Do you work in media sales, or more specifically in digital media sales? Whether it is your sole responsibility or part of it, you need a minimum amount of knowledge about the ad tech your company employs and that which your competitors and clients use. You also need an understanding of the other marketing related technologies, systems and tools used by your company, competition and clients to fully understand the opportunities at your fingertips and how clients really track what they measure.

Types of tech in marketing:

So far, we’ve explored a variety of types of marketing management tech solutions in the previous post. This time we will explore trafficking solutions more commonly known as Ad Tech.

Ad Tech

Website Analytics

Website Analytics offer Ccmplete analytics (UV, PV, minutes, visits…) for any given website, group of, section of or page of including all content types. Web analytics integrate with CRM, AdServers and other systems to give more in-depth insight and analysis such as view throughs, cost per acquisition and conversion rates. They allow for full click stream analysis as well as consumers’s path to purchase.

The main solution providers for web analytics are Adobe Marketing Cloud (previously Omniture), Google Analytics, CoreMetrics (IBM), WebTrends, Kontagent Mobile Analytics and Nielsen.

Agency Ad Server

Agency ad servers offer buyers unified campaign reporting across their numerous digital media vendors, both direct and through demand side platforms (through real-time bidding). This allows their reporting to cut through website duplication providing clearer insights for the advertising client. Agency ad servers connect to multiple other systems including a client’s web analytics to provide return on investment (ROI) and return on ad spend (ROAS). As well they connect to media management systems for billing and agency-side CRMs for contact management. They also connect to demand side platforms, ad exchanges, publisher ad servers, data management platforms, dynamic creative solutions to name but a few of the possibilities they offer. Note that many of these systems will be explained in next week’s post on programmatic buying & real-time bidding ad tech.

Predominant suppliers of agency ad server solutions include DoubleClick for Advertisers (formerly Dart), Atlas (Facebook), Conversant (previously Mediaplex), DG MediaMind, Pictela (AOL), AdGear, Smart Advserver and PointRoll (Gannett).

Media Planning and Attribution

Media planning and attribution solutions allow buyers to plan out their campaigns throughout their numerous touch points from display to email, social paid and owned components as well as search. These systems further allow the brand to attribute proper value to each marketing touch point in a campaign based on marketing management reporting and insights. They allow agencies to fine-tune their campaigns through multiple “what if” scenarios. This is similar to marketing mix modeling but strictly digital and real-time as opposed to offering insight after the fact.

Media planning and attribution solutions include MarketShare, Cognitive Match, Networked Insights, C3Metrics, Covario and Encore Metrics.

Dynamic Creative Optimization

Dynamic creative optimization solutions allow for the assembly of digital ad creatives from established rules, targeting parameters and determines creative elements. In other words, these solutions allow the dynamic creation of unique creative per individuals, tailored to their situation, location, time and other qualifiers. These solutions eliminate he need to produce multiple versions of creative which each would be targeted to distinctly different audiences with a similar message. This is data database driven and takes full advantage of the Internet’s possibilities while simplifying that task.

Dynamic creative optimizers include DoubleClick for Advertisers (formerly Teracent and Dart), Tumri (Collective), SnapAds, Mixpo, Yahoo! Advertising (formerly Dapper), AdReady, Spongecell, DG MediaMind, Dynamic Creative Optimization by Microsoft Advertising, MediaMath (formerly Adroit Interactive), GroovinAds and Adacado.

Retargeting

Retargeting solutions are distinct from DMPs (Data Management Platforms, covered next week). They allow the management of cookie based information, from the advertiser’s web analytics, for retargeting purposes with display advertising through the agency ad server to the publisher’s ad server.

Retargeting solutions include AdRoll, Chango, ActionX, Perfect Audience, AdGear, MediaForge, Adacado, Conversant (formerly Dotomi), Criteo, ReTargeter, Magnetic, SteelHouse, simpli.fi and TellApart.

Verification / Privacy solutions

Verification solutions are relatively new and constantly evolving ad definitions and methodologies involved are being refined by various organizations including IAB (US) and the Media Ratings Council. These solutions “audit” a campaign’s delivery of ad creative and impressions against specific parameters which can include viewability, in-geography, brand safety, fraud detection, competitive separation, respect of OBA principles.

Viewability refers to an ad being at least 50% in-view (on the users’ visible browser window) for a minimum of 1 second. In-geography refers to geotargeting and identifying ad impressions delivered outside the desired zone. Brand safety does refer to avoiding environments of pornography, hate content and known digital piracy sites (illegal downloads and the like) as well as to any other environments that are deemed “unsafe” for a particular brand. This of course varies greatly from one brand to another. A clear example of an unsafe environment is having your ad show up on a competitor’s website.

Verification solutions include vCE by comScore (includes AdXpose), Spider.io (now owned by Google), DoubleVerify, Integral Ad Science, Truste, Evidon and The Media Trust.

Publisher Ad Server

Publisher ad servers, while functioning similarly to agency ad servers, have as a primary function the management of online ad inventory – ensuring all requested ad calls are met with appropriate (sold) ads. They also offer campaign reporting for optimization and billing purposes.

Publisher ad servers connect to publisher’s financial systems or media management systems for billing and SFA / CRM for reporting purposes. They further connect to supply side platforms, data management platforms (for behavioral targeting) and other systems.

Publisher ad servers include among others: DoubleClick for Publishers, Smart AdServer, AdTech (AOL), AdGear,  OpenX, AdJuggler, Zedo, Adzerk and Orbit.

Next week…

Next week we will explore the various types of programmatic and real-time bidding ad tech digital media sellers need to know about.

To know more about digital media sales, I teach a Digital Media Sales course through IAB Canada which is a great preparation before taking the Digital Media Sales Certification exam through IAB (US) which IAB Canada fully endorses. It is a two day program which you can attend in-public once a year (see calendar for dates — a session is coming up in Vancouver February 4-5th) or have organized as a custom session within our company. Contact me to set up training with your organization, be it in English of French, national, regional or local – I will adapt for your organization’s needs.

Authored by Samuel Parent.

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