Programmatic Pros: Desiree Tunstall, Verto Media

"People sometimes get frustrated with advertising, but the goal of (programmatic) is to make sure that (consumers) are getting messages that are really getting geared towards who (they) are and (their) preferences."

Desiree Tunstall graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a major in history and a minor in religious studies—neither subject seems like it would lead to a career in digital advertising. After leaving Penn, she worked in the non-profit world, in government, in the White House, and then went into the private sector, working for a technology research company. However, she decided she wanted to "do something else, also in technology, but in a field that was growing faster,” so she looked to digital advertising. She worked at AppNexus, the largest independent advertising exchange, for a little over two years, learning about different facets of the industry.

Now, Desiree has co-founded her own digital audio advertising agency, Verto Media, in Northern New Jersey, and utilizes programmatic technology. Eager to help students and industry members learn more about programmatic, she discussed a few key issues with me.

Olivia: Tell me about your company, Verto Media.

  

Desiree: Verto Media is a digital audio advertising agency. So, what does that really mean? It means that we work with advertisers who are interested in communicating their messages using audio messages. We use programmatic buying strategies to help deliver those messages to the right consumer at the right time in the right medium. We also work with publishers to help them monetize their audio content. So if you’re a podcaster, a streaming radio station, or a pure play digital station like Pandora or Spotify, we will serve advertisements into those types of environments.

Olivia: It’s interesting that you work with both ends of the supply and demand spectrum!

Desiree: In this business, you have an option of working with just the advertiser, just the publisher, or working with both. … When I was working at AppNexus, I saw the companies that access to both supply, meaning the publisher, and demand, meaning the buyer, were the ones who tended to do better mostly because they understood best where their advertisements could serve and how they would perform.

Olivia: Could you speak about mobile and programmatic?

Desiree: Mobile advertising is kind of the new frontier of digital. You hear a lot of discussion about what mobile advertising is, how does it work, how are ads delivered, how is it going to be measured, and there are more and more companies getting into the mobile space, mostly because consumer behavior is mostly on mobile these days. ... So AppNexus made some significant technology and strategy investments in working on their mobile offering, and I was fortunate enough to spearhead that from a sales standpoint.

The way we look at mobile at Verto Media is that audio is naturally mobile. I mean, if you really think about where you listen to most of your audio content, it’s usually when you’re on the go. If you’re in your car, if you’re walking around listening to music or a podcast or some sort of audio publisher, you’re doing so while you’re walking around, so we look at mobile as a natural issue for us.

Mobile presents a couple of unique challenges. One of the things that programmatic advertising relies very heavily on are cookies. … Cookies are what advertisers rely upon heavily to find their users. However, there’s no concept of cookies in a mobile app environment. So, what often happens is advertisers have to find a new way to track the user. Now, you can use things like the device ID. In Apple that’s known as IDFA, Identification for Advertisers. On an Android, it’s just known as the Android ID. … However, it’s not the same as using cookies for targeting…Tracking your activity from one app to the next is not the same as tracking your activity from one browser to the next on your computer. So, what happens is advertisers have a new challenge in being able to find their users in a mobile environment. And there are technologies that are coming about that are helping people do that more effectively. It’s actually one of the reasons why Facebook is really winning, because Facebook relies on user login in order to access Facebook content. Which means that even if you are on your desktop, your tablet, your iPhone, Facebook knows who you are in all of those environments. Most websites don’t obligate you to log in, and they don’t because most people wouldn’t. They log in because they see so much value in Facebook, but there aren’t a lot of other websites that can do that. So that’s why advertisers who advertise in mobile like to do so on platforms like Facebook, because they can track across all those different devices.

Olivia: Could you speak about the out-of-home space and programmatic?

Desiree: The easiest way to think about programmatic is this— programmatic is the use of technology to deliver a particular advertisement at a particular time. So, you’re leveraging data and technology to deliver more relevant ads. So if I have a billboard, and let’s say it starts raining out, I could actually deliver an ad for Totes on that billboard, and that would be an example of programmatic advertising. Whereas back in the day, people would have to post up paper billboards and whatever is there is just there, but with these electronic billboards you can actually use different data points in the environment to determine what should be delivered.

Olivia: What are some issues or concepts that you feel make it difficult for people to understand programmatic?

