marketing in the programmatic age(e.g. ad exchanges, publishers, platforms), it’s clear that most...

MARKETING IN THE PROGRAMMATIC AGEROUNDTABLE SERIES

PRESENTED BY

IN THE

OF THEWORDS

MARKETERSTRENDS TO WATCH

DataXu | Business Development Institute 2

IN THE WORDS OF THE MARKETERS: TRENDS TO WATCH

IN THEIR OWN WORDS:

MOVING AT THE SPEED OF PROGRAMMATIC

Every day there’s talk of some new marketing tactic, tech innovation, or other challenge that will threaten (or increase) the adoption of programmatic marketing. As a marketer, keeping up with the ever-changing programmatic landscape is quickly becoming an essential requirement of your job. But how do you distinguish the hype from what’s actually meaningful to your organization?

Learning from one’s peers is often the best way to detect relevant signals in a mass of noise. Fortunately, when it comes to programmatic adoption and tactics, marketers are generous people, willing to freely share their insights so that the industry can move forward, quickly and efficiently.

The Marketing in the Programmatic Age roundtable series capitalizes on that generosity. The roundtables bring together senior executives and marketers from brands, agencies and publishers to explore the key issues and trends facing the industry from their point of view. We didn’t dictate the topics, nor did we attempt to steer the conversation; our job is to listen as participants speak frankly about their expectations, challenges and hopes for programmatic.

In 2014, DataXu hosted a total of 12 events across the country. The following topics emerged during the latter half of the series, called Trends to Watch:

1. Ad Fraud2. Transparency3. Viewability4. Measurement5. Data and Consumer Intelligence6. Omni-channel7. Best Practices for Adapting to the Programmatic Age

Data was a major topic of discussion throughout all of the 2014 events. Specifically, marketers in virtually every industry sector are keen to learn how to best analyze it, as well as put it to use in better understanding and engaging their prospects and customers.

SURVEY OF EXPERIENCE LEVELThe latter half of the series attracted participants who were familiar and experienced with programmatic tactics, as measured by pre-event surveys. Most described themselves as intermediate (44%) and advanced (37%). Only 19% of attendees claimed to be beginners. We found the self-assessments quite interesting, and as possible proof that the fast-paced nature of the programmatic industry is forcing marketers to get up to speed as quickly as possible.

This report summarizes the insights and experiences shared by nearly 300 marketers, by topic.

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...ON AD FRAUD

“Fraud has ripped the lid off the industry.” – Agency Executive

“It’s impossible for us, as an agency, to go out to the dozens of vendors to find out where the fraud is.” – Agency Executive

“Terry Kawaja said, there are the three companies with a total of 140 employees who are fighting fraud every day. There are 52,000 people in Russia that are doing this every minute.

There is no way to fight against that.” – Publisher Executive

When it comes to fraud, a central (and still unanswered) question is: Who is most responsible for ad traffic quality? Though many participants lay responsibility at the feet of specific industry sectors (e.g. ad exchanges, publishers, platforms), it’s clear that most marketers believe that fraud detection and protection are goals that must be tackled by every player in the ecosystem.

POLICING FRAUDParticipants debated who should take the lead in policing fraud. Some felt the programmatic platforms (both the ad exchanges and buy/sell-side platforms) should shoulder most of the responsibility. For instance, ad exchanges should adopt more stringent screening policies for determining which publishers can participate in their markets. Full-stack platforms, they noted, often have fraud detection and protection built in.

Some claimed that publishers aren’t doing enough to weed out fraud, and that advertisers should – in conjunction with a fraud-detection vendor – carefully screen which publishers they work with.

Advertisers, on the other hand, noted that, as the ones who foot the bill for the inventory, they should take an active role, and advocated for working closely with fraud-detection companies, and learning which tactics work best. Advertisers also need to realize that “you get what you pay for,” meaning one shouldn’t expect to pay low CPMs on a wide range of sites without encountering fraud.

But as one participant pointed out, advertisers are sometimes reluctant to accept a role in preventing fraud: “(Buyers) might have a site report they’ve been sending to their managers for a while. With fraud detection, they now have to go back to their managers and say, ‘you know all of the clicks we’ve seen – they were actually not people.’ It can be hard for some clients to see that and think about reworking metrics.”

WARINESS OF OPEN AD EXCHANGESNews reports finding that up to 30% of open exchange inventory is fraudulent are reaching the c-suite, and marketers are often asked what they’re doing about it.

