Programmatic Era Prompts a Reassessment of Video

While advertising today can appear increasingly complex with more opportunities than ever to connect with audiences across paid, earned and owned media, regardless of advertising channel used, the brand’s goal must still be to connect with prospective customers and communicate value.

Understanding the Audience

We have more tools than ever to be able to more deeply understand audiences, from their online browsing behavior, to which brands resonate with them, to purchasing data, and more. Since so much communication with customers occurs in the digital realm, we are able to use data insights to gain a holistic view of the customer.

Utilizing data from across the consumer journey enables advertisers to speak to consumers directly in specific terms, rather than broad platitudes.

For instance, a brand advertiser could employ humorous ads to reach customers who respond to such messaging. Thanks to targeting, the brand can do this on a piecemeal basis rather than running a traditional TV campaign, which shows the same creative to an entire audience. Production costs may be a bit higher with this approach, but the brand will improve its connection with its intended audience.

With programmatic advertising, we can also identify consumers who are at different stages of the consumer journey, and on different channels, and alter the messaging accordingly.

Recently, Amobee worked with a luxury retailer on a global holiday campaign. The initial phase of the campaign in November, delivered an aspirational brand message via video formats, creating an emotional connection with the audience. Following this exposure, by looking at the data we were able to find consumers who were receptive to the first messaging campaign, and then re-target those consumers with a product-focused display message that was designed to convert the viewer into a buyer. The initiative drove a 171% year-over-year increase in global revenues.

Video as Part of the Omnichannel Marketing Mix

Since its inception, TV advertising has been a mass medium, where creative is developed with broad targets like housewives with kids or ABC1 adults in mind. As a result, the messaging can be blunt and nonspecific.

Unshackling video ads from the :30 ad provides an opportunity to re-examine the mission of video advertising, especially when you apply granular targeting data. Using such data, brands are able to not only present the right ads at the right time and in the right context, but also the right sequence of messaging and media that best resonates with their target audiences, and drives the desired behavior.

ESPN recently used a campaign replete with display, video, social and mobile advertising to drive traffic to ESPNFC.com, its football (soccer) centric website in Latin America. Initially, the ads were in random order. As the campaign progressed, ESPN was able to use data analytics to identify the specific combinations and sequences of media channels that worked best to bring in traffic, and optimize towards that. The data showed that consumers who received messaging across multiple channels were far more likely to visit the site than those who had received messages from a single form of media. The data also illustrated that video was the most potent form of media, so ESPN targeted fans with a 15-second video ad first, followed by traditional display, mobile or Facebook ads.

Kraft Heinz also used video strategically recently, taking advantage of the ability to micro-target video messages. Data revealed that its target millennial audience didn’t know how to cook, and so were looking up video “How to” guides for basic techniques. This insight led Kraft Heinz to changing its content strategy from written recipes to video advertising that included a demonstration of the recipe, as well as links to purchase ingredients.

Such thinking requires stepping back from the traditional relationship between an advertiser and a consumer and addressing the true goal, which is to engage the consumer in a way that makes him or her think more highly of the brand. Social media has had the curious effect in some cases of elevating brands to the same status as a media property or even a friend. Effective marketing means not only listening to the data, but seizing opportunities to bolster that status.

The key breakthrough in recent advertising technology is the ability to unearth the individual desires that drive consumers. We now have the means to learn about those desires and use the most effective channels of communication possible – including video. Crafting the right strategies and mediums for those messages is where the science becomes art.

About Amobee

Founded in 2005, Amobee is an advertising platform that understands how people consume content. Our goal is to optimize outcomes for advertisers and media companies, while providing a better consumer experience. Through our platform, we help customers further their audience development, optimize their cross channel performance across all TV, connected TV, and digital media, and drive new customer growth through detailed analytics and reporting. Amobee is a wholly owned subsidiary of Tremor International, a collection of brands built to unite creativity, data and technology across the open internet.

If you’re curious to learn more, watch the on-demand demo or take a deep dive into our Research & Insights section where you can find recent webinars on-demand, media plan insights & activation templates, and more data-driven content. If you’re ready to take the next step into a sustainable, consumer-first advertising future, contact us today.