Ads that appear on content websites raise awareness, message association, brand favorability, and purchase intent more than ads appearing on portals and ad networks, according to an Online Publishers Association study conducted by Dynamic Logic.
The results of the study give established content publishers -- such as CNN.com, ESPN, and Gawker -- a considerable leg up in the battle for advertising dollars. It's the second round of good news for content sites this month, after a separate study revealed that marketers plan to spend more on content than on ad networks.
Ad networks have little impact in driving branding metrics, and provided no significant impact on purchase intent, according to the study (PDF).
Dynamic Logic's research also indicated that site environment makes a difference in ad effectiveness. The most popular ad sizes -- medium rectangles, leaderboards, and skyscrapers -- performed better on content websites than MarketNorms, an industry benchmark for online ad effectiveness. Video and rich media ads on content sites were also found to be more effective than those running on portals or served via ad networks.