The lack of anti-fraud controls is prompting large advertisers to shy away from open ad exchanges: “The big brands have turned away from open exchanges because this isn’t figured out. Many marketers say they can get (the inventory) they need from the top five publishers.”



INEVITABILITY OF INDUSTRY STANDARDSMany participants believe the industry will ultimately develop standards for fighting fraud, much the way it coalesced around solving the problem of viewability (still a work in progress).

PRIVATE MARKETPLACESPrivate marketplaces are seen as a safer haven for programmatic buying: “Private marketplaces aren’t always about price; they’re about access and control. In open markets, we lose control. For buyers, the best way to combat fraud is to work with publishers directly. We can use programmatic tools, data, and automated decision-making in a direct way to avoid fraud.”



...ON TRANSPARENCY

“Programmatic gives us the ability to determine for ourselves what’s premium. We have the data; we’ll tell you (the publisher) what’s premium and pay accordingly. That’s the promise of programmatic for

brands. When access to (publisher) data is closed off, my immediate question is – what are you hiding?” – Financial Services Executive

“It’s everyone’s problem and responsibility to understand how (programmatic) technology works. And having clear KPIs to understand I’m getting what I pay for, and where any breakdown is.”

– CPG Executive

“Where there is mystery, there is margin.” – Head of Procurement, Eli Lilly (at recent ANA conference)

Any discussion of transparency must begin with its definition: what is it exactly? To some marketers, it’s about price and inventory. For others, it’s tactics (i.e. asking how a particular vendor or partner achieves performance). The latter is a critical issue given that 73% of agencies and marketers work with 20 different vendors or more. Given this reality, vendor management is a huge challenge.

DEFINING TRANSPARENCYAccording to the participants, the promise of programmatic is transparency, shedding light on the supply chain, cost models, auction dynamics, and what constitutes a quality impression that’s worth a bid.

But transparency also begs a lot of questions, for instance, how much data can a marketer ingest and use to take specific actions? Explained one marketer: “Transparency comes with a burden, but it’s the right thing to do. Banner ads haven’t changed much, but now we have the data about what actually works. Transparency drives new solutions.”

In addition to the burdens, transparency drives opportunities. “If publishers are doing arbitrage on CPMs, they won’t be transparent about their inventory costs, or where they get that inventory from. In such cases, the publisher has no incentive to do what’s right for the client. They’re putting their margins above campaign performance. But transparency will align (client and publisher) goals in the most effective way.”

Additionally, a site may drive great results, but by definition, programmatic is limited to the amount of inventory that’s assigned in the bidding structure of the campaign: “Without transparency, buyers won’t know to directly approach publishers that are driving results to do a guaranteed buy in order to get more access to more inventory, or layer data and audience insight to ensure the right person is targeted at right time and with the right bid.”

Not surprisingly, buyers would like to see reports that work across all vendors and platforms, since this level of pan-reporting will lead to more transparency and more accurate measurement of results.

BE WARY OF PARTNERS STRUGGLING TO LOOK GOODEvery partner wants their contribution to a campaign to appear strong, leading some to obfuscate their data: “One publisher would only give us aggregate access or bits and pieces of data because it didn’t want to be compared to another publisher. It’s hard to work with publishers if they won’t let us make decisions and drive.”



CLIENTS MUST OWN THE DATAAdvertisers feel strongly that they should own the data since, “it’s where revenue comes from to fund the ad ecosystem.”

In many ways, data is the key to transparency, which is why advertisers demand unfettered access to it. Data is an essential asset to understanding the customer: “We need to have a full view of the customer. We need disaggregate data so we can assess which tactics works. The data has an impact on how we think about that customer from a paid media, ecommerce and lifetime value perspective. Data impacts all of these things. It’s the client’s money and data.”

But publishers aren’t always willing to share their data for business reasons: “We keep our data very closed. Consumers buy cars on average every 5-7 years, so we’re not giving that data away. We have a finite group of clients. Let us tell you our value story, and how consumers are three times more likely to buy from our site.”

OPEN VS. CLOSED SYSTEMSThe industry giants – Amazon, Google and Facebook – are changing the game by closing their systems to transparency. To some, this trend puts renewed importance on the role of the agency: “It goes back to media mix modeling and what works best for my client. Agencies will need to guide clients as to how and where to buy their media, and which data is necessary (to get results). The agency’s role will get back to basics to counsel brands.”

