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Gas for $4 per gallon. Milk for $5 per gallon. $6.15 for four ears of corn?! We just can’t catch a break in this economy.
And while consumers are hurting, many brands are also struggling to weather the current economic downturn and plan for a possible recession. While no two economic downturns are alike, we can (and should!) learn from past recessions. Much has been written about how brands who have maintained or upped their marketing investment during past economic downturns have seen success. One recent study found that brands who cut spending during the 2008 recession risked losing 15% of their business to competitors who instead boosted their marketing spend.
But of course, just maintaining or increasing spend isn’t enough to ride out a recession. Marketers must analyze and adjust their strategies with an increased degree of precision and agility during these turbulent times.
So, if you’re a marketing leader, how can you make the most of your ad spend and even discover an opportunity or two amidst all this uncertainty? We've got three recommendations to share with you:
As CMOs fight to defend their marketing budgets heading into 2023, brands would do well to strategically reallocate spend to maximize its efficiency during this economic instability. This will look different from brand to brand, but we’ve got a few considerations to keep in mind:
1) Forgetting about your current consumer base is a big no-no. For many brands, loyal customers are the main source of revenue and growth. However, those customers' behaviors are likely to change under economic stress. It’s of utmost importance to nurture your customer pools, solicit feedback from them whenever possible, and offer communications that show both your appreciation and your sensitivity towards their economic circumstances (a loyalty discount never hurts!)
And don’t forget about leveraging their first-party data: Trusted partners like TransUnion, for example, can extend your data’s reach by categorizing it against their own and creating new audience pools to tap into—which brings us to our next point:
2) With all the changes in consumer behavior that come during a recession, there’s an opportunity to branch into new markets. Marketing in a recession is all about balance: while nurturing your current customers is a smart defensive move, identifying and branching into new audiences is a strategic one for those brands looking to maximize future success.
Marketers should also make a habit of looking at performance metrics and using that data to reallocate spend between channels and tactics accordingly. Low performers should be cut or revised, while high performing tactics can take on some of that newly freed-up spend. It’s also important to prioritize tactics that are measurable, targeted, and precise, so that you can continue to pull actionable insights to revise your strategy and prove out the impact of your work to stakeholders. Again, in that spirit of balance, marketers should allocate spend between tactics that are reliable, like paid social and linear TV, and ones that represent calculated risks, like CTV PMPs or even augmented reality.
There are several strong arguments in favor of investing in brand awareness during a recession. Back in 2008, during the Great Recession, brand messaging outperformed performance marketing 80% of the time.
Maintaining brand awareness messaging during a recession is a savvy long-term play: Consumers may choose to forego investing in your product while budgets are tight, but once they have a bit more wiggle room, your brand will be front-of-mind. And when we say “long-term,” we’re not talking decades—the average recession in the U.S. has only lasted one to two years.
Additionally, in times of economic upheaval, many companies will opt to deprioritize brand awareness campaigns in order to focus on driving revenue more directly. With fewer competitors crowding the space, there’s an opportunity for your brand’s media to make emotional, memorable connections with consumers.
Still, an effective brand awareness campaign during a recession won’t look like a brand awareness campaign in times of economic stability: personalized messaging that meets consumers where they are is critical. Consumers in a recession are experiencing stress, upheaval, and financial difficulties. As a result, they’re looking for reassurance, connection, and empathy.
In 2020, TV viewers joked about how every COVID-19 commercial looked the same—and although the "we're in this together” message quickly became cliché, the marketers behind those ads knew what kind of consumer they were trying to reach! Leaning into the factors that specifically differentiate your offerings during economic upheaval, demonstrating empathy, and even using humor can be powerful ways to personalize your messaging during a recession. (Need some inspiration? Here are five ads that got inflation messaging right.)
While we can make educated guesses, there’s no real way to predict what the economy will look like in 2023, or how consumer behavior will shift as a result. Since 2020, it’s seemed like all we have been able to count on is an ever-changing landscape. In order to simultaneously meet changing consumer needs and future-proof your marketing operations, it’s critical for marketing organizations to prioritize agility.
Even in times of economic stability, the ability to monitor and adjust live campaigns based on real-time insights is quickly becoming a must-have for brands and agencies. From misinformation, to developments in consumer privacy regulation, to the rise in consumer demand for brand authenticity, there are a variety of factors that make the ability to “turn on a dime” a lifesaver in today’s marketing landscape.
