A little more than twenty years after its first introduction, programmatic advertising has successfully cemented its position within the ecosystem of the advertising industry. It’s no longer a question of whether or not programmatic advertising will dominate digital advertising since it is reported to account for $81 billion worth of digital display ad spending in 2021. Since they control 85% of the display advertising industry, the figures speak for themselves.

You may experience some difficulties when advertisers start investing more in programmatic advertising. We have listed five of the most significant issues marketers face when it comes to this type of advertising and technology-based ways to tackle these programmatic advertising challenges.

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What is programmatic advertising?

The buying and selling of internet advertising space between advertising agencies, companies, and other third-party vendors is referred to as programmatic advertising. A demand-side platform, also called a DSP, is used by companies or agencies to determine, in essence, which impressions to purchase and how much they should spend for each impression. The providers use what is known as a “supply-side platform,” or SSP, which is the marketplace on which they sell impressions to advertising agencies and brands.

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Challenges of programmatic advertising and their solutions

AOL claims that 92% of marketers are already employing the technology, even though issues are still associated with programmatic advertising. This indicates that programmatic ad purchasing is soon to become the standard. The amount of money spent on programmatic advertising is growing. As a result, this kind of advertising is becoming more widespread and is seen by marketers as easier to reach. This article will help you run more effective programmatic advertising campaigns by providing programmatic advertising solutions to five of the most significant difficulties you face with programmatic advertising.

Top 5 programmatic advertising challenges and solutions

1. The algorithms used in programmatic advertising

The use of algorithms is becoming an increasingly important component of the work done by advertisers and marketers. The processes of content creation, posting, and algorithms entirely govern advertising. Although robots are more productive than people (sorry, humans), they sometimes contribute to incorrect contextual advertising. Unfortunately, algorithms might make mistakes from time to time. The ideal scenario is one in which the advertisement could be more interesting to the viewer.

Your advertisement could wind up showing up on a website or web page that is harmful to the reputation of your business or needs to be corrected for the demographic you are trying to reach if the worst-case scenario plays out. Even though there is a significant amount of mathematics and science involved in algorithms, marketers may still take measures to protect themselves from being victims of bad or improper programmatic ad placement.

The Solution

Advertisers must ensure that they have carefully considered their targeting strategies. You will unlikely get the results you want by concentrating your efforts on specific behaviours or phrases. It is also critical to choose an appropriate programmatic advertising platform that satisfies your requirements, one that enables you to communicate with your intended audience, and one that enables you to consistently provide advertising that is relevant.

On the other hand, as competition in this sector heats up, programmatic providers will likely improve their targeting capabilities and the quality of the solutions they provide, which is fantastic news for advertisers.

2. Fraud related to viewability and impressions

Several industry professionals have singled out ad fraud as the most pressing issue regarding programmatic advertising that requires a solution. In the last couple of years, businesses such as Google and AppNexus have begun offering “fraud-free” advertisements since ad fraud has become a significant issue in recent years. Advertisers using programmatic methods are understandably worried about many types of fraud, including impression fraud. An example of impression fraud is fraudulently creating advertising impressions to inflate the number of impressions created and induce advertisers to spend more money.

This is not a new issue that marketers encounter; rather, it goes hand in hand with click fraud. Even as far back as 2005, Google was engaged in a war against these kinds of bots and implemented mechanisms to counteract them. Choosing programmatic advertising platforms that provide transparency, have a high reputation, and even enforce precautions against ad fraud is one approach that advertisers can take to reduce their risk of being victimised by fraudulent advertising.

The Solution

The difficulty that programmatic marketers have in terms of the viewability of ad impressions, in general, remains high within the realm of online display advertising. The Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) defines “viewability” in the context of online advertising as “viewable ad impressions.” The following are the requirements that must be met for an ad impression to be deemed viewable:

Desktop display advertising is deemed watchable if at least half of its pixels are visible for at least one second; however, the criteria for desktop video ads is for half of the pixels to be visible for two seconds. Additionally, the standard requires that for bigger desktop ad units, a viewable ad must have at least 30% of its total pixel count visible for at least one second. In today’s world, it is not possible to measure either custom advertising units or significant aspects of sponsorships reliably.