Learning how to work with the giants takes skill and learning: “Facebook Exchange works great when it’s combined with a DMP, so the marketer has all of his or her first-party in one place. But Facebook changes its formats seemingly every month, and it’s hard for technology companies to take advantage of new ad sizes and formats. Native formats work well, but then integrations can degrade the experience.”



...ON VIEWABILITY

“Viewability is the most uncomfortable conversation we have with clients. The industry can’t get agreement on what it is.”

– Agency Executive

“If my job is for eyeballs to see my ad, then that’s all I want to pay for. We need to align on metrics, standards, and technology, but we’re so far apart on agreeing what’s viewable.”

– Publisher Executive

“Using viewability as currency and saying everything has to be 100% viewable doesn’t make sense. It’s the wrong way to drive business for clients.”


Though participants believed that trading digital media based on viewability is inevitable, many see obstacles still in its path. For instance, there are no technical standards for measuring viewability, which is why different vendors report different viewability rates on the same inventory. Participants wondered how buyers are to purchase inventory when the tools can’t measure viewability on 100% of the impressions. Additionally, marketers believe that the MRC standard (i.e. 50% of an ad must be in view for at least one full second) is “paper thin.”

SETTING EXPECTATIONS FOR VIEWABILITYViewability ensures that consumers have a chance to see ads, but that’s no guarantee they’ll actually notice them: “Clients can turn on ABC and see their ads. The concept of paying for ads that people won’t see doesn’t connect.” Some participants refer to other media channels to put viewability into perspective: “Think about TV and how many people fast forward through ads on their DVRs. If you normalize banners or pre-roll video against radio or TV, it’s not such a problem.”

Others see the high expectations for viewability as a problem of the industry’s own making: “We made this world. We said, if you can’t measure it, it didn’t happen.”

What should we expect from viewability? For some marketers, the standard calls out for context: “Viewability has to match KPIs and business goals. If I’m seeing lots of clicks but have low viewability stats, it’s probably fraud.”

Finally, participants advised marketers to consider the costs of measuring viewability: “In a programmatic marketplace, everything comes at a cost. If you are spending $.30 tech fees to solve a 20% viewability problem, that doesn’t always make sense.”

TECHNICAL LIMITATIONSParticipants are well aware of the varying viewability counts recorded by multiple vendors, and the ramifications the disparity has on the process of trading media: “We looked across four vendors. Only 8% of served ads were marked as viewable by all vendors. This is a problem. New solutions need to be offered or (the industry needs to) rally behind one tech vendor.”

The limitations are felt on the sell-side as well: “The MRC has done a good job working with different (viewability) partners, but there is a big difference between them. One will show us as 84% viewable, and others only 62% because their



technology can’t view iFrames. We need to educate agencies on these variances. For example, is this ad unit above the fold viewable to you? Yes? Your tool measured that at just 9% viewable. (Agencies) shouldn’t make broad sweeping statements about viewability.”

VIEWABILITY AND QUALITYDoes viewability drive quality? Many participants saw a definite link between the two: “From a shopper marketing perspective, content grows in importance. As native gains traction, we look at what’s more viewable and how to find the optimal mix. From a publisher’s perspective, there’s an understanding of how to place ads around content, and to be more aware of the audience.”

Yet other marketers warn against equating viewability with quality: “The current viewability standard is paper thin. (Buyers) should be diligent and ask publishers for a higher standard. An ad needs to be viewable for more than a second to be valuable for advertisers.”

Another says quality requires publisher intervention: “The buy is only as good as how it’s set up.”

Still others say quality begins with the fundamentals: “It all starts with audience … seeing an ad on a site that doesn’t make sense is a prospecting problem.”

FRAUD AND VISIBILITYDiscussion of fraud is often mixed with viewability, but not all participants felt the two are that closely entwined: “Viewability is a bigger concern than fraud; 30% of ads are not viewable. Just .01% of ads are bot clicks. ROI is key.”

One of the participants engages the services of a viewability and fraud-detection vendor, but still doesn’t see a strong correlation between the two: “Viewability is important but the standards aren’t there. If an ad isn’t cause and effect to a sale, it wasn’t effective and will get thrown out.”



...ON MEASUREMENT

“With programmatic we’ve found you can do just about anything a client wants. But the questions become, should you, and how will it benefit client goals?”


“The end game is a shared model – all pieces that touch have an assigned value. We’re still a long way from that.”


