Prediction #3 – Trading desks will raise their clout in 2012

There are two things we know for sure about trading desks. They buy programmatically and they use lots of data to do it. Their knack for automation and precision targeting has made them an efficient  mode of transacting for advertisers. According to the recent 1H 2012 State of the Video Industry report, 27% of advertisers now look to trading desks to fill their inventory needs. So when we asked our customers who was being impacted by the rise of trading desks, publishers (32%) and service providers (33%) told us they are feeling it the most. With programmatic buying increasingly becoming the “modus operandi” for buyers, this data tells us that sellers, as well as ad tech providers, are quickly working to figure out the best methods to meet this demand. As the traditional mode of brokering media between buyers and sellers changes to more programmatic transacting, publishers need a strategy and the operational tools that will support programmatic selling.

I have been meeting with several premium publishers (a majority being comScore Top 25 video properties) in the last 60 days.  Some are experimenting with the idea and many more are still trying to figure out how to support programmatic selling.  There are at least three questions that consistently come up and that need to be addressed for publishers to grow the revenue opportunity this represents:

• What are the technical capabilities I need, beyond my current tag based ad serving tools, that will allow me to connect my inventory to demand sources that want view by view/RTB access. In other words,  “I have an ad server today, but how do I sell my inventory programmatically”?
• What levels of control will I have when connecting to these new demand sources?  For instance, how will I manage the creative approval process?  Or how do I maintain the brand quality of the ad content that my users have come to expect from me -  “ Do I need the same level of ad creative control that I have over what my direct sales teams sells”?
• How do you avoid channel and sales conflict with a direct sales team if an agency trading desk can now work with me via both ad tags and RTB connections. Essentially, “How do I maintain the  right pricing and inventory value attribution capabilities, when managing multiple sales channels?”

Click here to read Part One: 2012 video ad predictions “checkpoint.”

Click here to read Part Two: 2012 video ad predictions “checkpoint.”

Henk VaneNiekerk,, VP Sales, Platform for Adap.tv.

Tags: Comscore, online video advertising, programmatic, RTB, trading desks