Enhancing the value of custom ads
Custom ad formats deliver added value for everyone — more engaging experiences for consumers, better performance for media buyers, and more efficient costs per thousand impressions (CPMs) for publishers versus standard banner ads. However, scaling these top-shelf formats is becoming increasingly difficult for publishers. This is due to the high-touch nature of these deals and the fact that the direct reservation budgets typically used to buy custom ads are slowly being shifted to programmatic channels.
Google Ad Manager is working with Vox Media and other partners to address these challenges. The solution — Programmatic Guaranteed with custom creatives — marries custom rich media ad formats with programmatic demand, all while streamlining the operational workflow. It works by changing where the creative is being hosted from the advertiser’s server to the publisher’s. This small but strategic change allows media buyers to set up Programmatic Guaranteed deals using Google Display & Video 360. They then link their deals to their creative, which is being hosted on Google Ad Manager using a Creative ID. This way when an advertiser’s deal wins an auction, the associated ad is served instantaneously via the publisher’s server.
While the deals are still executed one-to-one, Programmatic Guaranteed’s thoughtful workflow and built-in automation dramatically simplify the process for both parties. Additionally, it connects publishers with a growing pool of programmatic advertisers.
Aligning with a growing demand
Programmatic advertising now represents how the majority of digital advertising dollars are transacted in the US. In a recent report, eMarketer estimated that 78% of all US digital display dollars will transact programmatically in 2017, totaling a market size of about $32.5B. The report also noted that Programmatic Direct will represent about 56% of that budget ($18.2B) in 2017, and is expected to grow. [1]
As more ad dollars shift towards programmatic, Vox Media is working quickly to educate its clients on how the company views the future of media buying.
Programmatic Guaranteed with custom creatives not only exposes publishers’ custom ad products to more demand, it also creates a new performance standard for programmatic advertising.
A new standard for programmatic creative
Forward-thinking publishers are embracing the intermediary role of “publisher as agency,” as they realize the unique value and performance lift they can provide their customers.
Ultimately, even the most technically advanced standard banner ads are limited to inside the box thinking. This constraint inspired Vox Media to create their sleek “Athena” unit. Athena, demoed below, delivers rich media experiences on both desktop and mobile devices, and can now be transacted and aligned programmatically through Google Ad Manager.
To illustrate the dramatic performance gains custom creatives produce, we evaluated Athena’s performance benchmarks against standard banner ads run across Vox Media’s properties. Here’s how Athena performed:
165% lift in CTR
310% lift in universal interaction rates (non mobile)
300+% increase in touch rates (mobile)
23+% increase in attention quality
40% lift in video completion rates
Given the scarcity of premium instream video inventory in the industry, offering video ads in custom creatives is an attractive solution for publishers looking to scale their video ad products. Especially since units like Vox’s Athena are delivering a 40% lift in video completion rates across their media properties.
The future of custom creatives and programmatic advertising
Programmatic Guaranteed with custom creatives marks an important moment for the future of programmatic advertising. It empowers publishers to take creative and programmatic strategies into their own hands, and it allows media buyers to no longer sacrifice performance to achieve scale and efficiency.
Stay tuned for more updates on Google Ad Manager in the coming months.