Dive Brief: 

• Pot-related brands looking to embrace digital advertising in full force may still have to wait for major ad networks to accept the industry—despite the fact that weed tech pulled in $100 million in venture capital last year. 
• Ad networks are still hesitant to distribute ad inventory from weed related brands or to distribute major brands to weed related web sites, but social sites like Facebook, Twitter—and to some extent Google—are loosening policies on cannabis ads. 
• Some marijuana tech companies are looking to fill the void like Mantis, which is an ad network of 60 marijuana related sites open to receiving weed ads. 

Dive Insight:

The booming marijuana industry in the U.S. is complicated right now. While there's certainly money to be made in weed advertising—the legality of it is very murky. Location-based targeting can eliminate some of that worry by delivering ads to places where weed is legal, but it's hard to guarantee that distribution in digital formats. As more websites become cannabis-friendly, the ad networks will come around. Until then, marijuana brands will have to continue to be creative.