At the same time, many marketers have little free time for things like manual campaign optimizations, because they’re bogged down by the complexity of today’s media landscape. In fact, marketers use an average of nine different platforms to run a typical campaign. That’s a lot of different tabs to toggle between! Advertising automation platforms that streamline and simplify the media buying process—from planning, to buying, to reporting—can help to minimize the chaos, free up time for marketers, and save money at the same time. With automation, advertisers can rapidly adapt while maximizing their resources—and if those outcomes aren’t game changers during economic upheaval, we don’t know what is.
While none of us can do anything about the 100% increase in egg prices, advertisers do have some agency when it comes to optimizing their marketing strategies in times of upheaval. Looking for more insights and advice on how to advertise in these wild times? Check out our webinar, Advertising Through Uncertainty: How Marketers Can Navigate Economic Downturn, to learn more about what the current state of economic instability looks like in the US, new consumer categories that form in times of economic hardship, and best practices for advertising in an unpredictable marketplace.
“The tectonic plates of the industry are shifting.” – Andrew Susman, Institute for Advertising Ethics, Programmatic I/O 2022
By now, it’s no secret the ad industry is facing broad, foundational changes. Many of the fundamental processes with which we’re familiar— including audience identification and targeting, measuring and attributing performance across channels, and the laws governing day to day operations—are being upended.
Conversations at AdExchanger’s Programmatic I/O 2022 centered around these familiar industry woes, but it was the tone with which they were delivered that set them apart. Sessions were as much an educational moment as they were a rallying cry—and, often, a reality check.
Case in point? Research presented by Permutive found that digital advertisers can reach just 30% of consumers on the open web today via traditional targeting methods.
Rewriting the playbook on how you engage consumers and drive business objectives isn’t easy. However, the conversations held at Programmatic I/O provided great insight on how to get started by re-focusing on the fundamentals.
Here are four takeaways you can act on now:
Education holds a fundamental role in successfully navigating how ongoing industry shifts or incoming regulations impact your business needs or day-to-day operations. It’s also pivotal in evaluating new solutions—separating the smoke and mirrors from viable opportunities—and the resources you’ll need to effectively meet your business objectives. At Basis, we are doing our part to provide the latest info on our blog, in our webinars, and through our podcast, and consuming a diverse array of thought leadership will leave you best positioned for future success.
And it’s not just about self-education: it’s imperative to also educate and engage with your stakeholders on these industry trends and new opportunities. Building rapport with these key decision makers ensures you have the support needed to successfully test new industry solutions.
Partners across the advertising ecosystem have worked diligently on solutions that fill the gaps caused by signal loss. There’s been meaningful growth within capabilities like artificial intelligence and machine learning, publisher-defined audiences, automatic content recognition (ACR), and mixed media modeling. The real question is, do you trust these solutions enough to test them?
You can move forward with confidence by setting expectations for each test opportunity: What business needs does it meet? What is the expected audience scale or outcome? Where does it sit within your broader media strategy? How are you gauging success?
Leveraging an advertising automation platform empowers you to fluidly test a variety of solutions and determine the mix that’s right for you.
Digital marketers can maximize their media investments—and the efficacy of those investments—by adopting a greater level of care and intentionality within media planning and buying.
Panelists at Programmatic I/O emphasized the need for higher standards within the inventory supply chain. From a media buying perspective, customizing brand safety and ad fraud practices as well as optimizing away from bad actors creates an accessible layer of protection. Both the buy side and sell side can create greater accountability and transparency within the supply chain by practicing supply chain optimization and implementing frameworks like the IAB’s ads.txt.
In addition, be intentional about where and what you’re buying. The channels, sites, or ad formats you’re running within not only define the quality of media in which you’re investing, but the experience consumers have with your brand.
Optimize your investment by maintaining audience targets (ex: removing previous converters), seeking out premium inventory via private marketplace deals, and creating a better audience experience with high impact or rich media ad formats and quality creative.
Consumer perception and favorability toward your brand is derived heavily from the experiences they have with your brand—essentially, the experiences we create for them.
