Ad-tech

Content recommendation

The native-ad inventory format — 'You may also like' style widgets.

Content recommendation (or 'content discovery') is the inventory format pioneered by Taboola and Outbrain — a widget under articles showing related content, half of which is publisher-internal links and half of which is paid native units. The format underpins the entire native-ads industry. The widget IDs (Taboola siteId, Outbrain SectionID) are the auction units; advertisers bid on them via safelists.

Example

Bottom of a CNN article shows a 6-tile content-rec widget. Two tiles are CNN articles, four are paid Taboola placements — same look, different revenue model.

Related terms

Native ad
An ad designed to look like editorial content within a publisher.
Taboola
The largest native ad network globally.
Outbrain
The second-largest native ad network globally.
Publisher
The site running the ad widget — never displayed by mediabuyer.
Site ID
Network-side identifier for a specific publisher placement.