Before we dive in, programmatic marketing is using technology to target specific, hyper-targeted users (behaviorally, demographically, or geographically) that will help advertisers meet their end goal across display, native, CTV, audio, and video formats.
Adsense in 2013
I recall sitting in a conference nearly a decade ago, hearing about the new hottest thing – “programmatic marketing”. In 2013 Google released their ad network called Adsense, the backbone of which was actually purchased by Google in 2008 (Doubleclick). Since that time, things have become “more programmatic” in how they work. Back in 2013, Adsense was almost, but not quite, programmatic.
2020, High Adoption but Leaving Money on the Table
Fast forward to today and programmatic has become mainstream with nearly 85% of all digital advertising now being purchased in a programmatic way. Yet, we speak with dozens of companies a week that are not fully utilizing programmatic. They might be leveraging technology to make their media purchases, yet they are not hyper-targeting their audience nearly as effectively as they could be.
Here are the top 3 problems I see with programmatic execution:
- Targeting, but Not Hyper-Targeted
Overlaying search, geographic, demographic, & behavior data is just the start. Most companies are not making good use of those programmatic capabilities and even more, companies are not getting the most out of their site retargeting or CRM files. - Using All the Delivery Options
We see remarkable results when companies utilize display, digital video, audio, native and connected TV. When you are confident you are hyper-targeting your audience, it’s not the time to be squirmy about going “all-in” on communicating the value proposition for your company via all mediums. Very few people respond to just Display, but the combination of display, video, audio, native, & CTV is generally potent. - Bad Data
If there is one thing I have learned in programmatic, it is that data is never created equal. Most companies rely upon “all-in-one” digital marketing shops that are using subpar data to buy programmatically. I’ve made it my life mission to help companies find pure, recent data that is accurate to the targeting they seek. Do not let companies squander your budgets in the name of “saying you are doing programmatic” but then letting them spend the media programmatically using insufficient data.
Above The Fold focuses on one thing, programmatic. We focus on programmatic because it’s our passion, it’s one of the most effective forms of marketing, and we are the experts at it. If you’d like to jump on a call to talk about your programmatic strategies, we’d love to help. We are offering a free 30-minute consultation to discuss your specific programmatic needs. We can help you assess how you are doing and what it will make programmatic your winning channel this year.