L’Oreal’s SVP and Head of Media, Shenan Reed, redirected the focus back to the consumer by reminding us to treat consumers the way we’d treat one another in real life, even giving a few cheeky examples like, “Would you repeatedly ask someone on a date after they’ve turned you down multiple times? Probably not.” So, why do we continue to bombard consumers with ads after they’ve communicated they’re not interested?
In an increasingly competitive, fragmented, and complex space, brands should consider how they can best orchestrate each channel, tactic, and creative asset to create a compelling and meaningful consumer experience.
Adapting to change can be daunting, but the message at Programmatic I/O was clear: it’s time to get moving. By taking the first steps, each of us contributes to the future of the industry itself.
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If you want to stay up to date on all the latest in the ad industry, then you’ll want to sign up for Basis Scout, a monthly newsletter highlighting new and essential content for digital marketing and advertising professionals. Get all the best news, tips, and insights from around the adtech world delivered straight to your inbox. Sounds pretty good, right?
Welcome to Scout! Each week, our team tracks down the best digital marketing articles, POVs, and reports—so you don't have to. Here’s what to read from the week of 10/14/22 - 10/20/22 to stay ahead of the curve:
The holidays really do start earlier every year: close to 40% of US consumers plan to start their holiday shopping earlier this season due to inflation concerns. If you’re still ironing out your holiday marketing strategies, here are the general trends you should know, as well as some specific insights for automotive, higher education, CPG, and cannabis brands.
The launch date for Netflix’s ad-supported tier is just two weeks away! Its price point for customers sits right between Peacock and Hulu, and its CPM for marketers is said to be among streaming’s highest—but could cool down. Will Netflix offer stranger things to advertisers? Or will marketers be married at first sight to this new option?
TikTok has changed the way people search, buy, watch, communicate, and advertise. Not too bad for a platform once written off as a “silly video-dance fad!” So, how did it grow so dominant, and what are the consequences of that dominance? This in-depth piece touches on all the details.
Like peanut butter and chocolate uniting into a combination far more powerful than either snack alone, grocery chains Kroger and Albertsons may merge in one of the biggest US supermarket deals ever. The combined strength of these behemoths could reach an estimated 85 million households nationwide—and upend the retail media network space in the process.
Ah, the elusive Gen Z. At Advertising Week in New York, a variety of panels are focusing on how marketers can connect with the generation for whom traditional advertising tricks just don’t hit the same. Read about those conversations, and more hot topics related to Advertising Week, in this rundown.
UberX, UberEats...UberAds? The rideshare and delivery giant has announced a new advertising division to help diversify its revenue sources. The company says it will sell ad space inside its apps as well as in-vehicle digital ads, sponsored mails, and storefront ads—the latest in a host of new premium inventory available to digital advertisers. Everything is an ad network these days!
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As a marketing professional, one way to impress a friend who doesn’t work in the space might be to have them look at any current LUMAscape.
“Wait...there are that many categories, tools, and companies just for audio advertising?!” they might exclaim as they ponder the complexity of your chosen profession, followed quickly by: “Are you OK?”
They wouldn’t be remiss in asking, given that more than half of marketers say they want to quit their jobs.
Since its debut in 2010, the marketing technology LUMAscape has served as a symbol of both the innovation and the complexity that have come to characterize the digital media and marketing space. Lately, though, the Great Resignation has brought renewed attention to that complexity as a driver of decreased job satisfaction and professional commitment. Buried under mundane, repetitive tasks and an ever-increasing number of tools and point solutions, marketers are burning out fast.
As if recruiting wasn’t enough of a problem on its own, complexity in digital marketing and media presents additional crises for brands, agencies, and publishers alike. Transparency, speed, and cost efficiency are all hindered by a rapidly expanding list of channels, formats, technologies, and solutions—all of which require new skill sets, guidelines, rules, and standards for marketers to learn. “Walking through mud” would be an apt analogy for how increases in complexity have impacted companies in the space.
To solve these colliding dilemmas of staffing, transparency, speed, and cost-efficiency, the advertising industry must better understand their underlying causes. Read on to learn about the factors causing this complexity, and the solutions that are poised to usher in a better future for everyone working in the marketing space.
