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Twenty-Year Media Industry Veteran Who Led Many Nine-Digit Sales Revenue Teams

Will Cultivate Deeper Relationships with Agencies in the Midwest United States

CHICAGO, IL – March 26, 2014 – Centro (centro.net), a provider of digital media software and services, today announced the addition of Doug Thomas as Vice President of Sales for the Midwest. Doug has had 20+ years of experience leading media sales organizations and driving nine-digit yearly revenues for top flight companies such as Time, Inc. and Tribune. Most recently, he was tapped to broaden client service operations for Omnicom media agency Novus.

Doug will help drive adoption and usage of Centro’s technology among agencies of all types. Centro’s technology automates and unifies guaranteed and biddable media buying between agencies and ad sellers. Its programmatic software streamlines the entire campaign lifecycle from planning, RFPs and ad operations all the way to finance and reconciliation. Doug’s relationships in the media industry, combined with Centro’s wide client base of major holding company agencies and regional independent firms, positions Centro as valued technology and services partner for buyers and sellers.

“Programmatic advertising has primarily streamlined buying unsold inventory on ad exchanges, yet, three quarters of digital media spend still goes through direct transactions between agencies and publishers. This remains the largest pain point for advertisers,” said Doug Thomas, VP of Sales. “The industry needs an automated system like Centro’s to simplify the manual process that dominates 70-80% of digital ad dollars.”

Centro’s approach of finding and delivering quality inventory through direct relationships with publishers has put it on track to grow to $300+ million in revenues in 2014. Its agency partners rely on the company to scale the direct buying process while streamlining ad operations, finance and reconciliation. Centro worked with more than 600 agencies in 2013. With demand continuing to grow, Centro is looking to add 40 more members to its national sales team this year.

“Agencies and advertisers recognize Centro for our transparent business practices and the performance our technology delivers for campaigns,” said Charlie Thomas, EVP of Sales, Centro. “Doug will ensure that our customers receive tailored solutions that fit their needs to maximize our unique value proposition.”

About Centro
Centro (centro.net) provides unified, cloud-based software to simplify digital media operations. Our media management platform streamlines and scales ad buys across all channels, accessing both guaranteed and biddable inventory, to achieve any campaign objective. Our holistic approach gives marketers a single system of record to fulfill their research, planning, buying, optimization and reporting needs. Since 2001, Centro has successfully planned and executed more than 100,000 local and national campaigns across all digital display platforms and ad format types. Headquartered in Chicago with 34 offices in North America, Centro’s success and commitment to culture has led to many accolades, including #1 on Crain’s Best Places to Work in Chicago in 2011, 2012 and 2013.

Contact:
Anthony Loredo
[email protected]
646-462-4888

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It sometimes feels like the digital buying world is in constant flux. Programmatic (I define programmatic as buyers and sellers connected through technology infrastructure) has been the buzzword for the last two years. According to some reports, 22-25% of display is transacted in programmatic channels today. It may get to 30% by 2017. There’s no question the historical, labor-intensive method of buying media has been disrupted. Today, marketers don’t even need an IO or a relationship with a publisher, as they can log into a system to buy media in an automated fashion. However, programmatic video hasn’t quite evolved the way traditional display advertising has. Why? In a word, scarcity.

RTB (real-time bidding) is a classic example of market economics. An impressions value is defined by the market at a specific point in time. Publishers value scarcity because it implies greater value for the impression. Further, video inventory is naturally less available than display. For instance, a webpage may have four or five display ad slots available, but a video player only has one preroll available (mid-roll and post-roll are generally considered less desirable inventory). Additionally, publishers don’t want to increase the number of pre-roll spots for fear of alienating a user and harming the user experience. Since video inventory is naturally (more) scarce, publishers have an easier time monetizing inventory and feel less pressure to participate in auctions where there’s no quality or price guarantees.

The current IO-based, upfront business that guarantees delivery with premium rates is much more attractive to publishers. However, expect this to shift in the future. As more media is transacted in programmatic environments, publishers will need to participate in the arenas the advertisers and agencies want to participate in.

Additionally, while RTB has historically been closely aligned with lower funnel DR tactics, more publishers are making what’s been previously considered premium inventory available in programmatic channels. Add in private exchanges, which is another brand focused strategy, and there’s growing branding opportunities in programmatic environments. As this continues to grow and more varied inventory becomes available, video will naturally follow -- not to mention, programmatic television buying may soon be next. Since about 40% of households today have internet-enabled TVs, and historical television buying is not efficient or measureable, this area is ripe for innovation.