“I have a hard time confirming that Facebook drives conversions for ecommerce.” – B2C Marketer

“Clients need to look at attribution more than once a quarter. Our goal is to use and implement models so that there is a relationship between the types of media we purchase

and our clients’ campaign objectives.” – Agency Executive

Can everything truly be measured in digital? It’s a topic that participants spend a lot of time thinking about (and explaining to their clients and CEOs). Among the participants there’s a sense that there is no magic bullet – no single metric or KPI on which they can rely to definitively say a campaign or tactic was a success. Rather, each campaign needs a specific set of KPI’s that relate directly to the business. Additionally, the goal of campaigns – and consequently the measurements of interest – continues to evolve. Today, marketers are more interested in how and why consumers engage with a brand, and are beginning to focus on new types of metrics beyond conversions.

LIMITATIONS OF LAST CLICKLast click, long the workhorse of digital measurement, is no longer useful for marketers. “For branding, we talk about the length of eyeballs on an ad, as well as the other actions consumers take after seeing an ad. Last click doesn’t measure all the value that an ad creates. There are serious limitations to the metric.”

One participant called last-click the bane of his existence: “Lots of brands are pushing publishers to last click attribution, and it’s the bane of my existence. They say they spent 250k impressions and got zero back, but the idea of last click is flawed and has sizable errors. We put more stock in view-through and assisted conversions, which are more organic.”

Another participant cited a financial services company that saw an inverse correlation between clicks and buying activity; consumers who clicked on an ad were less likely to purchase a product.

Worst of all, optimizing on click-through rate (CTR) invites fraud: “If you use last-touch or last-click attribution on a plan and you eliminate fraud, you will hurt your metrics.”

METRICS SHOULD PROVIDE CUSTOMER INSIGHTSIf everything in digital can be measured, marketers are growing impatient with metrics that essentially measure a line in the sand. Some see metrics as just one component to value, asking: “What’s more important: end campaign metrics, context, or audience?”



For example, cost-per-action (CPA) tells a marketer how many people took a specific action, but sheds no insight as to whether an ad’s message was effective, or if it led to an increase in sales. “We use media-mix modeling, which we continually review to ensure it provides the data we need. We also partner with offline data providers to understand if we got sales lift from a particular message or creative.”

Not surprisingly, many marketers look at multiple data points to assess campaign performance: “We focus on audience and acquisition targets. Engagements can be assigned a cost to determine if the client is paying the right price for the audience they’re buying.”

ENGAGEMENT NOW A KEY GOALProgrammatic provides a tremendous opportunity for marketers to understand what motivates prospects and customers – a benefit that is driving how campaigns are measured: “The change is that the evaluation metrics are changing. We’re adopting more non-direct response metrics, which provide insights into audiences. For example, we’re working with a large financial services brand, whose digital goals are moving from conversion to pure engagement metrics. Now we’re asking: ‘What is the right engagement?’ The goal is changing from, ‘what is the path to purchase?’ to ‘how do I understand and engage my customer?’”

CUSTOM KPIs ON THE RISECustom KPIs go a long way in helping marketers measure campaign success and to glean actionable insights, though such KPIs also demand custom data solutions: “We’ll see a shift from generic KPIs to ones that are customized to individual clients. But these KPIs demand more end data, such as loyalty or sale data.”

One publisher goes as far as to offer a money-back guarantee if KPIs aren’t met – a make-good the publisher hasn’t had to do very often. The reason? A total focus on optimizing on the right KPIs: “It’s not how we optimize the campaign, but how we work with the client to choose the right KPIs; ones that steer real business results. When we do more audience targeting, we’ll need to optimize segments to drive sales.”

LINKING DIGITAL ADS TO SALESEvery CEO wants to know how much revenue digital campaigns generate, which can put pressure on marketers to focus on low-funnel tactics: “It’s hard to measure upper funnel tactics. As soon as you focus on metrics that aren’t driving sales, you’ll get in trouble. Executives will say you’re spending too much money here, and what did it do for sales?”

Additionally, standard metrics can’t link ads to sales. Asked one participant: “Is it a Facebook post, then a Tweet, then a text message that drove a consumer to purchase?” Although digital is measurable, brands need to update their infrastructure and tracking models to assess which marketing initiatives actively contribute to sales. “Every brand should have the capabilities to measure everything together.”

KPIs shouldn’t be a guarded secret, either. In fact, they should be leveraged to promote further cooperation between the buy side and sell side: “I share the same KPIs with publisher partners and buying partners so everyone is on the same page. If they don’t help me hit my numbers, they are off the plan.”