According to a recent Advertiser Perceptions report, the factors contributing to media complexity for advertising professionals include:
The reported causes fall into two main categories: disparate technologies (number of tools necessary to run a campaign, consumer technology, increase in number of media channels, increase in number of media transaction methods, etc.) and disparate data (inconsistent measurement tools, walled gardens, etc.)
Marketers use an average of nine different platforms to run a typical campaign. That's nine different sets of analytics, customer support teams, and pricing methodologies to manage! And, as more and more media buying professionals leave their jobs, it’s also nine different programs on which companies must train their replacements. Simultaneously, marketers engage an average of six media vendors for a typical campaign.
Speaking of pricing methodologies, media buyers most frequently listed the “increase in number of media transaction methods” as a factor in media complexity. A single campaign often demands a variety of combined buying methods, a practice that hinders transparency and results in increased human error.
The convoluted nature of the ad tech supply chain also creates opportunities for fraud. Ad operations professionals have long noted that “How hard it is to track down bad actors in the supply chain” is one of the biggest challenges in addressing issues with ad quality. Put simply, in addition to the time media complexity steals from media companies, it also creates opportunities for fraudsters to steal their dollars.
All those different tools marketers use for their campaigns produce different sets of data, which are then organized by different sets of metrics. It’s not uncommon for marketers tapping into multiple advertising channels and vendors to have to stitch together precious campaign data from various separate Excel files. They’re then tasked with the near-impossible work of communicating progress to stakeholders and identifying holistic strategies based on their findings.
Attempting work like manually unifying disparate data sources results in an average of six hours spent per week on low-value, repetitive tasks. According to a 2020 4As report on workflow automation, "Tricky and error-prone tasks such as tagging, taxonomy, naming conventions and invoice reconciliation are falling on the shoulders of non-specialists, spread across teams. This results in issues such as labelling inconsistencies that can exist even within the same team or organization."
The same report found that agency media teams waste an average of three hours per day copying and pasting data from one program to the other. Frustrating tasks like these are primed for human error and practically ensure dissatisfaction among any team of highly skilled marketers.
Even more, the need to consolidate marketing data goes far and beyond employee satisfaction—with the deprecation of third-party cookies on the horizon, quality consolidated analytics are all the more critical.
Disparate technologies and disparate data have fostered a fragmented marketing landscape. The consequences of that fragmentation range from high rates of employee turnover to low-quality data, ad fraud, and valuable working hours lost each week.
This complexity shows an urgent need to consolidate, streamline, and automate the media buying process—from planning, to buying, to optimization, reporting, and financial processes. Let’s take a look at some of the opportunities marketing and advertising organizations have to streamline processes within the landscape:
Many industries—including finance, healthcare, and manufacturing—have already implemented broad automated processes to improve efficiency, while the marketing industry lags behind. In fact, global robotic process automation is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 32.8% from 2021 to 2028.
For digital advertisers, the upside to embracing automation manifests as time savings. A recent study found that advertising automation saves media buyers an average of 90 minutes per campaign. That's time they could spend on high-value pursuits like media strategy, education, and innovation instead of monotonous, repetitive tasks.
Advertising automation offers a better future for our industry and, importantly, its people—one where media professionals can work out of a single platform instead of nine per campaign, where they can use a single analytics dashboard to pull insights and craft strategies based on trustworthy, consolidated data, and easily reconcile invoices from multiple sources to boot. With automation, brands and agencies can have the time and resources with which to craft campaigns driven by real-time insights gleaned from trustworthy data and defined by quality creative, at scale.
To learn more about media complexity in the marketing landscape, check out Complexity, Job Satisfaction, and Automation in Digital Media. Or, to see how Basis can help simplify the media buying process, check out our Basis User Study Report.
Halloween season: It’s the only thing that can convince me to accept the fact that summer is over. My autumn anxiety is soothed by brainstorming costume ideas, eating too much candy corn, and ticking off titles on my list of horror movies to enjoy before the 31st.
If you’re a fellow horror fan, you know that one of the most frustratingly enjoyable parts of watching a new horror flick is seeing how directors play with the genre’s many tropes. Even if you’re new to horror, you’d likely recognize some of these conventions—the jump scare or the final girl, for example.
Sadly, horrors are not confined to the movie screen. The fragmentation and complexity of digital media, combined with the point solutions many marketers use to manage that complexity, can make navigating the space feel like trying to escape a haunted house. And while I have a love/hate relationship with watching horror tropes unfold on screen, I have no love at all for watching digital marketers trip over stumbling blocks that are entirely avoidable.
