With programmatic ad spend on the rise, brands are increasingly looking to run their campaigns in-house. This provides control and transparency.
However, running a programmatic campaign in-house can be a challenging task. There are a few things to keep in mind when making the switch. These include: the following.
1. Data-driven marketing
Data-driven marketing is a way of doing business that uses analytics to optimize your campaigns. It helps you understand your customers and market better, which means that you can create more relevant and engaging ads for them. It also improves the effectiveness of your marketing budget by targeting only the right people, which can result in higher conversion rates and increased ROI.
With programmatic advertising, advertisers get the benefit of real-time data that can help them make informed decisions in a timely fashion. This real-time information allows you to take control of your campaign and change tactics or channels in a very efficient manner. In addition, it helps you identify any unethical practices that might be taking place in your marketplace and eliminate them.
A key component of programmatic advertising is the demand-side platform (DSP). The DSP connects publishers who have ad space to sell with advertisers looking to buy that ad space. This is done through an auction, in which interested companies bid on placing their ad on the publisher’s page. The company with the highest bid wins, and their ad is placed on the page.
Another great feature of the DSP is that it lets advertisers upload their first-party data to the platform in a secure and private fashion. They can then use this data to target potential customers who are similar to their existing ones. This is known as lookalike targeting and is a powerful strategy that can be used across all platforms.
The DSP also allows advertisers to choose between real-time bidding or privacy exchange buying. Choosing the latter protects your data from being shared with third parties without permission and ensures that only the most qualified advertisers can see your ads. This protects your brand and helps you avoid the waste of ad spend.
2. Real-time marketing
Real-time marketing is a growing trend in the digital advertising world. It enables brands to react to events as they happen – whether that’s stock updates, weather forecasts, national celebrations or social media trends.
To execute real-time marketing, a brand needs to have the tools and platforms in place. This includes a Customer Data Platform (CDP), which enables brands to merge first- and third-party user data, as well as an Ad Exchange, which acts as a trading floor for ad inventory.
The next step is to implement programmatic technology that allows brands to buy and sell ads on a one-to-one basis. To do this, the advertiser needs a Demand-Side Platform (DSP) that is connected to the SSP, while the publisher uses an Ad Exchange or privacy-enhanced ad buying platform (PMP).
Lastly, the system must use Real-Time Bidding (RTB) or Programmatic Guaranteed, which automates auctions for ad inventory and allows advertisers greater control over costs and where they want to publish. It also gives both parties access to real-time data about ad placements and activity, which helps to maximize transparency.
An example of real-time marketing is Progressive Insurance’s campaign in the wake of Hurricane Florence. The company tweeted tips and resources for preparing for the storm, as well as retweeted messages from other organizations that were providing helpful information. As a result, the company saw an increase in ad engagement and website traffic from people who were interested in what they had to say.
3. Automation
Programmatic ad buying is the automated process of delivering digital ads. It combines two major elements of the advertising ecosystem — advertisers, who want to run their ads, and publishers, which own websites or platforms where those ads can be placed. It takes this human-based system and streamlines it into an algorithmic software process that runs in milliseconds.
As a marketer, you need to understand the technology behind programmatic advertising so that you can make informed decisions and optimize your campaigns. This includes determining the types of ads that are best for your audience, maximizing performance, and evaluating metrics like viewability and click-through rates. It also involves coordinating your campaign across channels to deliver consistent messaging and branding. This can improve brand recognition, strengthen your brand image, and ultimately lead to higher conversions.
There are multiple tools and technologies that enable programmatic ad buying, including sell-side platforms (SSPs) and demand-side platforms (DSPs). SSPs allow publishers to list their ad inventory on an exchange, and DSPs then purchase it in real time. This automated process allows for greater efficiency and cost-effectiveness as well as the ability to reach more relevant audiences.
While this type of marketing is a powerful tool, it does come with some drawbacks. For example, ad fraud is a serious problem that can reduce the effectiveness of your campaigns and even damage your brand’s reputation. To combat this, ad fraud detection tools can identify and prevent non-human traffic from clicking on your ads.
Another concern is that programmatic advertising can put your ad on inappropriate sites or pages, which can negatively impact your brand image. To avoid this, it is important to work with a trusted partner who will ensure that your ad is only delivered on high-quality websites and platforms that are relevant to your target audience. This is accomplished by implementing a whitelist, which limits the sites where your ads can appear.
4. In-house campaigns
Programmatic advertising is an automated online ad buying process that reduces costs and increases ROI. It helps marketers optimize their campaigns in real time, track performance, and target the right audience. This method also improves the user experience by delivering more relevant ads and increasing conversions. It has also helped brands to grow brand awareness.
A typical programmatic campaign starts with a supply-side platform (SSP), which holds the publisher’s inventory and connects to ad exchanges, ad networks, DSPs, and more. When a website visitor arrives, the SSP will send a signal to each of these platforms to see who has the best ad to show that visitor. They will then compete with each other in a real-time bidding auction to show that ad and deliver it to the viewer. The winner is decided within milliseconds.
This process saves both time and money for marketers, as it bypasses the traditional/offline advertising model that involves a lot of paperwork and requires an extensive request for proposals (RFP) and negotiation. It also helps to increase transparency of the supply chain.
Programmatic marketing is used for a wide range of digital channels, including display, mobile, video, and social. It’s also becoming increasingly popular for out-of-home digital channels, such as digital screens on public transport, shopping malls, and even billboards. It’s a good choice for B2B ad campaigns as it can help to target a specific group of decision makers rather than a general audience. This kind of ad targeting would be impossible to do with conventional offline advertising methods. It also makes it easier to track ROI. However, it’s important to remember that clicks alone aren’t necessarily a good measure of ROI, especially if the visitors don’t end up purchasing anything.
5. Artificial intelligence
Programmatic advertising has grown rapidly in the last several years and is projected to reach 91.1% of digital ad spend in 2023 in the US alone. One of the key benefits of this emerging trend is that it gives advertisers real-time campaign performance data. This allows them to invest their advertising budget wisely and ensure that it is delivering justifiable ROI. Additionally, it also helps advertisers spot unethical ad publishers and stop them from duping their audiences with fraudulent tactics. Major programmatic ad platforms curb these malpractices by leveraging machine learning to evaluate publishers and only giving them ad space if their ads deliver justifiable results.
Essentially, programmatic marketing is a way for marketers to automate the buying and selling of ad space on the Internet. The process is done through algorithmic software that connects the advertiser buyers, who want to buy digital ad space, with the publisher sellers, who have such space, in milliseconds. This type of automated marketing is an essential step in the evolution of the digital marketing industry.
One of the most common forms of programmatic advertising is real-time bidding (RTB), where ad impressions are bought and sold in a fraction of a second, as pages load. This is accomplished by ad exchanges, ad networks and Demand-Side Platforms (DSP).
Another form of programmatic marketing is cookieless targeting, which is used when cookies aren’t allowed or don’t work on certain devices. This allows brands to reach their audience across multiple channels without relying on cookies, as well as to use advanced ad formats. For example, the Amanda Foundation, a non-profit animal shelter and rescue, used programmatic marketing to target its audience with tailored animal images that were most relevant to them.
