As online advertising evolves, the technology behind it evolves as well. Case in point: using Dynamic Creative Optimisation (DCO) services, marketers can now automatically deliver tailor-made ads to Internet users, ensuring only the most relevant messages that viewers actually want to see are put in front of them. Essentially, DCO technology maximises the impact of every impression by dynamically analysing, then optimising the performance of display ad elements by learning which combination of message and creative performs best.
Combining DCO, which optimises to the best performing ads with advanced behavioural capabilities, ensure that advertisers deliver relevant ads to the appropriate target audiences. For example, an ad with a blue background and the headline “Vacation in Spain” performs better among a certain target group (say males aged 18-25 in the Greater London area) than an ad with a red background and the headline “Vacation in France”, advertisers would automatically adjust to ensure the first ad is served to that target group . Predictive targeting takes behavioural advertising one step further, by dynamically creating similar profiles to registered site users, increasing the targeting database.
In fact, the IAB UK estimates that behavioural targeting (including retargeting) represented £350m, so about 50% of display ad spent in 2010. With the availability of targeted ads comes a slew of information—and rumours—about how this technology functions and what it means to consumers. Here, we’ll discuss four of the biggest misconceptions:
Myth #1: Publishers and advertisers know an individual consumer’s personal information
In the UK, 31 percent of consumers polled for a July report by eMarketer said they’d be interested in Websites offering behaviourally targeted ads, as long as none of the data collected could identify them. The good news is that publishing sites are aggregating data and making assumptions based on users’ online actions and does not collect personally identifiable information; however, that information isn’t assigned to “Johnny Q. User”, but rather is completely anonymous.
Myth #2: Behavioural Targeting is only beneficial for agencies and advertisers
Publishers benefit from behaviourally targeted campaigns as well, because these ads dramatically improve results on site placements. Publishers gain the opportunity to better understand the value of their site’s content, enabling them to provide premium offerings and lift their average CPM. According to a case study commissioned by the IAB UK and The Guardian behavioural advertising enables publishers to extend the volume of inventory available by targeting users of a particular section elsewhere on the site, thereby monetising non-premium inventory at a higher rate. This means that publishers and ad networks can extend any contextual buys and take more advertising budget from advertisers. In addition, there are DCO tools on the market that allow for simplified ad creation and trafficking, making it a cinch for publishers to adopt and implement the technology.
Myth #3: There are creative and media spend limitations when developing a DCO ad campaign
A robust DCO offering provides complete creative flexibility, allowing all elements of a display ad (video, call-to-action, click-through URL, background colour, copy, etc.) to be designated as dynamic, ensuring nearly infinite possible combinations to deliver and optimise against. In addition, utilising a solution that doesn’t restrict agency users to templates is also helpful in maintaining client control. On the media side as well, flexibility is key—there are options available allowing agencies to manage the entire DCO process from beginning to end, including uploading or swapping out ad assets, scheduling, setting analysis parameters, executing optimisation decisions down to the individual placement level, etc.
Myth #4: DCO ad campaigns are time-consuming and costly to create
With all those possible combinations of ads going out to an inordinate number of placements, the mind reels at the sheer numbers of actual ad executions. However, the beauty of DCO campaigns is that once set up properly with ad combination groups assigned to target groups, human involvement is pretty much complete—at that point, the complex algorithms of the system take over and start automatically optimising, pushing the most relevant ads to the most interested audiences. Not only does that save time but also the cost of the manpower needed to create and traffic multiple ad versions.
As more and more marketers look to targeted ads as a way to maximise online media spend effectiveness and ROI, more discussions will generate among industry thought-leaders and more information will become available to the market.
As technology continues to evolve at fast pace in the online advertising space, advertisers, agencies and Publishers will soon be able to combine powerful predictive behavioural targeting capabilities with DCO enabling it to automatically deliver the best performing ad to the best user. The end result? Combined behavioural targeting and dynamic creative optimisation solutions will continue to grow and shift to meet advertisers’, agencies’ and consumers’ needs, creating in a win-win situation for all and dramatically increasing ROI on all online advertising campaigns.
Erwin Plomp
President EMEA, EyeWonder
Twitter: _ew