But never fear: If you’re an adtech user looking to avoid such horrors, this post will help you steer clear of four big ones. Just think of me as the friendly neighbor who, upon hearing that you’re thinking of purchasing a certain decrepit mansion that goes on the market every few years, refers you to a different realtor.
Even if you’re not a horror fan, you’ve probably heard the famous “Jaws” quote, “You’re going to need a bigger boat.” In the movie, a police chief, an oceanographer, and a pro shark fisherman set sail to find and kill a deadly shark. There’s a turning point in the movie when the trio lays eyes on the shark for the first time, and... well, it’s a lot bigger than any of them expected. Despite the police chief’s reasonable request that they go back and return with a bigger boat, the ego-driven fisherman insists they pursue the shark with their limited equipment. (Spoiler alert: neither the fisherman nor the boat in question survive).
In the advertising world, digital marketers often set up ambitious campaigns without using all the tools available to them. There’s nothing more terrifying than seeing a well-thought-out campaign with killer creative go live without taking advantage of all the resources available to optimize it, including time- and money-saving features like:
All no-brainers, right? Tap into all the optimization features available to you, and your campaign has a considerably better chance of reeling in the big fish—without capsizing.
Not getting a bigger boat, drinking on the job—who hired this man?!
The horror trope I personally find most frustrating is when the protagonists decide to split up in the process of trying to escape and/or defeat the villain. Apparently, a significant percentage of horror movie protagonists never heard the phrase “safety in numbers.” This poor decision-making plagues characters in films like “Fright Night” and “The Cabin in the Woods,” plus an alarmingly high number of Scooby-Doo episodes.
Sadly, similar missteps sometimes pop up in the advertising world—particularly when it comes to conversion-based campaigns. Conversions, as advertisers know, are kind of the holy grail of marketing. However, in today’s increasingly complex media environment, tracking those conversions can be a challenge.
Cross-device ad targeting allows marketers to not only reach users across their many devices, but track user activity across all of them—so if Jill sees your ad on a CTV device, but converts via her mobile phone, you still get credit for that conversion.
Moral of the story? If you’re running a conversion-based campaign, don’t be the group that splits up! When the whole team works together (read: when you enable cross-device), there’s no enemy you can’t vanquish (read: conversion you can’t track).
After 40 episodes, Fred never learns.
If you work in advertising, you’ve probably heard the “right time, right place” adage more times than you can count. And, like in advertising, timing is a critical factor in scary movies because it creates suspense. In “I Know What You Did Last Summer,” for instance, there’s an almost three-minute-long chase scene where one of the protagonists, Helen, is trying to escape from a hook-wielding assailant. At the end of the chase scene, she’s so close to safety...but her decision to hesitate for just a second seals her fate.
In digital advertising, timing is especially important when it comes to retargeting. It’s a strategy that delivers strong results for awareness, site traffic, and conversion rates alike—but when done thoughtlessly, it can haunt consumers rather than reach them in the right moments. Imagine purchasing a new car, for instance, and then being followed by automotive ads for months on end. It’s not only annoying for consumers, but a waste of ad spend for media buyers.
To avoid this horror, marketers should think through retargeting timeframe rules in relation to whatever product they’re running. If you’re advertising for a coffee brand, then sure: retargeting daily might make sense. For larger and more infrequent purchases, however, marketers should probably not retarget converted customers quite so soon.
Our retargeting campaign knows that you purchased a gym membership last summer, and we’re here to suggest a different option before you renew...
Prepare yourself, because this last adtech horror might legitimately give you a bit of stress. But first, the corresponding trope: the character that’s in denial. I’m talking about those singular characters who have the power to do something about the antagonizing murderer/monster/ghost, but refuse to believe the threat exists until it’s too late.
A classic example? Sheriff Brackett from “Halloween.” When the sheriff is warned about an escaped murderer wreaking havoc around town, he scoffs, telling the character warning him that “I have a feeling you’re way off on this.” As with many other non-believers in the horror canon, karma ensures that the sheriff is ultimately punished for his failure to act.
