Buyers and sellers are constantly looking for ways to improve the efficiency of programmatic supply paths. Ana Milicevic, principal of Sparrow Advisers, Lisa Arnold, vice president of programmatic strategy at Dentsu, and Greg Watkins, founder of AllHipHop.com, sat down with Adweek during our NexTech Summit to discuss the state of the programmatic landscape and what changes are on the horizon.
Optimizing the supply path
According to Arnold, in 2023 and beyond, advertisers should focus on supply chain optimization. She added that in order to properly optimize supply chains, transparency and control are two key factors.
“When it comes to SPO, our focus moving forward needs to be on continuing to use for increased transparency and control as we move toward an ideal state of clear, efficient supply paths for every impression we buy,” she said. “I think we know the supply side of the business is not where we want it to be when it comes from a programmatic buying perspective. So continuing to push for those things when we talk to our partners is hugely important.”
Milicevic added that in an environment of macroeconomic headwinds and a downturn in the advertising sector, if you don’t optimize the supply chain, you’ll have to cut media as a buyer.
“You don’t want to do that because then coming out of a recession, you’re not going to know whether something you’ve done in your media mix has really impacted the ability to sell your product,” she said. “As long as the people with the money on the buy side have this as a challenge, it behooves everyone to focus on optimization.”
Evaluating your partners
The trio agrees that ad tech moves in cycles, meaning what works at one point in time may be completely ineffective later on. This is why Milicevic stressed the importance of regularly reviewing your partners and taking all so-called best practices with a grain of salt.
“That also may mean the partners you’ve been working with for the last several years have shifted in focus,” she said. “Maybe their offering is different. Maybe you’re no longer locked into the same commercial arrangement as you were in the past. What every company should be doing is looking at its partnership ecosystem and reevaluating it at least once a year. In many cases, you will find that tiering how you approach different partners will provide value.”
Identity takes a new role
With third-party cookie deprecation on the horizon, Watkins said he believes identity is going to be a big driver in the coming years. He said new identity solutions present an opportunity for advertisers to reduce the amount of fraud in the advertising ecosystem while maximizing spend.
“I read one study that said the biggest illicit trafficking operations in the world are cocaine smuggling and ad fraud—that’s the scale of it,” he explained. “If the industry focuses on working together regarding cookie deprecation and Unified ID solutions with a holistic approach throughout the supply chain, there’s an opportunity to take back some of the power from the duopoly and return it to the open internet and reduce ad fraud, which is rampant.”
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