Desiree: When I started working at AppNexus, of course I had to learn a lot about the space. …As I started to learn more and more, I started to realize that the very people who I was working with, my customer base, were often not knowledgeable about many parts of the ecosystem. Part of it is that there are so many technologies that it can be tough to wrap your head around everything that’s happening. The second thing is, because it’s so new, there isn’t a comprehensive educational source for most people. There are consulting companies that will come to a marketer’s office and will say “we’ll teach you everyhting about programmatic,” but those engagements can be thousands and thousands of dollars. If I am an individual and I work at an advertising technology company or I’m interested in getting into the space, where do I really go to learn about programmatic? There are some blogs out there, some of them outdated…maybe you can ask around on forums, but there’s no real go-to place for people to get that knowledge. The third thing is that many companies that are in the space invest in educating their customers, but there are many who don’t, because if their customer is confused, they can continue to make money. The more confused you are, the more I can charge you for the services that I provide, because if I lay it out for you, then we’d have to have a different kind of discussion about my value…. You know that old saying, “knowledge is power?” Knowledge is also money.

Olivia: What does the future of programmatic look like?

Desiree: I believe that the technology is going to evolve. There are a lot of pain points for publishers and advertisers. Sometimes advertisers are frustrated about where their ads are being placed, because they might serve on fraudulent inventory or mislabeled inventory. Publishers are sometimes frustrated with advertisers because they’re not getting the best pricing. A lot of those issues are just the growing pains of any new ecosystem that is putting new technology out there. And you have to keep in mind that this industry really came into being within the last ten years. That’s infancy in the life of an industry. So I believe the technology will continue to evolve, education will continue to grow, and I do believe that programmatic is going to continue to grow, and it’s not going to just be a solution for what publishers are unable to sell. I believe publishers are going to start—and many of them have—putting their premium, prime property into exchange environments. You’re going to have advertisers putting more brand dollars into programmatic. The numbers really indicate that this is what is going to happen, and based on what I’ve seen in the industry, we are going to continue moving into that trend.

Keep an eye out! Verto Media will also be putting out a formal video training series this month for people who want to learn more about programmatic.

Programmatic Pros: Leah Feigel, Amnet Group

Over the summer I had the amazing opportunity to venture to New York City and intern at Carat, a media agency part of the Dentsu Aegis Network. During my time there, I was exposed to many of the other branches of the Dentsu Aegis Network. One such branch is Amnet, the trading desk for Dentsu Aegis. I briefly shadowed an employee at Amnet, which piqued my curiosity and helped me begin my programmatic journey through this blog.

This blog is not only to help me learn about programmatic tech—it's to assist others in learning and understanding the new advertising technology available, whether it be a student interested in media buying, a consumer wondering why they see so many ads based on things they've searched, or professionals looking more into what the programmatic buzz is all about.

Since I got my start learning with Leah Feigel, an account manager at Amnet, I decided to reconnect with her, pick her brain, help others learn from her, too.

Olivia: Tell me about your role at Amnet.

Leah: I am an Account Manager with Amnet. I currently work on a variety of brands including: The Home Depot, Hilton, Gucci, and Adidas. As a manager, I am responsible for both overseeing the technical aspect of working with different systems to purchase media as well as maintain positive client relationships. Day to day, I am often optimizing campaigns for performance as well as fielding client questions about current or future opportunities.



Olivia: What types of skills do you need to do your job effectively, and how did you gain them (training course, college education, etc.)?

Leah: Well, I got my start by getting a BS in Advertising at the University of Texas at Austin. At the time, I didn’t foresee myself working in media buying at all. From a degree standpoint, I’d say anything that equips you with complex problem solving skills helps prepare you for this job. The knowledge that you gain from experience is really valuable for anyone in this industry. Technology changes so quickly that there really isn’t any other way to keep up other than to be completely immersed in it. To get your foot in the door, I’d definitely follow relevant digital industry publications like AdExchanger, Digiday, etc. Aside from that, internships are always key to getting the right connections and experience to get you started.



Olivia: What is one topic, definition, etc. you think people are missing that makes it hard for them to understand programmatic?

Leah: People often over complicate the subject. Programmatic just means automated. It simply means that you can buy media without having to have 20 conversations and signed contracts. Real time bidding (RTB) is just a form of programmatic buying (this is where people start to get lost): much like the stock market, the highest bid wins the inventory. Then throw in data… now it’s really complicated. Data is pretty infinite. Google’s CEO, Eric Schmidt, was recently quoted saying "From the dawn of civilization to 2003, five exabytes of data were created. The same amount was created in the last two days." That’s pretty crazy to think about. Marketers go nuts trying to figure out what to do with all of their data and how to fit it all in to this programmatic scene. When speaking with clients, it’s easy to geek out on every detail all in one conversation. I try my best to break each topic out and then take to the whiteboard for visuals.



