is other ways to do that without being so aggressive with the advertising. Keep up with the good posts I followed :)

Thanks for the follow. I agree with the YT. Sadly, many content creators earn paltry amounts of money than the views they bring onto the platform,

Exactly but there is another ways of making their earned money like the affiliate market where they get some discounts for the buyer's and earn a little % of the sale. And that is way better then an annoying ad on the middle of your video or stuff like that.

advertisement is getting more aggressive again. i developed a routine on twitter to block every ad, even if i might be interested...

i cant tell you how much i've seen this "American Gods" ad while watching videos.
it's really anoying