Life in Programmatic Digital Out-of-Home
00:00:02 · S0, Philippa Evans, Gavin Wilson
[00:00:02] S0: Life in Programmatic Digital Out of Home brought to you by JCDecaux. Bringing together the greatest minds, discussing the latest trends, and uncovering what life in Programmatic Digital Out of Home is all about. [00:00:28] S1: Hello and welcome to the latest episode of the Life in Programmatic Digital Out of Home podcast. My name is Philippa and I'm delighted to welcome my guest today, Gavin. Gavin, could you please introduce yourself to our listeners and tell us a bit about your role and view? [00:00:43] S2: Yep, Hi, Philippa. Thank you for having me here today. My name is Gavin Wilson. I'm the Global Chief Customer and Revenue Officer at VIOOH. VIOOH is an SSP. It's owned by JCDecaux. We're about six years old. I've been at the company for about five years now. And we're really trying to help you and your colleagues around the world drive value from the outdoor kind of ecosystem, in particular, the programmatic ecosystem. Doing that in about 22 countries now. So really seeing the rise of outdoor and the development of outdoor and obviously included in that is the development of programmatic, which I think is adding value to hopefully you and the whole ecosystem. [00:01:26] S1: Fingers crossed. So let's dive right into it. You've recently released the latest version of the State of the Nation. It's a bespoke piece of research that VIOOH commissions each year. Could you tell us a bit about the purpose of the research, the methodology before we dive into any of the key findings from this year?
00:01:45 · Gavin Wilson
[00:01:45] S2: Yeah, absolutely. So we have done this for a few years now, we find it's a really valuable piece of qualitative and quantitative research, literally looking at the outdoor market, and I guess how it's evolving, and how it's evolving alongside other channels, which is obviously really important when we think about total media, and total media planning. The survey goes out to the buy side. So about 1,200 individuals receive the survey each year, they are an advertiser and agency level. And we tend to do that across five key markets, of which The UK is one other markets, including Germany, Australia, US, just to name a couple. Usually, we're trying to engage with senior business decision makers, as I said, at that advertiser and agency level. And really the criteria is that they must have either planned Programmatic Outdoor in the last twelve months, or be looking to plan Programmatic Outdoor in the upcoming twelve months. So really, we want them to be digitally aware, digitally astute, but also aware of how a programmatic outdoor can interlink with others, other channels. Respondents, as I said, normally around 1,200. That's the quantitative part. So we're getting a nice mass of feedback from relevant buyers. The qualitative part is we try and ask a couple of key stakeholders per market for further insight and kind of deep dive into what they're seeing in terms of trends. And usually they're senior decision makers at agencies. So we're getting a nice balance, we hope of that sort of attitudinal and behavioural insight from sort of the masses as well as a core sort of couple as well. So yeah, really nice piece of research that hopefully gives buyers and would be buyers a bit more insight on what's going on in outdoor.
00:03:41 · Philippa Evans
[00:03:41] S1: Brilliant. So the research shows that in The UK, there's been a significant increase in adoption of programmatic digital out of home over the last twelve months. There's a high proportion of repeat investors and strong growth predicted over the next twelve months. What is it about programmatic digital out of home that you think keeps advertisers coming back for more?
00:04:02 · Gavin Wilson
[00:04:02] S2: That's a really good question. And there's lots of things. I think if we start with the obvious, outdoor in general is an incredibly kind of a valuable channel, hugely visible, great premium locations. And obviously, you know, outdoor as a medium has been around for a long time. I think what programmatic does, though, is it does involve and incorporate quite a degree of flexibility. So it does allow that buyer to potentially look at moving budgets more seamlessly from other channels, maybe planning a little later in the cycle, you know, and having that ability to target audiences and plan cross channel. And again, let's think logically, you know, buying direct in outdoor is hugely valuable for those optimum spaces. But equally so if you're looking at an audience plan or an audience kind of ambition, and you want to plan those channels kind of side by side, the ability for outdoor to be to be bought programmatically now really gives you that flexibility. So I think planners and buyers like the ability to move that money around. You know, it's high quality, as I said, hugely viewable, but equally so you know, that money can move seamlessly. I think another thing is, if we look at channel by channel, Programmatic Outdoor is still incredibly affordable, still one of the slightly cheaper channels when you look against say CTV, or other channels. And that again, I think, you know, with a great measurement that's coming into effect, and obviously, the ability to look at cross channel uplift, I think gives buyers again, a bit more comfort that this is a channel worth investing in, and probably dialling up that ad spend as well. A few other things we've noticed from the report and from talking to buyers, Philippa, things like the dynamic creative is now really, really advantageous.
00:05:48 · Gavin Wilson
I think in this channel, you know, the ability to really tailor a message on the programmatic message that could be linked to something happening there and then could be an event, be a sporting event, it could be whether it could be, you know, any kind of emission in the environment, really, I think, you know, buyers and planners like now that they can design that creative to really engage with an audience, and really kind of talk to them perhaps in the kind of here and now language, which again, if you're, you know, if you put your consumer hat on, you know, a brand that gets me and talks to me almost I'm more likely to connect with versus a brand that's maybe got a bit of a generalised message. So I think we're seeing that's quite important as well. And then I think maybe the last part is just to kind of touch on that a little bit, but about that optimisation of ROI. Again, I think, you know, marketeers rightly so expect, you know, return on investment, and they're looking at the channel as both brand and performance led. And I think when we look at how programmatic outdoor can span alongside mobile campaigns, or even kind of driving footfall to store, I think the ecosystem has come a long way in the last eighteen months in how does the channel not be seen as isolated, And perhaps how does it be seen as complementary? So hopefully, you know, the flexibility, the affordability. And then as I sort of said, that almost measurability now, I think is meaning more and more buyers are saying this is a viable channel for me.
00:07:20 · Philippa Evans
[00:07:20] S1: Agreed. I think what you touched on there is quite important. We've also seen just generally, this has been more of a six year journey for The UK in particular, but there's now a better understanding of the benefits of programmatic digital out of home. Still a ways to go in terms of the education and full understanding of the channel, but it has come on leaps and bounds in the last six years, which is always great to see. You mentioned the DCO. There are improvements to the first party data integrations that people are getting a hold of and using now for their targeting, their triggering and their DCO capabilities, which is amazing. And also the omnichannel element, priming with out of home is so important and it does make those other online mediums work harder overall. So moving on, from your experience, what are the common pitfalls that trouble brands, the agencies, the DSPs and cause those barriers to repeat investment? How do you think those can be overcome?