CHOOSING A PRIMARY METRICAs noted earlier, optimizing a campaign on clicks invites fraud. Some of the roundtable participants noted that clients try to counter click fraud by trying to drive viewability: “If you ask a publisher to optimize for viewability and clicks, then you’re asking for two, distinct metrics that aren’t compatible. We counsel clients on how to set up campaigns for each metric.”Marketers also see viewability as a guidepost; a way to ensure that their campaigns are on track: “We use viewability as a goal. If it’s really low, something is wrong.”



ATTRIBUTIONAttribution will ultimately help marketers assess the true impact of their full suite of initiatives on their businesses: “We need to get back to true business impact. What’s a true conversion? If traffic drives actual business results, if it’s loyal people returning to buy from your business, you can track that with your CRM. You can also see how display or video assists in that purchase through your attribution model.”

One participant noted that problems arise when the end advertiser and marketing execution tech partner aren’t in direct communication: “Where it breaks down is if the client has an objective and the agency is going after different metrics, and the publisher or tech partner doesn’t know what (results) the client wanted to achieve. It’s the client’s responsibility to know what’s happening along the path.”



...ON DATA & CONSUMER INTELLIGENCE

“Programmatic is what will take digital from being below the line functionality and make it the most above the line turning it into the lead.”


“Programmatic helps us to shift clients away from campaigns to audience management, and how they manage customers through the entire lifecycle.”


“Data is gold. I want to be Uber, not Yellow Cab.” – Agency Executive

Data is top of mind among our participants. Specifically, marketers in virtually every industry sector are keen to learn how to best analyze it, as well as put it to use in better understanding and engaging their prospects and customers. One of the biggest challenges is consolidating (and activating) data across devices and channels in order to get a unified view of the customer, as well as the buying journey.

DATA CHANGES THE WAY WE PURCHASE MEDIAProgrammatic marketing, driven by data, is radically changing the way media is purchased. One agency executive said data has redefined how organizations are oriented: “The potential of programmatic is to change what clients ask for … (it’s) a new way to buy but with complexity; to use the data we have in a smarter way.”

Programmatic also encourages publishers to open up their audience data (as well as tap into a new revenue stream): “If you’re looking for a person rather than an impression, then publishers will want to provide that data because buyers want to buy it.”

But with all things digital, fragmentation is a concern: “Our biggest issue is internal fragmentation. Getting internal teams aligned and data sources together to support media buys and targeting is important, and one of the first things one should do.”

BEYOND DIGITAL MARKETINGFor many participants, digital marketing is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to leveraging data. Many see it affecting many parts of the organization, such as product development.

THE VALUE OF INTENT DATA“How will marketers’ roles change? It used to be that content was king. Now it’s all about intent and intent data, knowing when a consumer is in-market for a car, and uniquely identifying that consumer across devices.”

CROSS-PLATFORM DATAMarketers struggle to manage cross-site, cross-device and cross-platform data. “How do you manage IDs across devices and datasets?” Additionally, they want to leverage their first-party consumer data beyond their own web properties: “How (do we use it) to go beyond our walls to find our consumers?”



THE WALLED GARDENS OF FACEBOOK, GOOGLE AND AMAZONThe programmatic industry recognizes the value of data, and whoever has the most, wins. This reality is leading many of the industry giants to keep a tight lid on their data. These companies sit on huge datasets, data that can provide insights into the customer journey, and do cross-device matching. “If I can’t get user-level data from Facebook or Google, how do I make up for that gap from analytics perspective (so I can) understand the buyer journey?”

Still, some marketers are finding their way around the walled gardens: “We use first-party data with Facebook in a transparent way to get to target consumers. For instance, we can use client sales data from offline purchases.”

And marketers are turning to other companies who haven’t walled off their gardens: “Other companies are marrying cross-device with Wi-Fi data to get better targeting.”

MIND THE WEATHERThere’s no escaping the weather, and marketers are using that to their advantage: “Weather data creates unique insights and valuable segments. After all, weather affects everything, so we’ll look at weather and client data together to see there are correlations. If there are relevant weather conditions in affect, we’ll serve the relevant ads at that time. We’re been doing this for a few years now with many advertisers.”

BIG DATA AND CAMPAIGN PERFORMANCEBig data can help marketers select the right creatives and messages that resonate with individual consumers, though doing so is a massive endeavor. Some partners aren’t daunted, however, and are moving forward with these types of projects: “Our concept is to measure performance across each audience segment, against a list of KPIs, regardless of creative, words and images. If we can do that, we can see and understand the normalization of various inputs, which gives us the opportunity to say these words resonate with this audience segment, or these pictures don’t resonate with that audience. The technology is there, but what do you feed into it to know what works? We’re at least a year out from having a solution that is measurable. But that’s our data-driven approach.”

