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Do Digital Media Agencies Have a Plan?
Digital agencies used to get paid for unpacking an incredibly complicated digital landscape for marketers. Faced with all kinds of new marketing opportunities, advertisers turned to savvy digital agencies to figure out where to spend their money, and how much of it to dedicate to display, mobile and social channels. The dingy little secret was that the agencies didn’t really plan much of anything. The way it worked was that agency planners would make an Excel template, create an RFP document, instruct the media owners to send back all kinds of creative ideas and fill out the media plan template. RFPs sent publisher teams spinning into action, churning out exciting-looking PowerPoints with screenshots and suggested spending levels. Not much of this was scientific. Publishers often promised more inventory than could be delivered, knowing they would never get the full budget allocation. Agencies asked for various “budget levels,” knowing they would allocate only $50,000 per publisher – but asking to see [...]
Ad Tech Investors Are Wasting Millions on Buyer Interfaces
Sell-side technology vendors building buyer interfaces are destined for failure because they ignore the needs of the media buyer.
Know These 5 AdTech Memes for 2014
Well, at least it’s not the “year of mobile” again. Or, maybe it is. After several days of media investment banking conferences (Gridley and JEGI), I can reliably report that 2014 will be “the year” of many uber-trends ,some of which will enrich the M&A bankers who have a focus on the increasingly frothy ad technology and marketing space. Here are five memes to consider: “Mobile First” If you were to believe every ad tech panelist, you might be inclined to throw your laptop in the East River. Apparently—despite desktop only slightly starting to lose overall time-spent share to mobile on a year-over-year basis—nobody is developing ad tech solutions for the desktop anymore. Everyone is “mobile first,” meaning that they are writing code for tablet and mobile phone browsers and apps before developing solutions for the poor laptop or desktop computer. Of course, mobile devices are showing explosive growth, and clearly where the majority of consumers’ time will be found [...]
Here’s Why 86% of Digital Media Planners Still Use Excel
Why do they media planners stick with Excel when other options exist despite its well-known shortcomings? Here are reasons from the iMedia Agency Summit.
The Nuts and Bolts of Programmatic Direct
An interview with Econsultancy’s Monica Savut and Bionic's Chris O'Hara, on his recently published programmatic direct whitepaper. Econsultancy: Why now? In other words, why has this “programmatic direct” trend been on the radar lately? What’s driving all of the conversation the space? Chris O’Hara: It’s really something my boss Joe Pych calls the “Sutton Pivot,” inspired by the famous thief Willie Sutton who robbed banks “because that’s where the money was.” Over 70% of digital display dollars are transacted in a very manual way today. Despite all the LUMAscape hype over RTB, most of the digital money still gets transacted through the request-for-proposal (RFP) process. Everybody wants a piece of the action, hence the “Sutton pivot,” in which all the ad tech companies are running to try and provide automation technology for directly sold deals. It’s actually a good thing. Today’s process for buying guaranteed digital media can take over 40 steps and suck up over 10% of media budgets just in [...]
The Tiger in the Bathroom: Agency Hangover
Digital media agencies face a challenge similar to the cast of The Hangover because they lack an agency information repository.
Programmatic Direct Isn’t Just About Efficiency
When you are selling anything, it’s really easy to get caught up in pitching the benefits of your product, and ad technology is no different. Some of today’s new programmatic direct marketing solutions promise to change the very nature of how media buyers and sellers spend their time. Demand side systems are focusing on replacing Excel and e-mail with web-based, centralized systems that take the manual grunt work out of buying. Supply-side systems are tying into publisher ad servers to help create more streamlined access to inventory, without the hassles of secure it via paper insertion orders. While it’s easy to focus on all of the amazing efficiency benefits offered by today’s web-based solutions, it’s also critical to remember to ask your client what’s important to them. On a recent sales call to a large agency, my old-school sales training kicked in. After showing off all of the neat bells and whistles of my software, I asked the company’s Chief [...]
A Fresh Attempt to Slay the $31.5 Billion Digital Advertising Workflow Monster
The digital advertising industry is wasting $3.6 million dollars per hour with inefficient manual processes. Despite the high risk of failure, Google, Centro, Facilitate, Mediaocean, Bionic, and others are making fresh attempts to solve the complicated digital media planning dilemma.
Agency Operating Systems are the New Battleground
With the inefficiencies in digital media buying today, your agency’s operating system is becoming a critical factor in winning new business, hiring the best talent, and operating profitably.
Digital Media Enters the Bionic Age
As we approach the 19th anniversary of the first banner ad, Digital Media Planning is entering its third age: The Bionic Age.