You probably know where I’m going with this one, right? Yup: it's time to talk about third-party cookie deprecation. I know, I know, cookie loss has been delayed until next year (after previously being delayed to 2022, after previously being delayed…) But consumers and regulators alike want marketers to transition to more privacy-friendly targeting methods ASAP. Right now, advertisers have the opportunity to explore a world of existing privacy-friendly advertising solutions, rather than being forced to implement them without any prior experience. So even if you’re not in denial about third-party cookie loss, it pays not to procrastinate.
Don’t be a Sheriff Bracket: start testing and learning with solutions like contextual and geo-based targeting now! By getting a head start, you’ll protect yourself from falling into the bucket of digital advertising procrastinators who risk karmic punishment (or just old-fashioned, non-karmic consequences from consumers and regulators, which might actually be a scarier prospect!).
The death of third-party cookies, that is...
While dabbling with tropes is a horror director’s birthright, marketers must learn from the mistakes others have made. To that end, I hope this post has scared you enough that you steer clear of the media missteps outlined above!
Another terrifying prospect for marketers? Not being up to date on the latest digital marketing news and developments. Luckily, we’ve got a team of digital marketing experts working around-the-clock to bring you the best digital marketing content and news. Sign up for Basis Scout to get it all delivered straight your inbox each month!
Welcome to Scout! Each week, our team tracks down the best digital marketing articles, POVs, and reports—so you don't have to. Here’s what to read from the week of 10/7/22 - 10/13/22 to stay ahead of the curve:
Data privacy regulators are not playing around: In September alone, Zillow, Expedia, Chewy.com, and Lowe’s were all fined for alleged data privacy breaches. In response, marketers are reevaluating their data practices and partnerships with renewed urgency—but that’s easier said than done, thanks to collection and sharing processes that are many-layered and difficult to audit.
Not only are marketers dealing with the threat of repercussions from misused data, but the loss of third-party cookies also looms on the horizon. While Google’s delay makes it tempting to procrastinate, marketers who test and implement alternatives early will be better off in the long run. (P.S. There’s a pun in that sentence, but you’ll have read the article to get it!)
This article from The Drum lays out five consumer trends that brands will need to grapple with in 2023—from increased competition for consumers’ time, to decreased brand trust. Thought we were done talking about the many challenges facing marketers, huh? Don’t worry, the next couple of links are much friendlier.
It seems that Apple is set on taking a bite out of the ad industry: Just a few months after rumors first started circulating around an Apple DSP, the tech giant is reportedly ready to start running ads alongside its original video content. With Netflix and Disney+ already planning to jump into the ad-supported pool, 2023 is shaping up to be a year for premium video inventory.
That inventory doesn’t come worry-free, though! In addition to brand safety concerns that have been exacerbated with the backlash around Netflix’s “Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story,” the lack of independent measurement offered by the platform has made advertisers uneasy. In response, the streaming giant has partnered with DoubleVerify and Integral Ad Science to reassure advertisers that their ads will run where and how they're expected to.
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I hated PE as a kid. Don’t get me wrong, I was quite active—how my parents balanced my involvement in basketball, softball, swimming, volleyball, and soccer at the same time, I’ll never know. But PE (aka physical education, aka phys ed, aka my worst nightmare)? Hard pass.
Why? My hatred boiled down to one thing: forced lap running.
Each day in class, my teacher would bring out a box filled with purple slips of paper and dole out several to each person. As class progressed, there were more “opportunities” to “earn” these slips—namely, by not following the rules.
Before class ended, the lap running would begin: run one lap for each slip, drop one in the box when you pass the teacher. For a kid who was a bit of a rulebreaker and not very fast, this routine was, quite simply, the worst.
What annoyed me most was that I had zero choice in the matter! If you’d asked me then if I would ever willingly take up running, the answer would have been a resounding “NO.”
Fast forward a few decades, and—alas!—I was wrong. As an adult, I’m an avid hiker and spend as much time in the mountains as possible. And in the past few years, my outdoor activities have expanded to include (drumroll, please) trail running!
The difference now? I choose to run, give myself opportunities to “play” and try new things as I train, and (perhaps most importantly) there have been zero purple slips involved. Turns out, I have completely different feelings about running when it’s my choice.
But enough about me—it’s time to let you in on how my journey with running relates to digital advertisers.