But some marketers caution that data-driven approaches to creative must be handled with care: “We’ll get to a point when we’ll know that this consumer likes this type of emotion. It’ll get a little creepy, being able to activate on that type of data.”



...ON OMNI-CHANNEL

“Do you make distinction between mobile, display and video? Do you classify media differently? Or is it just one a big pool of inventory?”

– Publisher Executive

Consumers pay no regard to channel distinctions, and marketers are eager to catch up to them in that regard. In fact, to many marketers, inventory is inventory, and they eagerly anticipate a fully seamless, cross-platform world. Though great strides have been made towards achieving cross-platform matching, the solutions to date are proprietary. Ultimately, marketers would like to see a pan-industry approach, which, of course, incorporates programmatic TV.

INVENTORY IS INVENTORYMarketers are keen to breakdown inventory channel silos, as they know all too well that their customers interact with their brands from multiple devices and media. One participant asked: “Do you make distinction between mobile, display, and video? Do you classify media differently? Or is it one a big pool of inventory?”

Another added: “Our agency takes a media-neutral approach for clients. In our point of view, there are no channels since they’re all converging. We’re hiring differently today than we did five years ago, because as marketers we need to think differently. We can’t just hire MarCom people anymore.”

CROSS-DEVICE IDs: NOT QUITE READY FOR PRIME TIMEMarketers are keenly aware of the difficulty inherent in cross-device identity management, and feel that it’s not quite there yet: “Display is low-hanging fruit. The next rung is cross-device targeting so we can pinpoint consumers with sequential messaging and media.”

While some big industry names have made great progress in cross-device identity management, each has developed a unique approach. Marketers would like to see a more pan-industry approach so that they can streamline their operations: “Can someone solve (cross-device identification) for the industry? Google, Facebook, Acxiom/LiveRamp are developing their own solutions. How do the rest of us identify unique users if every partner we work with has a different solution?”

MOBILE IS THE HARD PARTMany feel that mobile is the biggest hurdle holding back true cross-device marketing: “We’re working towards cross-platform, but the difficulty is identifying mobile consumers and video consumers as one or different individuals. And ad formats play into this confusion. We’re exploring ways to get to cross-platform data targeting but we’re not there yet.”

For marketers of big-ticket items, mobile presents unique challenges: “Mobile is hard because few consumers purchase high-value items on their smartphones. Using cross-device data to target consumers from mobile back to tablets or desktops would be valuable.”

In contrast, marketers have an easier time incorporating video into their media mix: “Video is more like display, not a frontier, just another ad unit.”



PROGRAMMATIC TV IS A SLEEPING GIANTMany pundits say that 2015 will be the year of programmatic and connected TV, although the participants were a bit more circumspect as to what it means for them in the short term: “Programmatic TV is still in infancy, and the industry has to get there before marketers can get there. We see lots of testing to get ready for it, but it is still two years away.”

Whether or not programmatic TV is near-term or far off, marketers are very much aware of its ability to transform the programmatic industry: “TV is the big industry that will change. Live events will benefit; after all, there’s a reason why (the cost of) sporting rights are going through the roof.”

Who will benefit the most once programmatic TV goes mainstream? Marketers predict interesting times ahead: “It’ll benefit the cable companies. Any company that can provide a connection between content and the consumer will be in a unique position. It’s already playing out with streaming services. Interesting times are coming.”

And who may lose ground? Participants worry for companies that can’t consolidate and leverage their data: “The content owners could (lose) if they can’t accumulate data. Does TV and content everywhere get the benefit of data collection, or are they at the mercy of getting access to others providers’ data?”



...ON ADAPTING TO THE PROGRAMMATIC AGE

“Open exchange as a concept is not long for this world. We’re circling around a three to five publisher inventory universe.”


“According to Yahoo, the opposite of programmatic is not premium but manual.” – DataXu Executive

“Beware of things that are packaged up too good to be true. A lot of people are selling the same thing with fancy names. Getting the right partners to help educate on what the right things to buy are will

save you a ton of money.” – Agency Executive

When it comes to sharing best practices, key take-aways and predictions, we thought it best to simply provide the marketers’ own words:

BEST PRACTICESFocus on the Basics. “Now matter how you’re buying, it comes down to the basics: measure KPIs, optimize your plan, and use programmatic as a new way to buy rather than changing your goals for it.”

