Trade groups band together to define ‘made-for-advertising’ sites

Four ad trade groups have joined forces to help advertisers better identify made-for-advertising sites.

The Association for National Advertisers, 4A’s, World Federation of Advertisers, and Incorporated Society of British Advertisers collaborated to provide an industry-wide definition of MFA sites, which, broadly speaking, rake in marketing dollars by luring in audience traffic through clickbait content. Their joint effort follows a recent ANA report that found MFA sites account for 21% of impressions and 15% of ad spend.

MFA sites pay for traffic, typically via Taboola chumboxes or through paid ads on social platforms. In other words, they have no organic audience to speak of. According to the aforementioned industry trade groups, this “high percentage of paid traffic sourcing” is one way to spot an MFA site. Other characteristics include a “high ad-to-content ratio,” as well as ads that play automatically or refresh at a rapid pace.

Visitors who find themselves on MFA sites will usually encounter generic content; the information is often old, low-quality, or non-editorial, per the coalition. The final nail in the coffin marketers should look for when evaluating a potential MFA site is low-quality website design.

Bill Duggan, group EVP at the ANA, said these sites have only recently been scrutinized. They’ve “supposedly been around forever, but nobody has ever paid any attention to them,” he told us.

“I was at ad agencies for 20 years. I’ve been with ANA for 23. This term never, ever crossed my desk until it was uncovered by our team for the report,” he said, referencing research the trade body released in June.

In 2021, Marketing Brew found that brands including Best Buy, CVS, and Nike were advertising on MFA sites. After the ANA published its report earlier this year highlighting the issue, a number of supply-side platforms took notice and said they would remove MFA inventory from curated publisher lists they sell to select advertisers.

In the meantime, advertisers should directly examine their media buys, rather than relying on third-party agencies, the ANA said in its report. The trade body also said advertisers should request access to the data being used in programmatic advertising.