• by Gavin O'Malley , March 3, 2006

The Interactive Advertising Bureau Thursday recommended that its publisher and agency members take a hard line with agencies that submit creative material late.

The IAB proposed that publishers enforce original insertion orders by holding advertisers responsible for the media purchased. If the creative is not submitted on time, the IAB suggests that media companies run a public service announcement or house ad until the creative is received--but still hold advertisers responsible.

Greg Stuart, CEO of the IAB, said that agencies that send in creative late pose problems for the whole industry, by giving publishers a bad impression of online advertisers. "Late creative is huge problem," Stuart said. "When publishers and agencies used to traditional media standards encounter this type of behavior, they're typically shocked and turned off by the experience."

A long list of the Web's best-known publishers have publicly stated their intention to enforce the IAB's late creative policy before the summer. ABCNews.com, AOL, BusinessWeek Online, Forbes.com, MSN, MTV Networks, TVGuide.com, and Yahoo are among those publishers fed up with lax deadlines and the operational issues that result.

Dave Bovenschulte, vice president-general manager at TV Guide Online, said an effort to hold online creative agencies to stricter time standards is needed. With more ads coming in these days, publishers need to exert tighter control or the process becomes unwieldy, he said. "As the number of advertisers increases, it just gets unmanageable and out of control."

Oda Chan, director of ad operations at TV Guide Online, added that late creative poses a persistent problem. "We always get a lot of creative that comes in late," Chan said. "There's a belief that it can be turned around so quickly, but when creative comes in a month late resources are really being wasted."

One agency account director who wished not to be identified said it's common for agencies to hold off turning in work until the last minute, because they hope to use that time for revisions. "We as an agency try to push things as long as possible, because standards aren't enforced and there are always last-minute changes to be made," he admitted.

But such slackness will no longer be tolerated, according to IAB Senior Vice President and General Manager, Sheryl Draizen. "Interactive has become mainstream media," she said. "As an industry we think it's really important, in terms of maturing, that we conduct our business in the most professional way possible."