Understand Measurement. “Understand how to put strategy and tactics in place, as well as how to measure (programmatic) against other marketing initiatives. Measurement is huge, and you need to understand what you can achieve incrementally and learn as you go.”

Get Closer to the Data. “No matter where or who you are, you need to get closer to the data from a transparency perspective. Know who the buyers are. Use a test and learn approach. Know which levers to pull, and what works and what doesn’t.”

Be a Programmatic Leader. “Don’t be afraid of the unknown. Talk about Deal ID, and what works with private marketplaces. Understand there are large degrees of unknown. Push your data partners and DSP vendors to be more nimble to get beyond their comfort zones.”

Centralize on One Platform. “For (our brand), we found standardizing on one platform helped to eliminate fraud, cookie bombing, etc. One platform will be really important.”

Ask Your DSP Questions. There are a lot of the DSPs and they can sound the same. Ask your DSP partner specific questions, such as: What are your differentiation points? What do your algorithms look like? How are you innovating? Who are your data scientists?

TAKE-AWAYSThe Era of Iterative Testing is Upon Us. “The time for testing and incrementality is over. It’s about iterative testing. For big advertisers, testing is on your dime so make it count.”



Opportunities for Small Budgets. “Programmatic allows for democratization of low-cost media buys for small brands. Big players probably want to do the reverse.”

In-House Programmatic. “Price is the main driver (for in-house programmatic). We have a limited budget to work with, so we need to be really smart with how we spend it. With video, it’s easy to execute in house.”

“Optimizing directly (through the platform) is great because we’re closer to the data. Our teams intimately know the needs of the client. With an auto client, we used managed services and implemented frequency caps, but we ultimately moved to self-serve because we were better able to understand upper versus lower funnel actions. Once we had that insight, we optimized our frequency capping through test and learn, and we’re able to better allocate those dollars throughout the funnel.”

Direct Deals and Pricing. “Reach out to individual publishers. In the past, publishers were reluctant to let big brands know they could buy (their inventory) for $2.25 on an exchange, for example. We wanted you to buy it directly for $10. Getting past that is big.”

“You have more leverage to negotiate on price – along with additional transparency – when going with a publisher-direct deal. If I can get (inventory) for $1.25 rather than $10, then that’s where I’ll maximize my budget in order to get more reach and to drive more sales in my stores.”

Agencies and Data. “From a data and analytics perspective, should marketers rely on the agency? The answer depends on the data you have. It helps to have someone within your company to work with the agency. If you don’t know what data you have, hire a consultant who can help you answer that question.”

PREDICTIONSA recent forecast by Magna Global predicts that investments in global programmatic will rise 52% this year to $21 billion and reach $53 billion by 2018. The participants had strong opinions on the drivers behind the rapid industry growth.

Programmatic Growth. “Programmatic will grow in 2015 as the vendors learn who has budgets that can be applied to programmatic, and as brands bring programmatic in-house. The bigger brands will still use agencies, but they’ll apply pressure to keep the costs low. After all, brands now know how much things cost.”

Google and Data. “Google wants to maximize its profits to justify a high stock price. Facebook won’t want to open up its data and give up its profits. Brands have the opportunity to move their budgets if a particular publisher platform isn’t working. They’ll change how they work so brands don’t pull budgets and move to a competitor.”

Consumers and Brands. “I predict there will be a new social contract between consumers and brands. It isn’t privacy; it will be contextual. Consumer will say, ‘use my data to deliver more relevant content to me.’”

“Consumers will start to think about how they can monetize their own data trails. How can marketers better incentivize that type of behavior?”



...ON ADAPTING TO THE PROGRAMMATIC AGE (continued)

“Proctor & Gamble negotiated upfront agreements with over 100 publishers. You can’t do that programmatically, or without human intervention.”


“Marketers try to determine which channel is best. In the past, that determination was 80% planning and 20% execution. Programmatic has flipped that equation.”

– Healthcare Executive

“Marketing is becoming more self-service, but it’s also more complex than it used to be.” – Agency Executive

Buying 100% Programmatic. “That’s a long way off, if it ever happens. Google says it’s working to buy 60% of media for their own ads programmatically – it’s challenging.”

Programmatic’s Impact on TV. “There is $650 billion is at stake. For the first time in its history, the TV upfronts went down. Programmatic is starting to have an impact. But marketers are typically three years behind consumers in regards to communication, as we saw with social media.”