Right now, advertisers are in a position where they can choose to explore privacy-friendly solutions. That means the process can be done in a way that’s intentional, experimental, and even playful. Today, I’ll make the case for why advertisers should start testing third-party cookie alternatives early, and explore some of the identity solutions currently available for doing just that.
I know, I know: third-party cookie deprecation has been delayed to 2024. Plus, marketers already have plenty to juggle with inflation, economic instability, and ever-shifting consumer sentiments. But while it makes perfect sense for advertisers to want to procrastinate, there are significant benefits to testing solutions now.
If my relationship with running has taught me anything, it’s that doing something by choice is far more pleasant—and effective—than doing it because you “have to.” Still not convinced? Here are the two biggest reasons digital advertisers should get a head start on testing alternative identity solutions:
Consumers have made it clear that privacy must be a priority for the advertising industry. With 86% of Americans saying data privacy is a growing concern for them, and a variety of privacy-focused regulations being introduced over the past year, it’s clear that consumers and regulators alike want the status quo to change ASAP. Brands and marketers who embrace this sentiment now can reach consumers in innovative, creative ways that align with demands for increased digital privacy. Beyond that, addressing customer demand for privacy is a great way to build brand trust and loyalty, both of which are increasingly important in this time of shifting consumer behaviors.
I mentioned this above, but it’s worth restating: doing something when you can choose how and when to do it is a far better experience than being forced into change. Browsers like Apple’s Safari, Mozilla’s Firefox, and others have long since bid “adieu” to third-party cookies, and, despite Google’s many delays, the metaphorical bottom of the cookie jar is in sight. Eventually, third-party cookies will no longer be an option, whether advertisers like it or not. By starting to use cookieless solutions now, marketers can avoid the unpleasantness of being forced into the change unprepared.
Let’s start with the bad news: there is no silver bullet to fix all our third-party cookie loss problems...yet. However, there are many strategies that marketers can play with to help them reach the right audiences in privacy-friendly ways.
Here are some of the solutions marketers can explore when it comes to effectively crafting personalized customer experiences in a world without third-party cookies:
Have you “run” out of patience for my extended metaphor? No? Great, 'cause I’m not done yet!
One of the most impactful lessons learned along my running journey has been the importance of trying new things, especially things that are intimidating or unfamiliar. As a mountain-activity-loving adult, I spent years watching those around me dive into trail running, but didn’t participate because of the negative associations I had with running—and also because I feared being terrible at it.
Eventually, I realized how much I was missing out. By taking the risk, I developed a newfound sense of confidence: sure, I was sometimes (maybe even often) the last one up the mountain, but I made it to the top! And I enjoyed it along the way!
For advertisers wary of trying new strategies in their campaigns—especially when it comes to adapting to the identity crisis—a similar lesson applies. In preparing for third-party cookie loss, it’s better to make progress imperfectly than to get left behind.
And the great news? Exploring these new solutions is far more controlled than throwing on a pair of high-tread shoes and hoping they don’t slip as you barrel headfirst down a steep slope. Here are some of the ways advertisers can intentionally explore these new approaches:
A few weeks ago, my partner and I were trail running through the Wind River Range in Wyoming, in some of the most rugged, awe-inspiring mountains I’ve explored. As we followed the winding trail up and over rocky passes, beneath jagged cirques, and around stunningly blue lakes, I found myself reflecting on my growth as a runner: how much had changed since I was that kid living in fear of being handed an extra purple slip and forced to run another lap around the gym!
You know where I’m going here: while transitioning away from third-party cookies may seem daunting now, starting to test privacy-friendly alternatives is the first step to using those alternatives confidently when third-party cookies are finally gone. By being proactive and trying new privacy-friendly strategies now, marketers can avoid being stuck with that dreaded pile of purple slips when third-party cookies are no longer an option.
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Basis Technologies is here to support brands and agencies as we approach third-party cookie loss. To learn more about our perspective on the identity crisis, get a deeper dive on what led the adtech industry to this point, and explore novel solutions in greater depth, check out our guide.
Each month, Basis Technologies’ Programmatic 101 series tackles a different facet of programmatic advertising—from best practices for buyers, to competitors in the space, to trends you should know.
Looking to kickstart a career in digital media? You’ve made a good choice: from the metaverse, to live sports, to TikTok, there’s a lot to get excited about. Plus, it’s an industry that’s forecasted to see steady growth in years to come.