Olivia: As a person in the industry, what are your thoughts on the worries people have that computers will "replace" humans in programmatic buying?

Leah: This has been a hot topic for some parts of the industry, especially sales. However, there will never be a time where the industry will rely on technology 100%. The tech we use is absolutely brilliant, but there is always the need for a human element. A computer can make billions of algorithmic based decisions, but it still lacks judgment. The technology element has allowed for some efficiencies which can mean that fewer employees are needed to manage media relationships, but I feel that the industry is finding ways to account for this from an organizational standpoint.



Olivia: What do you think the future looks like for programmatic, including some of the key technological issues such as programmatic TV and mobile?

Leah: TV is definitely on the horizon. As more and more users adopt connected TV sources like Apple TV, Roku, TV streaming apps etc., we are opening doors to gather even more data to make educated video buys. Outdoor advertising is another channel that is quickly seeing opportunities in the programmatic space. We can access digital outdoor displays and now change messaging faster than ever. Essentially, anywhere a digital or connected element exists, there will likely be opportunity. Mobile is already pretty well developed and is currently expanding into the cross device conversation. Ideally, we’ll be able to know a user’s work computer, home computer, tablet, connected game system, and mobile phone so we can reach them with the right messaging on the correct device at the right time.



Olivia: What advice do you have for marketers interested in adopting programmatic technologies?

Leah: Remember that programmatic is just a tool in your media mix. You want it to work together with your other buys and initiatives, not be completely siloed. If you are spending millions of dollars for a presence on TV, there is probably a good reason for that. Find ways for programmatic to supplement and boost your other media investments. Secondly, what are your goals? Are you looking to measure sales or are you looking to drive awareness? They’re not the same thing.



Olivia: What advice do you have for students who may be considering a career in media buying/programmatic buying?

Leah: Definitely keep up to speed with what is happening in the industry via the web. Secondly, I’d keep an ear to the ground for any opportunity to gain experience. Textbooks can’t teach you this stuff fast enough. It definitely doesn’t hurt to have experience in coding if that is something that interests you as well.



Olivia: Finally, what do you feel is an overlooked topic regarding programmatic capabilities, features, or issues?

Leah: In my experience, measurement has been a tough conversation to have. Attribution is a highly debated topic that hasn’t really settled yet. There are a ton of players in the space delivering the same message for any given advertiser, so who is owed credit? Each brand or product can be so different as well that trying to assume an industry wide standard seems impossible. For example, if I’m buying a vacation I might be exposed to a whole host of messaging from one advertiser (search, retargeting, branding). It’s likely that I may research potential choices for my vacation anywhere from a few days to a few weeks. Because someone served the very last ad to a user before they purchased online, does that mean that every advertising effort that came before isn’t owed any credit? In this case specifically, last touch attribution doesn’t seem fair. Hopefully some smart marketers will be able to find better solutions for this in the future.

Is [The Website] Real Life? Or Is It Just Fantasy?

Imagine you are a media buyer. You want to advertise in People magazine. You find out there is an extremely high number of readers per copy, and it is very inexpensive to place an ad. This is an almost perfect situation for an advertiser!

Then, you find out the magazine you thought was People is fake. It calls itself People and appears to have readers, but it actually is a poor quality magazine with few readers. All the numbers have been made up and this magazine exists only to trick advertisers so the creator can make some money off of "advertising." 

                                   

It'd be quite sad. Source

This seems pretty absurd, and it probably would never happen. It would be pretty obvious to find out that a magazine doesn't exist, and media buyers generally require that a copy of a magazine be sent to the agency to prove the correct ad actually ran.

However, online, and especially using a programmatic buying method, fraud like the above situation tends to happen often. In fact, one source says that 30-70% of digital budgets are based on fake impressions and clicks. In a programmatic exchange, many publishers of websites can enter the auction without disclosing their names or sites. This means advertisers can bid on ad space on sites that may not actually exist.

Types of Fraud

URL masking occurs when a low-quality website pretends to have a domain name that is more reputable (such as the People example above). While the ads placed on these sites may actually have human eyeballs seeing them, the traffic on these sites are often low-quality and ad space is priced much higher than it should be. This is fraud.

                                                

It's not quite who you thought it was, huh? Source

Some sites may bring in high amounts of traffic that actually turn out to be "bots" online. They pass this traffic off as real people. This is fraud.