INCREASED FLEXIBILITY IN MARKETING SPEND“Just 90% of Super Bowl ads are sold (three months out). With programmatic, clients can be more dynamic and iterative with their budgets to drive results. They don’t need the upfronts and to plan media buys for the whole year. The biggest challenge is to merge offline and online teams. We’ll still have experts and specialists.”

MARKETERS NEED TO ADAPT TO CHANGE“We need to challenge teams to change fast. For example, the TV team should always be thinking video.”

“Healthcare marketing grew out of PR. All other initiatives are new, and not many (in healthcare) do digital marketing well. But it’s changing; it’s no longer all about earned media. Healthcare is moving to be more consumer-oriented.”

NOT 100% AUTOMATED“Although programmatic is automated, human intervention is still required. For instance, campaigns require active management; you can’t expect a machine to do it all for you.”

BRANDS AND AGENCIES WORKING TOGETHER“How can brands be better consumers of agency services? They need to ask the hard questions.”

“Brands need to keep up with industry evolution. We are frequently updating targets, tactics and the best platforms to find the right consumers.”

CLIENT EDUCATION“Some clients want to know more than others. Internally, we work to get everyone across the agency up to speed.”



UNDERSTANDING THE CONSUMER“Consumers don’t want to be interrupted. As a result, marketers need to change the marketing mindset.”

“Consumers will become their own CMO in regards to privacy. They’ll evaluate the privacy trade-off for the benefit.”

PRIVATE MARKETPLACES (PMPS)“Brands and agencies have embraced PMPs because they offer a lot of strategic value. The strategic approach is important, not just the price point.”

“(In) embracing programmatic, we see a shift in emphasis. On open exchanges, focus is on media efficiencies. With PMPs, clients value operational efficiency and unified reporting.”

“Open exchanges are still an opportunity. We’re not managing the demand we have well enough. A PMP is a step on the way to something else; it’s complex, manual and painful. There will be a differential between auction and guaranteed buys, but all of it will automated. The debate isn’t simply open versus private. It may also include a certain amount of hybridization – in other words, the number of sellers and buyers working in a hybrid manner – controlling both biddable and non-biddable. The more we see that, the more we’ll see a collapse in the market because it’ll be based on client needs, as well as the recommendations from publishers as to how they can best use their inventory to get to the KPIs the client wants.”

CHANNEL CONFLICT WITHIN PUBLISHERS“We’ve had zero conflict with programmatic versus the direct sales channel internally. Programmatic is here, and we have to deal with it. In fact, we’ve had to massively embrace it. As a result, we’ve experienced no sales channel conflict.”

CREATIVES & MESSAGING“The promise is amazing. We do a lot of dynamic creative optimization. There is maturity in display, but once the technology is in place for mobile and other channels, the (agency) creatives will get really excited.”

“For clients who have really interesting content, how do we marry it with massive multivariate testing to engage people? That’s what the creatives think about – people. We’re still a year or two away from bringing it to life. The idea is to get great content on a regular basis served to the right person at the right time. It’s the machine on the back end that’s the most challenging. How do you create 1,000 display ads that are useful? How do you create 1,000 video ads customized to individual consumer - as an industry, we’re not quite there.”



WHAT’S NEXT?

Due to the heightened concern about data, the 2015 series, Marketing in the Programmatic Age: The Power of Data, will dive into the opportunities and challenges that data presents, and look at how today’s top marketers are getting the most out of their data to drive results.

We’ll kick off the first half of the 2015 roundtable series in March (through June). The second half of the roundtable series will start in September and run through November.

We’ll make 12 stops across the United States including Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Denver, Los Angeles, New York, and San Francisco. Check www.dataxu.com or www.BDIonline.com for the current schedule.

Care to share your input or participate as a panelist or attend at an upcoming roundtable? Email Denise Vardakas-Styrna at [email protected] or contact Steve Etzler at [email protected].

INTERESTED IN LEARNING MORE ABOUT DATAXU?DataXu is a petabyte scale marketing cloud that enables marketers to better understand and engage their customers. Powered by Active Analytics™, our patented approach to Programmatic Marketing, the DataXu Marketing Cloud is a suite of applications that transform big data into better customer experience – at the speed of life. Our software helps marketers focus their marketing investments and achieve optimal results across all available media formats, devices, channels, and buying modes. With thirteen offices in nine countries, DataXu is powering the digital transformation of the world’s most valuable brands.

Visit dataxu.com for more information or contact us at [email protected].

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