The Association for Online Publishing (AOP) has appointed Steve Chester as standards consultant, it has been announced.
The former director of data and industry programmes for the IAB will act as a part-time advisor on issues such as viewability, brand safety and ad fraud.
Chester has more than 18 years’ experience in the digital advertising industry. While at the IAB he led a team that delivered industry education, guidelines, research, and events covering display, search and data.
Prior to that, Chester spent eight years at Microsoft Advertising overseeing a variety of account management and client service teams.
In this new role, Chester will help to drive standards across the industry, with an aim to create premium trading principles recognised and implemented by all parties, including the buy-side, the AOP said.
“Our members provide the highest standards but we also recognise the opportunity to raise the bar even further,” said Richard Reeves, managing director, AOP.
“We are striving to create premium trading standards, which will further enable the buy-side to clearly differentiate premium inventory from the mid-long tail. Steve’s outstanding contribution as a driver for industry standards sets him apart. We are extremely lucky to be able to utilise and benefit from his expertise as we continue to establish a clear position on standards for the premium digital content community.”
Chester added: “I’m delighted to be working with the AOP and to support the great work they are doing to establish clear differentiation for the high standards delivered by their premium publisher members.
“Having been a permanent member of the Joint Industry Committee for Web Standards (JICWEBS) - overseeing digital trading standards for the UK including brand safety, viewability, and ad fraud – I’m pleased to be advising the AOP.”
Chester will be chairing the next AOP workshop, which will focus on ad quality and provide a forum to set out the new standards implemented by JICWEBS. Details here.