And even though it is more like "soft fraud", some marketers may not fully understand their reports and think their programmatic campaign is working, when in fact it is the results from other digital campaigns that are carrying the campaign that are buried deeper in their data. This is another drawback to the programmatic model.

Why Does this Happen?

With programmatic, direct relationships between a publisher and an advertiser do not necessarily exist. Dishonest publisher sites in an ad exchange can easily hide their identities. An unknown publisher may put a site not driven by human traffic in an ad exchange simply to make money in a fraudulent way. These dishonest publishers often gravitate toward larger markets to make more money; thus fraud may be more prevalent in the United States than in some smaller markets using programmatic.

Exposing fraud is a lose-lose. Those who expose it are not rewarded. Fraudulent clicks are often cost-effective and have what appear to be high engagement metrics. When removing fraudulent clicks, metrics like reach and traffic go down, costs go up, and one must answer for why these dishonest sites were being bought anyway.

Ad tech companies that charge based on impressions may lose revenue by reporting that most of these impressions are false. And some believe that having millions of impressions, even if they are fake, doesn't matter if you are actually converting and having success with real people. So fraudulent impressions should just be accepted if the site is actually converting users.

Furthermore, fraud makes marketers more wary of programmatic buying, meaning a pushback against the technology, meaning one may not want to bring up these issues and discredit the programmatic method.

Most of the time, bad actors are not caught. If identified, their sites are simply put on blacklists and the creator of the fraudulent site may be able to create a new dishonest website.

A Solution?

Companies are cropping up that solely focus on fighting programmatic fraud. Xaxis is promising "humans are viewing 95 percent of online ads, or your money back." The American Association of Advertising Agencies, along with the Association of National Advertisers and the Interactive Advertising Bureau have recently formed the Trustworthy Accountability Group (TAG) to assist in fighting fraud and creating transparency between "who is getting paid and who is doing the paying." I and several other marketers believe that fraud can be stopped at the source.

Marketers ultimately are the ones who are hurt by fraud. They spend money on fake metrics that are supposed to help sell products and provide insights for their business. Marketers need to step up and insist that the impressions they are buying are of quality. They also need to demand metrics that are transparent and do not easily hide fraud in a bundle of numbers and percents.

In addition, Andrew Casale of Advertising Age suggests that barriers to entry be put in place in the programmatic ecosystem; suppliers should offer their name of their site and the human's name that will be placed on the check written by marketers. In this way, cons can be deterred from using the programmatic space in such a dishonest manner and, if they are found to be fraudulent, the creator can easily be identified.

Do you think programmatic fraud is a problem? Have you experienced it, and do you have any further solutions to stop it?

Humans vs. Technology: Why Can't We Have Both?

We've heard of companies that, in the name of efficiency and lowering costs, begin using machinery and other equipment to create their product. After using technology, the company realizes that it no longer needs its human workers, and jobs are cut, resulting in unemployment for workers.

Some are pointing to a similar situation that could occur as programmatic media buying sweeps advertising agencies and marketers. By automating the online display ad buying process, doesn't this mean that media buyers will no longer be needed? Is this new tech craze going to kill jobs?

It's important to consider this issue, and on the surface, this problem makes sense. While the trend of programmatic is yet to be known, many are predicting a huge influx of programmatic technologies being used to buy online ads and even TV. We don't know yet where the industry will go and whether jobs will, in reality, be lost, yet some are against programmatic for this very reason. Even industry executives are split on whether they believe jobs will suffer—An AOL survey showed that 57% of executives do not think jobs will be affected.

    
Why can't we all just get along? Source

For me, it's a scary thought—after graduation, the profession I seek to obtain is media planning and buying, so the threat of a new technology that could do my job and thus take it from me is frustrating.

But I don't think the threat is big enough to become a reality. While automation would make things much easier in the online ad world, it certainly isn't perfect, and the need for humans still exists. Here are a few more reasons why I think we can have our technology and keep our jobs, too.

1. Optimization is Key to Avoiding Dreadful Mistakes

A human media buyer knows that running a brand's ads on certain websites or alongside television programs that don't match the brand's persona or ideals is not a good idea (think porn sites or South Park for a family-friendly brand). A computer program may not understand this, even if seemingly foolproof restrictions are put in place. And this has, in fact, actually happened! Some ads have ended up on Jihad YouTube videos and other inappropriate sites. A human controlling the programmatic buy can notice and prevent these types of issues. But humans optimizing campaigns isn't just for avoiding disasters—optimizing campaigns to ensure costs stay low, that the budget is being allocated to specific goals (rather than simply putting all of the budget toward a cheap option), and to ensure placements are congruent with brand image and audience objectives is necessary every day in programmatic management.