As inventory is acquired per impression for the most part in programmatic advertising, there is difficulty concerning the viewability of the advertisements. Advertisers would naturally only want to pay for the impressions that a person has seen rather than for ones that have been provided but have yet to be viewed by a user.

As a result, if you want programmatic advertising to be effective, you need to address one of the most significant accusations against it and work toward achieving 100 percent viewability. This programming problem is being tackled by organisations such as the IAB and firms such as Google, both of which comprehend the significance of aiming for 100 percent viewability rates.

3. Advertisements on all channels

It is common knowledge that we now live in a world with several displays, and additional screens in the form of wearable technology are on the horizon. Even though most programmatic ad purchasing has been concentrated on desktop advertisements, spending on video and mobile programmatic will likely contribute to the expansion of this sector. What makes this such a difficult task?

The Solution

Many marketers still need to rely on Flash banners, which cannot be read on mobile devices, or advertisements that need to be optimised for mobile and, as a result, provide an unpleasant viewing experience for users. It is time for online marketers to understand how to construct responsive mobile advertisements in HTML5 to create fantastic campaigns that are compatible with all displays.

Top 5 programmatic advertising challenges and solutions

4. Knowledge of automated programmatic advertising

The field of programmatic is filled with jargon and words that are only partially defined. If you’ve ever been overwhelmed by programmatic complexity, know that others are in this boat. It’s no secret that advertisers and marketers believe they have a knowledge gap in programmatic advertising; we all know that programmatic advertising is significant, but we need to figure out precisely what it is. This is a difficulty that has to be solved within the realm of programmatic advertising.

The Solution

If it can be solved, however, it will result in a much-improved industry full of experts and better marketers; as a result, customers will be able to enjoy the advantages of this improvement by watching better and more relevant advertising.

5. Innovative concepts for programmatic

While substantial progress has been made in the technology used to purchase advertisements over the last several years, the creative development process has mostly stayed the same. Users of programmatic advertising increasingly realise that to make the most of the sophisticated targeting technologies offered by programmatic advertising, it is necessary to develop a wide diversity of creatives. On the other hand, creating this many creatives manually is a time-consuming and prohibitively costly endeavour. Advertisers are now seeking creative programmatic solutions, which automate parts of producing advertisements and enable modifications to be made on the fly, for example.

The Solution

The use of creative programmatic solutions will make programmatic advertising purchasing more effective than it has ever been. There are now accessible options; all that is required is for advertising to begin using them.

The amount of money spent on programmatic advertising is expected to increase; as this sector expands, existing difficulties will be solved, but other challenges will emerge in their place. If you want to give your brand an edge, the time to start getting into the programmatic game is now.

Final Thoughts: Advantages and Challenges

There are obstacles associated with programmatic advertising, just as there are issues associated with any innovative approach or cutting-edge new technology. However, the benefits brought about by the creation of programmatic advertising unquestionably transcend any short-term obstacles that the industry, programmatic providers, and individuals using programmatic advertising may work together to overcome. As a growing number of marketers and advertisers boost their spending on programmatic advertising, this is still a field that is obviously expanding and maturing. 

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A Summary

  • Learn how programmatic advertising mediums and targeting operate so that you won’t be taken advantage of by algorithmic errors.
  • Keep in mind the viewability of the ads. Carry out some research on the topic at hand, and investigate how the programmatic advertising platform you use counts ad impressions.
  • Select a supplier of programmatic advertising that has a solid reputation and makes an effort to combat ad fraud by doing so actively.
  • Display advertisements that were built using HTML5 were optimised for mobile devices so that they could be seen on any screen.
  • Investing in programmatic advertising is a challenging endeavour; before you take on this task, ensure you understand the sector or contact someone who does. Campaigns that could be more effective with professional insight can result from a good lack of expertise in programmatic, which can lead to poor performance.
  • The central focus of programmatic advertising is buying appropriate inventory that will expose your brand to your target clients. Increase your click-through rate by optimising your programmatic advertising campaigns by developing many personalised creatives for each of your target groups. This will help you get more people to click on your ads.

Continue reading iTMunch for the latest news and articles related to programmatic advertising.

SEE ALSO: What is People-Based Marketing and What are its Benefits?

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