Guest Contributor, Helen Miall
Earlier this year, we released our annual State of the Nation research, providing a comprehensive overview of key trends and insights in the programmatic digital out of home (prDOOH) market. This year’s report delves into the perspectives of 1,200 executives from both traditional out-of-home and digital advertising sectors across various countries, including the rapidly growing market of Spain.
We wanted to look at the different programmatic journeys market by market and the big challenges faced by each. What were the key topics coming up this year? How has the market moved in the last 12 months? What can we see from these trends? We accompanied the research with a series of in-person local market events starting in New York, then to Spain, UK, Australia, Germany and France.
The findings offer a nuanced understanding of the challenges, advancements and evolving dynamics within the prDOOH landscape. While there are differences between each country, there are some common themes too. These include:
Sustainability
Sustainability has become an important topic this year. Media buyers and brands are starting to ask more questions, as there’s now a real desire to understand how prDOOH is part of the consideration about where to sustainably place advertising. In the UK and Germany, we saw a pronounced emphasis on sustainability, with Australia following suit, albeit to a lesser degree.
There are several independent research pieces – KPMG in France and Climate Partners/Media Plus in Germany – that show OOH is one of the most sustainable media channels due to the nature of being a broadcast media versus a one-to-one channel.
VIOOH has signed partnership agreements with two companies – Cedara and Scope 3 – who we are working with to provide more transparency to advertisers looking to make informed decisions about their media selection. In addition, we recently shared VIOOH’s impression intensity carbon emissions (grams CO2e) per ad impression for 2022, calculated through Cedara to be 0.28gCO2e, which is 18% below the Cedara programmatic open web benchmark.
While it’s clear that questions surrounding the environmental impact of advertising are on the rise, this has yet to translate into a noticeable shift in ad spend towards lower carbon density channels.
Inventory evolution
One standout trend was the broadening spectrum of inventory types considered for prDOOH. We regularly partner with new media owners that have diverse inventory offerings. DOOH can now be found in retail environments such as shopping malls or supermarkets at the point of sale as well as petrol and electric vehicle charging stations, supermarkets, gyms and co-working spaces. The accessibility facilitated by programmatic technology is a driving force behind this expansion.
The resounding feedback from the report was that advertisers are seeking more granular data to understand the diverse audiences within these environments. So as prDOOH becomes increasingly sophisticated and data-centric, demands for inventory have increased. This is an evolution that we have started to see repeatedly across markets.
Cost efficiency
Another topic that was a particularly strong theme in Spain was cost efficiency, but this is also a trend that has started to drop away in more mature markets. These concerns tend to be predominantly from traditional OOH buyers who are still getting used to buying programmatically and are comparing CPMs versus direct buy, as opposed to digital buyers who are very used to paying for increased flexibility, data that improves targeting, and options around dynamic creative optimisation.
More experienced buyers are understanding that as targeting increases with audience data or you’re looking at certain triggers such as weather conditions to activate campaigns, there is a slight cost increase in CPM due to the additional fees. However, these increases are outweighed by the overall gains in campaign efficiency and performance.
It’s incredibly compelling to look at different markets to see where behaviours are shifting, and how they are moving, because as markets mature and understanding improves prDOOH becomes increasingly key.
Market Variations
The US stands out as a fragmented market, with many advertisers favouring regional ad campaigns over national ones, where they may only want to reach a specific state, city or neighbourhood. In addition, the sheer size of the US means there’s a huge number of OOH media owners, rogrammatic is enabling easier buying across multiple media owners, offering buyers the option to work with only a couple of DSPs and SSPs to access the majority of programmatically available inventory more easily.
Australia, on the other hand, whilst comparable in size to the US geographically, is quite unique because the population is mostly found in a relatively small number of contained areas. In Australia, VIOOH provides access to small and large-format DOOH sites in urban areas as well as small format screens in health centres, pharmacies and GP surgeries in both urban as well as rural and remote areas. This is where adopting a strategy to find complementary inventory really works.
Conversely, Germany has lots of cities with relatively equal audience numbers, spread across the country. The German market tends to use a lot of “programmatic guaranteed” deals, which provide a guarantee on the number of impressions, along with the flexibility of buying DOOH through programmatic platforms..
It’s incredibly interesting to see the variety in each country and as we talk to customers we can better understand their point of view which is hugely insightful. VIOOH’s State of the Nation 2023 sheds light on the ever-evolving landscape of prDOOH, emphasising the global nature of the industry while acknowledging the importance of market-specific insights.
As sustainability gains traction in influencing buying decisions and inventory options multiply, advertisers are navigating an increasingly sophisticated landscape, prompting a demand for more granular data and heightened efficiency. It remains imperative for industry players to adapt, innovate and stay attuned to the evolving demands of advertisers in the dynamic world of prDOOH.
Helen Miall is CMO at VIOOH. For more information visit: www.viooh.com
Read the full State of the Nation report here: viooh.com/sotn
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