2. It's Obvious, but...Computers Just Aren't People

...and they can't do things a human with a brain and a personality can. A computer can't have a conversation with the client to know what the true brand objectives are in order to implement them effectively. A person can. A computer cannot give a presentation to the client summarizing the learnings from a programmatic campaign and make suggestions for the future. A human can. See where this is going?

3. Humans are Flexible

Humans will bend and change with the new technologies that face them. In a few years, a media buyer's role might definitely change (in fact, they are starting to change now), but this doesn't mean all is lost. Caspar Schlickum with iMedia Connection points out that programmatic is providing new opportunities for the humans which relate more to data and technology. Do a Google search for "programmatic jobs," and you'll find numerous companies looking to hire people to work with programmatic technologies. To me, this doesn't seem to show that programmatic is taking any jobs, but rather creating more specialized ones. This means that there may be a gap now in the skills needed to be a media buyer and run a programmatic campaign—the previously mentioned AOL study also showed that more than one-third of the surveyed executives think there is a skills gap that needs to be filled. Media buyers may need to invest some time into learning about this new technology, but that's no reason to run screaming from it.

Neil Pace from McCulloch and Company says it perfectly, "There is no button to push or switch to flip that will just create a media campaign and do all the work for you. Additionally, there will never be a future where all humans will be replaced by robots performing programmatic buys." I see no solid evidence showing that people will be replaced by machines.

Have you had an experience with jobs being created or taken because of programmatic? Share it in the comments!

Could Programmatic TV Buying Fundamentally Change the Traditional TV Buying Model?

The way television ads are traditionally bought and sold has the potential to completely change.

Programmatic buying methods took the online ad buying space by storm, and now there is an attempt to apply programmatic technologies to buy TV spots.

Traditionally, buying television ads used data about TV shows to pick appropriate programs for targeted audiences. However, under a programmatic method, now TV ad buying would focus on using data about audiences to pick relevant shows. There is less emphasis on the actual TV show being bought and more focus on the specific target watching; advertisers don't care whether their ad is shown on The Simpsons or Chopped, as long as their target audience is viewing.

Perhaps dogs will also be included as target markets under programmatic TV buying... 

(That was a joke.)

Source: Mark Stevens

In fact, some say that ratings for television programs may not even be needed in the programmatic model, as advertisers would be focusing less on the show a consumer is watching and more on who that viewer actually is.

Programmatic TV buying envisions a system in which one has a defined audience, the ability to deliver an ad, and the automation system to deliver that ad millions of times in multiple channels. It also can target users more specifically, as programmatic buying does online. Instead of buying an audience of Women 18-34, advertisers can target a subset of that demographic—perhaps Women 18-34 who are avid bicyclists.

Or buyers using programmatic TV methods could target Men 18-24 who like Apple products and Hawaiian Punch....?

Source: Yuwen Memon

I find it intriguing that television, traditionally a reach medium seeking as many relevant eyeballs as possible, would move toward a more strategic approach to finely target consumers. TV would still reach many people, yes, but, using programmatic, it would be more picky about which eyeballs are watching. I think this would be a positive thing for consumers; as I've said previously on this blog, I believe advertising that is relevant to specific consumers is a win-win for potential customers and advertisers. Common sense says that there's a higher probability a person would watch an ad for something in which they might genuinely be interested rather than a mass-marketed commercial.

Yet, there is some backlash to programmatic TV buying, and some say that there are too many drawbacks to the programmatic TV model to ever be effective. I agree that some are concerning.

One drawback that has been mentioned is that auction-like environments might devalue some highly desired ad time (such as events like the Superbowl). As with online programmatic buying, the definition of what programmatic TV buying actually is causes confusion. And proving to broadcasters that this new system is worthwhile is also a challenge. 

Networks own their ad inventory and want to sell it at a premium price or force advertisers to buy it to get more access to sister networks, etc. This type of system isn't an option in the programmatic model.

Neither is the upfront and scatter method. Traditionally used in buying TV, ads are sold at a discounted rate during the upfront (Springtime, before the show airs) to ensure the show doesn't fail. After that, ads are bought using the scatter method (bought closer to the air date of the show and not necessarily aimed at a specific demographic target). Ads are mainly meant to offset the high production costs of shows, and highly efficient programmatic buying doesn't really fit that type of business model.

