BY Kathy Crosett
Do your accounts know that 90% of the U.S. digital display ad market is programmatic? With $180B now being spent annually, marketers understand programmatic advertising benefits. You can help your accounts get more out of the format by sharing AudienceSCAN data to help them properly target consumers.
What’s changing in programmatic ad buying this year?
Programmatic got its start in the static display ad market. The marketplaces where publishers and advertisers meet are now so efficient that CTV, video and DOOH ads are increasingly bought this way.
Private marketplaces are grabbing more programmatic spending. This trend is developing because advertisers realize their ads will appear in good places, measurement is easier and relationships are maintained. In open marketplaces, the opportunity for fraud remains high.
How are marketers shifting their programmatic ad spending?
Marketers have learned to be cautious with programmatic ads. In the Proximic State of Programmatic 2026 report, around 58% of surveyed marketers will increase spending on programmatic. With the additional spending will come a focus on “disciplined, intentional planning.”
The report indicated the amount of media budget going to programmatic by media format:
- CTV/OTT 26%
- Socialmedia 22%
- Digital desktop/mobile 20%
- Linear TV 17%
- Audio/podcasts 10%
What is the trend of programmatic advertising on CTV?
Programmatic in CTV is emerging as a powerhouse. Half of surveyed marketers anticipate increased programmatic CTV advertising. They are tapping linear TV, desktop/mobile and social media budgets to fund the increases. However, 16% have increased ad spending overall to fund the opportunity they see in CTV.
What are the programmatic advertising benefits for digital audio?
With advertisers showing more interest in programmatic audio, they are moving budgets from linear TV and fixed audio. Analysts believe that the flexibility in programmatic audio, along with measurement performance, makes the category appealing.
Which exchanges do marketers prefer?
In the early days, one programmatic advertising benefit was allowing marketers to efficiently buy ads. But a consistent complaint about programmatic ad spending is that a significant percentage of ads are never being seen.
Too often, the placements go to made-for-advertising sites. Your clients can’t afford to waste their ad budgets in a highly competitive economy.
Marketers are focused now on “…where ads run, how inventory is accessed, and which supply paths best align with their brand, performance and risk standards.”
Just under half of marketers spend around 40% of programmatic funds on open exchanges. The other 60% goes to protected environments. Analysts point out that marketers like private marketplaces (PMPs) because they can guarantee placement near quality content.
Media sellers should know that marketers find comfort in a “curated” environment. Over 70% want access to high-quality or exclusive inventory. They know the content offered by these publishers will not shock or disturb their target audience.
Contextual Targeting
Similarly, 50% of programmatic buyers, especially in verticals like health care and financial services, emphasize contextual targeting as one of the key programmatic advertising benefits. In these situations, they don’t set up bids based on a user’s data points. Instead, bids are managed based on the webpage or program content to protect privacy.
An ad about a local health club might appear on a page about obesity management that a consumer is visiting. An ad about a discount on fast food would not appear on that page.
Increasingly, AI is used to determine webpage content before an ad appears in a contextual placement.
Another way to optimize contextual advertising is to consider the IAB categories. This taxonomy was developed to help marketers improve targeting and brand safety. When you use AudienceSCAN from AdMall for audience targeting, you’ll see the appropriate IAB category.
Performance
Marketers accept that AI technology will grow in importance when they buy ads programmatically. But they still expect human oversight. For example, 48% are mostly manually selecting targeted audiences, while 40% use a mix of manual and AI-driven selection.
Over 80% of marketers want to see predicted performance in terms of reach when they choose an audience for their campaigns. But it’s the outcome that really matters. Over 62% hope to see higher conversion rates.
You can help your accounts take advantage of programmatic advertising benefits by using AudienceSCAN’s many profiles. In addition, the profiles contain AI-generated ideas for how to develop ad copy to appeal to each audience.
Image by cottonbro studios on Pexels.