For digital media associates, understanding the basics when it comes to programmatic is a must. To help guide your career journey, we’ve outlined the top three skills digital media associates should have in order to run successful programmatic campaigns:
The most important part of any programmatic campaign is ensuring that a client’s business outcome (increasing market share, driving more traffic to a website, etc.) is translated to the correct digital key performance indicator (KPI).
For example, a client’s goal may be to increase their reach in a new market—but reach isn’t a key performance indicator you can optimize towards within a DSP. You can achieve a similar goal by instead using KPIs like eCPM, which estimates how much revenue is generated per thousand impressions, or delivery, which shows how effectively your ads are being delivered within your chosen tactics.
For a traffic or consideration campaign, the business outcome may be to increase site traffic, but if you don’t control for cost then you’ll likely end up spending a lot of money on just a couple of site visits. To track traffic while controlling for cost, a DSP campaign can be optimized towards a cost-based KPI such as cost-per-click or cost-per-landing page view.
For the same reason, it’s important to control for cost if you hear a client say they want to drive more sales. To avoid spending your whole budget on just a few sales, you can use KPIs like Return on Ad Spend or Cost-Per-Acquisition to track sales while spending efficiently.
Let’s discuss three of the main formats to consider when building out a programmatic strategy: audio, video (this includes CTV), and display (this includes interstitial and native advertising). We’ll break down why each format should be used, when it should be used, and some of the strategy red flags to keep an eye out for.
Use Case: According to eMarketer, digital audio will account for 12.7% of overall media time among US adults. That’s more time than US adults will spend on social media networks or watching video on their mobile devices! No wonder audio is digital advertising's fastest growing category. Plus, it's one of the last ad types that isn’t affected by ad blockers.
Best Used For: Awareness campaigns whose KPIs are focused on reach or completion rates.
Strategy Red Flags: Audio shouldn’t be used as the main ad format to drive conversion. While significant progress has been made with campaign-specific promotional codes and custom landing pages, advertisers should always complement audio placements with display ads to help drive efficiency and scale.
Use case: In 2022, nearly 84% of all US households will use a connected TV. And according to eMarketer, 2022 is the first year that video will surpass non-video formats in programmatic ad spending, largely due to the rise in connected TV ad spend.
Best used for: Like audio, video is best used for awareness campaigns whose KPIs are focused on reach or completion rates. In addition, video is great for brands and products that benefit from visual storytelling to communicate brand differentiators or explain a nuanced product.
Strategy red flags: Comparing programmatic video performance to social video performance is a big red flag. Unlike other channels (who have companion banners or specific call to action buttons), programmatic video and connected TV are consumed before or in the middle of other content. While these videos are great for awareness, consumers are unlikely to leave their content to go complete an action on a website, making them an inefficient way to drive conversions.
Use case: Display ad spend saw huge growth in 2021, and is forecasted to increase by 20.9% in 2022, according to eMarketer. Native ads are particularly well-positioned to deliver higher click-through rates, because their blended-in feel helps to combat banner blindness.
Best used for: While display can be used for any objective, it’s best suited for driving an action, as consumers are used to clicking on a display ad to learn more about a product.
Strategy red flags: When display creative doesn’t have a strong call to action or when the same display creative is being used month-over-month. As a best practice, display creative should be updated every 4-6 weeks, even if it’s a simple CTA or image change.
There’s nothing worse than taking the time to build out a campaign, upload and map all the creative, and set it live…only to find it isn’t spending. If your daily budgets are not being met, we’ve created this helpful checklist for you to run through.
Want more resources to achieve your digital media career goals? AdTech Academy provides curated learning paths that are designed to bolster your industry knowledge around certain topics and industry roles.
Check out AdTech Academy’s learning path for Digital Media Associates here!
The digital media campaign process is in-depth, complex, and relentless. Today, marketers are spending too much time on small, repetitive tasks—time they could be spending on things like media strategy, education, and innovation.
It can be difficult to understand how the right media platform can impact a team’s day-to-day and overall output. So we partnered with Directions Research to study how Basis can help marketers simplify and save time throughout the campaign process.
Among the findings:
Want to learn more about how Basis can help save you time? Download the Basis User Study Report today.