Digital advertising: how can advertisers and publishers successfully combine digital efficiency and ESG priorities?

French version

This report, prepared by Analysys Mason for the think tank The Good Advertising Project, provides an overview of the challenges that advertisers, agencies, publishers and adtech providers face in pursuing responsible practices in digital advertising.  

The report highlights concrete actions that stakeholder are already taking, on the basis of on interviews conducted with various market participants in France, as well as wide ranging research.

We have identified three main areas where the ecosystem is aware of the challenges and actively seeking solutions that combine responsibility and performance: privacy and the protection of personal data, the environmental impact of the creation and distribution of advertising, and societal issues related to diversity and representation, as well as the protection of children and vulnerable audiences.

These issues are increasingly important for our citizens and consumers. Advertising plays a special role in our economies and societies, both as a driver and as a mirror of societal values and trends. All players in the online advertising value chain have now taken stock of these issues and are implementing initial solutions at the crossroads of human capital and technology. 

Advertising agencies play a particularly important role, at the center of these issues, in advising their clients and supporting the implementation of complex technology-driven solutions. These include AI-enabled tools, which many interviewees saw as having the potential to work towards more accountability across the entire value chain: AI tools can help assess diversity in the creative process, could support better targeting and performance with less or no personal data, can help analyse and filter undesirable content, and can help advertisers manage campaigns more effectively.

For any other information and if you would like to discuss these finding with us, do not hesitate to contact David Abecassis (Partner, London) or Sylvain Loizeau (Principal, Paris).