GARM Framework Makes Safety and Suitability Front-and-Center Topic For Brands

The global measurement and analytics company OpenSlate announced recently that it will be taking advantage of the Global Alliance for Responsible Media’s (GARM) Brand Safety Floor and Suitability Framework as it helps advertisers better understand and utilize contextual advertising.

In a Sept. 16 blog post on the OpenSlate website, chief product officer Andrew Smith wrote, “OpenSlate is committed to incorporating the framework published by the Global Alliance for Responsible Media into our contextual targeting and measurement solutions. GARM has definitively tackled the long-term challenge of…universal brand safety standards, allowing advertisers, publishers, content platforms, and data providers to benefit from a common language around this crucial topic.”

The GARM Brand Safety Floor and Suitability Framework provides platforms, agencies, and marketers with the framework with which to define safe and harmful online content. The framework lists 11 content categories ranging from sexual content to hate speech to sensitive social issues, and provides both a floor—content not appropriate for any advertising support—as well as three risk categories—low, medium, and high—so advertisers can align their brands with what they feel are appropriate risk levels.

According to Smith, the GARM framework is, “very much in line with other standards, such as ad viewability, providing a baseline that makes decision making and scaling of media strategies more straightforward.” That standard, wrote Smith, enables brands to customize their efforts. “Any advertiser that is serious about content alignment will utilize GARM as a building block for an advertising strategy that will ultimately be bespoke to their brand or campaign.”

Smith points out in his blog post that, “after half a decade of high profile brand safety incidents, industry conferences, and much discussion and debate, it’s still far too common to find advertisers that aren’t fully leaned into comprehensively solving this problem for their brand. By elevating this discussion to an industry-wide movement, GARM has made brand safety and suitability a front-and-center topic for any brand to consider.”

The Brand Safety Institute (BSI) professionalizes the topic of brand safety and seeks to improve brand safety efforts by providing certifications such as the Brand Safety Officer (BSO), as well as resources, checklists, and other tools to anyone focused on brand safety at every stage in the industry supply chain. Brand safety floors, brand safety playbooks, brand safety frameworks and more from the 4As, the IAB, as well as GARM and others are all valuable tools to help BSOs align their advertising strategies with appropriate content. The BSI provides valuable information and insights for developing, implementing, and analyzing advertising strategies and how best to achieve campaign goals in the current media environment, and all are updated regularly to reflect the changing nature of challenges to brand safety worldwide.