The Guardian's new 'Hosted by' platform gives brands an opportunity to publish their own content
The Guardian has launched a new native advertising offering, Hosted by the Guardian, allowing brands to host their own content on site instead of working with the publisher to align themselves with editorially-led native features.
The Guardian's new branded content format, trialled by Renault
It means advertisers create the content themselves, instead of the publisher creating content on behalf of the brands in a native editorial format that doesn’t feature products or information about the brands, as is the case with Guardian Labs.
The Hosted platform can shape part of a display campaign, Labs campaign or sit on its own, in the form of videos, galleries or articles.
The format was tested with Renault, who trialled a series of videos to market its design competition with Central St Martins as part of an overall promotion of its electric car Zoe. The publisher claims the videos delivered a 60% view-through rate from over 25,000 unique visitors, with a further 4% clicking through to the Renault website.
Adam Foley, commercial strategy director: "By creating ‘Hosted by’ we have answered a genuine industry problem faced by advertisers and agencies who create their own branded content and struggle with a suitable home - we have built a premium platform for advertisers own rich and diverse content that serves an interested audience and delivers guaranteed results.
"We’ve been working with a range of brands from different sectors and been honing the offering and banking a great set of results and campaigns."