Once a month I send out an email highlighting what I think are important issues for ad publishers.  This usually just goes out to publishers we work with and blog subscribers, but I thought I'd share it here and see if anyone finds it interesting:

I’ve broken it into 4 headings so that you can just scroll down to the parts that interest you

• Key stories in brief - Essential reading for ad publishers

• OKO news - What’s been happening here at OKO HQ

• The drive for ad quality - This month’s focus topic

• Ad blocking developments - Because it's a huge issue that won't go away

Key stories in brief

Three quick stories that I think every ad publisher should be aware of this month:

Facebook ads for everyone : Facebook Audience Network will now serve ads to non-facebook users, putting tracking from websites like buttons to use and taking on the Google Display Network.  Read in full

Trojan infects nearly 1m computers to steal ad revenue : A bot network has been uncovered that replaces Google search ads with adsense code, allowing the operators to earn from fraudulent clicks. Close of the network means advertiser money will again be directed to Google and AdSense publishers.Read in full

Mobile Carrier “Three” to trial network wide ad blocking : The trial will see all ads blocked for opted-in users for 24hrs.  Read more, or read what I wrote about this last year
 

OKO company news

I always get told off for talking about everything in advertising other than us. Here are a couple of bits of exciting OKO news for the month.

OKO goes transatlantic :  If you haven’t met his yet, we now have Mitch on our team and representing us in North America from his home in Canada.  Mitch is has just completed his Google training successfully and is working with a number of AdX publishers.

Amazing wins with AdX : We’ve made some changes to the way that we offer Ad Exchange and the results have been great.  If you have DFP and at least 250k pageviews a month and are not running AdX then you should definitely get in touch.

The drive for ad quality

Ad safety and ad quality have been in the headlines a lot this month. Whilst this interest is no-doubt motivated by the number of users blocking ads, it’s good news for publishers who don’t want bad ads on their sites. This looks like it is going to be a hot topic for a while.

Is Google looking to launch its own “acceptable ads” policy? Few publishers find AdBlock’s “acceptable ads” to be acceptable, but what if Google were to release a standard? Read in full

Big wigs meet to tackle ad malware : FBI, Justice Department,  Homeland Security and  Ad Industry leaders meet behind closed door to tackle Malvertising.  Rare get together gives hope for collaboration to tackle ad spam and malware. Read in full

Certified Against Fraud programme launched : The Trustworthy Accountability Group (TAG) has launched a trust seal to fight ad fraud and increase trust in digital advertising. No news yet on suitability for independent publishers. Read in full

New York Magazine penalises data hungry ads :  With big ads pushing more users towards ad blocking, New York Magazine turns the auditing tables on advertisers. Read in full
 

Recent ad-blocking developments

Ad-blocking is such a hot topic for web publishers that I thought it would be useful to give a short round-up of any news or developments each month. If you are looking for ideas on how to tackle ad blocking, there is also this blog post.

AdBlock Plus now wants your users to pay : AdBlock plus have teamed up with micropayments provider Flattr to collect micropayments from site users if they want to support the sites that they engage with but block ads on.  Read in full

NewStatesman threatens ad-blockers with paywall : The British Politics weekly joins the ranks of sites drawing the line on users of ad-blocking software, asking for donations and threatening to paywall content. Read in full

Incisive Media reduce ad blocking rates by 40% : The publisher of tech and financial sites take a tough stance after seeing blocking rates of 30%. Users who block ads receive a polite message and are blocked from reading further.Read in full

Time.com try humour to combat ad blocking : Rather than blocking users the site draws attention to the ad blocking issue through a humourous “plea”.Read in full
 

Still here?

If you made it the bottom I am impressed.  Let me know what you thought and how I could make this more useful each month. I'm also always open to ideas for blog posts that need more of an in-depth look.