Sustainability Should Be Reason Enough to Reconsider Programmatic Media

A key objective of the ANAamp8217s study was to help marketers drive business and brand growth by eliminating quotwasteful and unproductive spendingquot It39s a simple objective which in theory should be easy to achieve if only marketers had access to the right information However as with prior studies the quotinformation asymmetryquot in the programmatic space makes it challenging for marketers to understand and obtain information about price quality including whether content is brand safe and ads are viewable and fraud free and audiences needed to make informed decisions about their mediaThe barriers to transparency in the programmatic supply chain can be exhausting and time consuming Case in point out of the 67 ANA member companies that volunteered to participate in the study only 21 were able to get through the legal and other hurdles to get access to their own log file data from their DSPs SSPs and ad verification vendors These barriers are not new and were also found in prior programmatic studies yet they still exist despite years of industry recommendations for advertisers to take a more active role in their media investments and to obtain access to log file and other supply chain data through direct contracts with the supply chain or through their agency agreementsThe study also found that advertisers are too focused on driving costs down versus incentivizing value Agency performance payments are often tied to savings they generate for the advertiser which can lead to value being overlooked and lost Further because it can be difficult to measure ROI on a campaign marketers may be hesitant to focus on effectiveness over cost But not all inventory is created equal The study recommends that advertisers balance the desire of lowcost inventory with ad quality ie viewable fraud free and brand safeAs if having more effective and efficient marketing that is seen by actual humans is not enough of an incentive for the industry to make changes then perhaps the ANA39s recommendation for advertisers to be aware of the sustainability impact of their programmatic supply chain should be reason enough for serious changeThe report found that on average the participating advertisers were advertising on over 44000 websites This quotdeeply concerningquot number of sites is neither a new revelation nor a sensible investment The study however shows that advertisers may be ignoring the sustainability impacts Every impression and ad call in the supply chain creates carbon emissions The longer the supply chain ie more websites used the higher the emissions As if that was not bad enough some of those websites including Made for Advertising websites are higher in emissions than others The report urges advertisers and their media buying partners to focus on sustainability by streamlining the number of websites on which ads appear by using inclusion lists instead of exclusion lists and consider supporting options like Ad Net Zero the advertising industryamp8217s drive to reduce the carbon impact of developing producing and running advertisingAs outside legal counsel to the ANA together with my colleagues Nick Swimer and Douglas Wood I had the privilege of being part of this study as well as prior industry studies on programmatic but the sustainability piece is particularly notable to me All the recommendations in the study could easily be connected to a brand and agency KPI focused on improving sustainability If sustainability is important to advertisers they need to accept that itamp8217s not just about wasting dollars or the value received and quality of the inventory they buy Itamp8217s also about the environmental impact created by questionable spendingThe study shows that marketers need to work with their agencies and supply chain partners and adopt industry controls that not only ensure a provable ROI but also help save the planetYou can check out the full study and recommendations hereThis column was written by Keri Bruce a Partner at Reed Smith LLP the ANA39s General CounselPosted at MediaVillage through the Thought Leadership selfpublishing platformClick the social buttons to share this content with your friends and colleaguesThe opinions and points of view expressed in this content are exclusively the views of the author andor subjects and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillageorgMyersBizNet Inc management or associated writers

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Sustainability Should Be Reason Enough to Reconsider Programmatic Media

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Sustainability Should Be Reason Enough to Reconsider Programmatic Media

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