While a programmatic TV buying model isn't a complete reality yet, it is being experimented with by companies trying to create programmatic TV platforms to networks like NBC.

Is it possible that, if developed, programmatic TV buying could flip traditional TV buying on its head? Or is this hype all just another programmatic fad?

I also used this article and this article as background for the writing of this blog post.

What Really Happens While a Webpage is Loading

Though I provided a basic outline of programmatic buying in a previous blog post, I recently stumbled across a few interesting infographics compiled by Altitude Digital explaining more about programmatic marketing process and providing some key insights. The graphs are useful in helping to fully understand the programmatic buying concept. This is the second and final post in a two-part series looking at these informative images. See the first part here.

This 2013 infographic from Turn shows the life cycle of an online ad. I love this image because it helps consumers understand the technology behind ads they see online every day.

                     

• For example, let's say I (Olivia) click on a URL to look at a cooking blog website (We will call it Cooking Blog—capital letters always make things more official). 

(*Note: the "publishers" mentioned in the infographic are anyone who create and post content (from little blog creators to sites like Facebook) that collect online revenue.)

• Cooking Blog checks its own local ad server to see if there is an online ad bought by an advertiser that they can serve. If they do not have one, they go to an AdExchange, or a real-time auction space where publishers and advertisers can interact and buy and sell online ad availability.

• The AdExchange sends my user profile to several demand-side platforms (remember, my profile is anonymous! See this post for more information about my thoughts regarding the Internet, anonymity, and advertising). A demand-side platform is simply software that helps purchase ad space in an automated way across multiple publisher sites. DSPs are the "matchmaker" between ad space and specific user profiles. They also serve and track the ads.

• The DSPs add some additional data on to my profile to better determine if the characteristics of my user profile meets those specified in certain ad campaigns. The DSP also looks at the size of the ad or accepted types of ad formats to be sure the ad that will be served even fits that requirement. Obviously, an ad with video capabilities would not work well in a space that doesn't accept video ads.

• The demand-side platform uses its mathematical algorithm and looks at specific qualifications to evaluate the "value" of my user profile (whether or not it's worth it to bid on my impression). It relates this to the different advertisers (say, Cooking Product One, Cooking Product Two, and Cooking Product Three) bidding on my profile. This also includes the cost of my impression (how much my viewing of the ad is worth in actual dollars).

• This DSP information is submitted to the AdExchange.

• The AdExchange runs the auction using a second-price method, which means whoever wins the auction pays one penny more than the original bid of the second-highest bidder. For example, Cooking Product One may think my impression is worth $4.50, while Cooking Product Two thinks I am worth $4.00, and Cooking Product Three may bid $3.00. If Cooking Product One would win the bid, instead of paying their original price of $4.50, they would only pay $4.01 for my impression (Cooking Product Two's price + one additional penny).

There's no doubt that online auctions
are more efficient and less awkward than this experience.
Source: BurnAway

• The winning bid is sent to the publisher (Cooking Blog).

• The Cooking Blog server tells the web browser to show the ad and the advertiser's server sends the winning ad to the browser.

• The ad gets shown on the page I clicked on on Cooking Blog's website!

Now that you know some of the basics, try your luck on this quiz about the real-time bidding and programmatic buying process created by Altitude Digital. If you scored high, comment below and brag about it! Or let me know the things you learned from the quiz or are curious to know more about!

Why Programmatic Meets Marketers' Needs: Infographic Review

Though I provided a basic outline of programmatic buying in a previous blog post, I recently stumbled across a few interesting infographics compiled by Altitude Digital explaining more about the programmatic marketing process and providing some key insights. The graphs are useful in helping to fully understand the programmatic buying concept. This is part one in a two-part series looking at these informative images.

This 2013 infographic from DataXu gives some insight into issues marketers are having that might be leading to the acceptance of programmatic. I've provided some summarizing commentary on the right.

It is no surprise that consumers are actively using technology to help them shop. Consumers are using digital technology even when shopping in-store and are using technology to interact with brands online.








Marketers are setting aside dollars for real-time bidding. Remember, real-time bidding is not the same as programmatic buying. Real-time bidding is selling online ad impressions through an "auction" that happens in the amount of time it takes a webpage to load. Programmatic can use real-time bidding, but not all RTB is programmatic. Get it? Got it? Good.



