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Five Key Factors For Successful Programmatic Display Advertising

Because a (very) large part of the worlds’ population is surfing the web and visiting apps, the sheer reach/availability – the marketing-discipline; programmatic display advertising offers – is unmatched/unique.

If somebody visits a website or opens/uses an app, in most cases an ad can be served. Why? Because about 80-85% (estimates vary) of websites and apps earn money because they allow ads. With that, essentially, the same model of revenue is active today – as has been around for ages. How did the first newspapers (1605) earn money? Exactly; by allowing ads/commercial messages. The programmatic display advertising ecosystem is based on this very simple model. There is a difference, however. Instead of having to contact a website or app (publishers) manually to agree on the placement/cost of an ad; a Demand Side Platform can serve ads in thousands of different websites and apps – programmatically/automatically (in a matter of seconds). In this piece, we describe this incredible marketing-discipline and offer the following 5 key factors for successful programmatic display advertising.

1. Reach out to a Demand Side Platform (DSP) and make sure this DSP offers the following main abilities:

a. The DSP has an internally build bidder

b. The DSP has a strong, capable GEO-fencing tool

c. The DSP is connected to (or; integrated with) at least 20 to 25 adexchanges

2. Only serve professionally designed ads/banners, deploy a professional landing-page, use rich media banners and use the cheapest hosting options that are available

a. It’s highly recommended to only serve ads/banners that have been made by a professional.

b. The landing page must have a similar appearance as the ads/banners.

c. Use/serve rich media banners.

d. If you are going to deploy rich media ads in your campaign, make sure these are hosted with a ‘cheap’ hosting provider. 

e. Many Demand Side Platforms also offer in-house creative services.

3. Only use a DSP that offers full transparency

a. The days of receiving simplistic reports (e.g Excel) after your campaign is finished – are over.

b. You can also consider using your own tracking tool/platform.

4. Use a DSP that offers secondary tools – outside of the normal scope of functions a DSP offers

a. Brand safety tools are a necessity.

b. Footfall attribution methods to determine physical store visits from people (or devices) that have been served an ad/banner.

c. The DSP should be able to offer the full spectrum of targeting options that are legal and apparent in this industry.

d. It is very likely that you – as an agency, a marketer or brand owner – will like the results of programmatic display campaigns.

5. Use a vendor/DSP that has experience and willing to share knowledge

This might be difficult to determine (‘does the DSP I’m working with has a lot of campaign-experience?’), but is very important you work with a party that knows what they are doing and is willing to educate you along with the process/deployment of your campaigns. Even though – essentially – this whole industry just evolves around serving ads/banners between online content (for example; news-content), the industry, the possibilities and pitfalls are complex by nature. So how do you determine the DSP you use (or want to use) has sufficient experience and knowledge AND is willing to share this with you?

a. Full transparency in terms of campaign set-up, pricing and live results/analytics are things to base your search on – regarding finding the perfect DSP provider.

b. Ask if you can test the platform and if a refund is possible (when pre-pay is asked for) – in case you are not happy with the quality of the provided traffic.

c. Ask what brand safety measures are taken if you would deploy campaigns within the DSP of your choice.

d. Ask if backend reports of – for example – device ids (encrypted or raw) can be provided during and after the campaign.

e. Ask if you can get a publisher report. 

f. Ask if the DSP that interests you has experience with the high bounce-rate mobile traffic usually provides and knows how to decrease this metric (bounce-rate).

g. Request case studies.

h. Ask for trading references.

i. Last; go with your guts. If you don’t feel comfortable with the company (or representative of this company) – stop your activity with them

Originally posted by Isua Botman.

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