Thursday, September 1, 2011
Q&As from Last Week’s Webinar: Buying Display Ad Inventory
View the PowerPoint deck from last week’s webinar, Buying Display Ad Inventory, below.
Thank you again to those of you who joined us for last week’s eMarketer webinar, “Buying Display Ad Inventory,” and to TRUSTe for sponsoring. We wanted to take a moment to address some of the outstanding questions we received that we weren’t able to cover during the webinar:
Question: What are the best inventory sources for a targeted campaign with a direct-response goal?
Answer: It’s important to remember there are benefits and caveats to each type of inventory, so what is best-performing for one marketer might perform much differently for another dependent on everything from individual direct-response goals to type of audience to type of product.
Oftentimes, direct-response marketers find that ad exchange inventory, purchased through an RTB, can give them the target audience they’re seeking at a relatively low price? But, publisher sites might also prove effective for capturing an audience that is highly motivated to purchase a product; however, the CPM associated with these sites could put it out of reach for an aggressive CPA goal. Conversely, inventory from a DSP might be the most cost efficient, but it may not perform as well – again, dependent on your objectives, product type and audience.
Question: Would it be beneficial to use a DSP or buy direct from a publisher if you are doing more localized buys within certain DMAs?
Answer: Taking the time to determine the most important campaign criteria and objectives can help determine whether a DSP or a publisher-direct buy (or a combination of both) would best benefit your brand with a local buy.
Publisher-direct buys from local sites such as regional newspapers and media sites can help to marry local site content with a local audience. But, if site content or context is less important and price is most important, a DSP might be the way to go. However, keep in mind this type of programmatic buying is highly algorithmic. Like any model, it will take many impressions (and, ultimately money) to begin to model accurately, so advertisers with smaller budgets might not reap full benefits.
Question: Can you do contextual targeting on most ad networks? Or is it only Google?
Answer: Many networks beyond Google will allow for contextual targeting; however, the level and quality of contextual targeting could vary from network to network.
Question: Where do social network giants Facebook and Twitter fit into the display inventory provider landscape?
Answer: Many social network sites that have begun to sell display –Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn – would most likely fall into the publisher category at this stage, largely because advertisers most often can only purchase inventory site direct. However, unlike many publishers that sell inventory on a CPM basis, social networks are also selling inventory on a CPA or even CPC basis – appealing to both brand and direct-response advertisers.
Question: Is there any data that supports the theory that CTR goes up after a person sees an ad three or more times? Should we be making sure fewer users are seeing the ads more times to increase ad engagement?
Answer: Display is much more an influencer than a driver of click activity, so CTR is not always an effective measurement of a display ad’s true impact. This particularly true because users will more often conduct a display ad-inspired search than they will click on the ad itself.
Still, exposing a user to a display ad multiple times has been shown to increase conversions, particularly in the case of retargeting. Though many advertisers find success by using retargeting to continue to influence potential buyers as they move further down the funnel, there is such a thing as over-exposing an audience, which can ultimately have negative effects.
The ideal number of exposures will depend on your average sales cycle and average number of touch points required to convert. It’s important you are able to track the number of exposures for each conversion to develop a sense of the ideal number for your product and brand.
Question: What are the key criteria to look for or questions to ask when assessing and speaking with DSPs?
Answer: Questions that help you to ascertain their level of customer service and expertise are very important, given how technical DSPs are to operate for the general marketer. You want to make sure you find a provider who is willing to take the time to help you learn the platform and leverage it to meet your specific campaign objectives.
Other important criteria are whether or not it is compatible with your current ad server and or analytics systems and whether you will be able to leverage and use the types of data (first party, third party) you need to effectively execute your campaign.
Question: With regard to direct-response marketing, would you say content or audience is more important?
Answer: Content can often serve as a proxy for audience: For example, advertising on a business site is often a way to target a largely B2B audience. Audience is not always a proxy for content, particularly when it comes to site retargeting. Most often, the decision is never one or the other; many marketers use a combination of both to maximize their CPA. In the end, the driving determinant should be which performs best and fits within the intended CPA. Oftentimes, the cost-efficiency of audience-focused data on DSPs and exchanges will outweigh the value of high-priced, site-direct buys.
Question: How you might go about placing a more localized display ad buy?
Answer: Almost every inventory source can accommodate a localized display ad buy on some level. Worth investigating are regional publishers, like media sites or even some of the internet yellow pages providers, who are now beginning to offer display advertising in addition to search and directory listings. Many of the social networks like LinkedIn and Facebook also allow advertisers to target by geography or locale. DSPs and ad exchanges also allow for relatively robust geotargeting, but their more programmatic form of buying could take some time to learn.
Question: Can ad networks participate in a private ad exchange?
Answer: Private ad exchanges are being created by publishers and media properties to keep their inventory off of the ad exchanges and general ad networks. In theory, private ad exchanges could sell some of their inventory to ad networks if they wanted to, but most were largely created to cut out the middle-man: ad networks.
Question: Are there advantages to going with niche ad networks? For example, one that targets just African Americans, Asians?
Answer: One advantage to working with a niche ad network is the access to greater audience reach and multiple properties by working with one provider instead of going through multiple publishers. Niche ad networks are often specialists in a particular vertical or for a particular demographic ,and the good ones have built their network to include those publishers and properties that best reflect this vertical or audience.
A complete report, Buying Display Ad Inventory: Making Sense of Multiple Sources, is available exclusively for eMarketer Total Access clients. Learn more.