However, setting aside dollars toward this technology means nothing without data to help drive it. "Data" may be a buzzword in advertising, yet it's extremely important, and this graph shows that many marketers are struggling to know how to properly use it.







Many organizations have tons of data, yet much of it is not analyzed or formed into effective plans. Additionally, they struggle to show proof of plans that are effective.






















Using consumer insights to build plans, and taking ownership as a company of this intelligence, is essential—not only for the company, but for customers. Relevance is always important.

Programmatic is perhaps being accepted as a way of buying online ads because its allows automation and ease for marketers in the right areas where they need it. Programmatic can utilize consumer data efficiently, finding the correct, relevant viewers for an ad and not potentially wasting ad dollars. It can show ROIs and metrics, and makes the user experience for consumers more comfortable and pertinent. In an article in Forbes, Ben Arnold, Associate Director of Digital Strategy at Kellogg, summarized programmatic in such a way, saying that, "the most interesting aspect of this (programmatic) ecosystem is a DSP (demand-side-platform)'s ability to ingest a client’s digital media plan—brand, budget, success metrics, etc.—while layering on other data sources and decisioning algorithms to find the impressions that deliver the right consumer when they are most receptive to the message." In other words, some of the things marketers are struggling with, including metrics showing ROIs, budgets, and consumer data, are all executed through a more efficient process in programmatic.

Are there any other reasons why marketers are picking up on programmatic so quickly? Share your thoughts below!

Is Your Online Privacy Threatened by Programmatic Ads?

I grew up without Internet. In fact, we didn't even own a computer when I was young. (Keep in mind, I am a Millennial.)

Trying to do homework without Internet was quite the task. If a homework assignment required research on a certain animal or period in history, we would use our huge encyclopedia set in the basement. Unless it was a word starting with the letter "N" or "St-Su". We were missing those volumes.

And if it was an assignment where the two paragraphs from the encyclopedia just wouldn't cut it, we trekked off to the library to spend an hour online doing our homework. It was frustrating.

Finally, in late elementary school, we used our tax refund to buy a computer, and eventually got dial-up. It was revolutionary.

As I grew up, I became aware of things like AIM, online forums, and social media. My world expanded!

 But my parents were terrified of these sites. All they knew were the horror stories of children being abducted because of interactions with creepers online or the pop-ups that would give your computer a virus.

We finally got "real" Internet five years ago, when I was a junior in high school. But after all that time, and the things I'd learned from my parents, I was still cautious, perhaps even scared, about being online. I still am cautious. I triple check things before I post. I try to find a balance between sharing enough so a future employer can contact me and holding back enough so a stalker can't attack me.

So of all people, I should be the one who shies away from the ads, including programmatic ones, that seem to infiltrate our lives and know what websites or products we were just looking at online.

But I don't.

I wholeheartedly believe in personal freedoms. I believe in privacy, of one's home and one's interactions online. I am often one who craves simplicity and being away from technology so I can escape the commercialism.

And yet, I love advertising. I hate being sold to, and I hate being told what I should want, need, and value in my life. But I love interactions with brands, being shown deals and coupons relevant to what I am seeking, or being entertained or informed by an advertisement. I believe ads are a necessity in our world, and I applaud the companies that are financially successful and/or produce effective advertising.

So how do I balance this, and what does this have to do with programmatic advertising?

Recently, people have become aware of their privacy (or lack thereof) online. This is good! Everyone should be educated about how to be safe and smart online. Programmatic ads utilize cookies and data of users, and with this renewed desire for security, there have been mentions and rumblings about whether or not programmatic buying will cross any privacy lines (especially in the UK with their data privacy legislation—see more here). Some have even posited that this is ethically wrong! However, privacy issues and data collection are not exclusive to programmatic buying, and sometimes the blurring of this line can be a positive thing for advertisers and consumers.

While there is still much for me to discover about the programmatic buying method, the reasons why I am so attracted to programmatic buying is because
1. It is efficient (unlike our encyclopedia set!)
and 2. It meets the needs of consumers and advertisers.

Advertisers Gain Meaningful Impressions and Consumers Gain Meaningful Information
Advertisers are able to cater their ads to people who may actually care about their product if data about these consumers is utilized. Money is not wasted on impressions or leads that will go nowhere. Consumers benefit because they are served with ads they actually care about. I recently got married, and was on what felt like an endless hunt for the perfect vests for my groom and the groomsmen. After multiple fruitless Google searches (in which I was obviously being "watched"), I was served with multiple small ads on Facebook for black, male vests. I saw the ads, clicked on them, and while I did not purchase the specific one in the ad, I did end up buying our vests from Macy's (and they looked awesome!). Win-win!

