Evolve Media Launches Native Advertising Product

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Integrated digital media company Evolve Media has launched a new native advertising product, INgage.

The product compiles and semantically maps site content, enabling Evolve to build sponsored custom content modules that it says feel native to each publisher’s site design. Evolve has tailored its portfolio of sites -- including CraveOnline and totallyher -- to enable INgage, which it says reaches more than 65 million U.S. users, per comScore.

Advertisers are able to sponsor this ad unit, which compiles content articles native to their brand. Once a visitor clicks on the link they are taken to the article, which contains an overlay and standard units with the brand’s ads.

“It all begins with our proprietary publishing technology which sits across our sites, tracking the content our users consume, identifying trends and breaking them down into targetable topics,” says Brian Fitzgerald, president of Evolve. “INgage allows us take this data and aggregate content that fits a theme appropriate for a brand [and] then serves up the native solution with the site's visual standards.”

Evolve says INgage goes beyond sponsored tweets, posts and advertorials because it is connecting brands to content users are searching for in a manner that's native to the user's experience.

“Users are savvy and can smell sponsored content a mile away,” Fitzgerald says. “This program allows us to place brands in-content in a manner that doesn't take our users away from the driving force behind their consumption, which essentially encourages a stronger connection between the brand and the user.”

According to Evolve, INgage results in a significantly higher level of engagement with the content and the sponsor’s brand assets. To wit: Evolve ran two internal tests for brands in different categories, targeting different topics and audiences: 50,000 standard 300x250 ads and 50,000 INgage ads, comparing the differences in both tests. According to Evolve, the INgage module had five times the click activity and engagement as a standard 300x250 ad. Further, the 300x250 ad within the module saw 1.8x higher click activity than a standalone 300x250 ad.

This unit also creates a positive association between the advertiser and trusted content, Evolve says.

“The ability to leverage our publishing tech to pull hot, trending topics in order to display relevant content from the site with the brand's logo and message around this native content experience ultimately allows us to effectively place brands in front of users through content they come to the site to consume in the first place,” Fitzgerald says.

As INgage has launched today, no advertisers have signed-on yet.

Evolve specializes in vertical publishing for men and women with its two flagship publishers, including CraveOnline Media, home to CraveOnline.com, GameRevolution and LiveOutdoors, and totallyher, which houses theFashionSpot, Momtastic and Teenspot.