Consumers are Never Actually Identified
An advertiser or algorithm may see the different sites I visit in a day, but they never actually see me. Any identifying information is stripped from its data in advertising technology (though apparently identification does happen in rare cases in which consumer opt-in has been obtained). There are several organizations used for self-regulation by digital advertising agencies to avoid unethical collection of data, and there are always programs and technologies that allow consumers to opt-out of digital tracking.

The Internet and Its Content Remains Free 
Advertisers are paying for sites to remain open, for publishers and writers to have salaries, and for consumers to access content for free. If I am able to access what I want online and only be bothered by a few sidebar ads, I consider that a relatively low cost in exchange for the the content provided.

We should definitely be smart consumers and contributors online and be aware of the risks and issues involved with privacy and data collection. However, I personally am excited to see the benefits brought to the table by smarter, more targeted, relevant, and efficient online advertising. Even as an overly cautious Internet user. But what do you think? Are you concerned about privacy issues with online advertising?

If you're interested in learning more about this issue and the multiple viewpoints presented, provided below are links to further reading:
Is Programmatic Buying Problematic Buying?
Targeted Online Advertisements: A Threat To Personal Identity And Security?How Will "Do Not Track" Affect the Programmatic Landscape?

Basics of Programmatic Media Buying

It’s a long, complicated phrase with a seemingly even more complicated meaning. However, programmatic media buying is also an important concept for media planners and buyers (and even students seeking a career in advertising in general) to understand. Programmatic buying is becoming a buzzword in the advertising industry, and while some controversies exist over its usefulness (that’s a different blog for a different day), there is no denying that buying online display ad space programmatically is starting a lot of conversations in the advertising world.


 But what exactly is it? A recent Millward-Brown study said that advertisers don’t even seem to know—60% of respondents said they “didn’t feel that the ad industry had an accurate and unified definition for the term.” So even though I don’t have direct experience with running a programmatic media buy*, I believe the concept is so important and relevant to advertising trends that it needs to be discussed and defined.

At its core, programmatic buying is simply a way to buy display ads online. 

Historically, advertisers had to manually purchase online display ad space by reaching out to specific websites and buying certain sizes of ads.

Source: callum.stephenson.710

Programmatic buying is a way to make this process more efficient and specific. 

A company that sells cooking products can certainly buy display ads on recipe sites. But with programmatic buying, the cooking products company can use data-driven insights of their typical consumer (say, a thirty-year old woman who also likes to do DIY crafts and has young children), and buy sites that have visitors that are “lookalikes” of this consumer.

Sites are able to tell who a consumer “is” by their previous search and browsing history, obtained through cookies and pixel tags.

Cookies are bits of code that are saved on a web browser and retrievable for other uses later. The cookies have a unique ID that is triggered on various sites, proving the users to be the same person.

Pixel tags refer to a small, invisible GIF pixel embedded in a page (such as the “thank you for purchasing” page on Amazon and other online commerce sites). These pixels can “read” the cookies on a site, as well, and discover further data about consumers by tracking the other sites they visit.

A computer and an algorithm execute programmatic buys. 

However, humans are still much needed in this process to help optimize the ads' targeting. Sometimes the buy will utilize real-time buying (RTB), which is an auction-like environment for buying impressions of display ads online. RTB methods only buy domains, but a programmatic buy can include specific pages on those domains (the weather section of a newspaper website, rather than the newspaper site as a whole).

Programmatic buys can also occur when the advertiser buys a certain amount of digital impressions from a website publisher beforehand.

Advertisers can also retarget their consumers. For example, a consumer who has recently visited a site, looked at a specific pair of shoes, but then did not buy ultimately the shoes can be "followed" around the web. This consumer will be served an ad featuring that specific pair of shoes. (These types of ads often show up on Facebook. You know, the creepy ones that make you swear someone was watching your every move?)

Advertisers are still able to set certain parameters when buying programmatically, as they would normally when considering how they will buy display ads. They can set the bid price, total budget spend, campaign flight dates, and similar specifics.


Having at least a general understanding of programmatic buying is beneficial. From here, we can see where programmatic is headed and the issues surrounding it.




*Full disclosure: I briefly shadowed employees at Amnet in New York City during the summer of 2014 to further understand and ignite my interest in programmatic media buying.