Even though digital transformation has been around for a long time, it is now being fueled by the upcoming end of third-party cookies. As a result, media companies that haven’t already embraced the digital evolution are being forced to do so due to the deadline that has been set for when third-party cookies will no longer be used. While media businesses seek a solution to the issue of third-party cookies, they are analyzing their current processes and developing strategies to improve their media ad sales process and make their ad operations teams more efficient.
In this article, we look at 6 reasons why media companies are deciding to update their media ad sales process.
Cookie Deprecation
The end of third-party cookies really has been the driving force for many media companies to change their approach and to look at their advertising processes. They really don’t have a choice in the matter, either they act quickly and change their approach or risk losing significant revenue. As part of this, media companies need to ensure they have or are planning a strategy to build strong first-party data in order to avoid a loss of ad sales revenue.
Advertisers must trust that the media companies with whom they currently work will prepare for the change, this is why media companies must act now rather than later. Otherwise, advertisers will look to advertise elsewhere with media companies that have built their first-party data and have a similar audience available.
This has been a key factor in media companies changing their media ad sales strategy and advertising structure. If you’d like to learn more about 3rd Party Cookies: Challenges and ADvendio’s Solution To Safeguard Your Advertising Revenue then register for our upcoming webinar here.
Omnichannel advertising
In the fast-paced world of today, it’s not enough to just have an ad in a newspaper and expect that it will make a difference and generate hundreds of sales for you. Advertisers are now looking to have an ad campaign placed cross-channel at a variety of different touchpoints with their audience, in order to achieve the best ROI on their campaign.
Media companies that once only worked in print media, are adapting to the needs of their advertisers and are starting to offer an omnichannel advertising plan to brands. This change brings with it a need to address how media companies are currently managing their ad inventory and processes and companies are now looking for solutions to make the management of these types of campaigns easier for ad ops teams. Advertisers are demanding more from media companies and they need to be able to keep up with the demands or risk losing business to other media companies that can manage these campaigns more efficiently and effectively for advertisers.
Ad inventory
Advertisers have to move faster with campaign planning, they are jumping on trends and changes in the environment a lot quicker, where once a campaign might be in the planning phase for several weeks or months, today, advertisers need to jump when something changes in the world that they can capitalize on.
Therefore, media companies need to have up-to-date information on available ad placements, in order to provide accurate, reliable information to advertisers when they come looking to book a campaign, to avoid double-booking a placement.
Also, as media groups move into a cross-channel advertising model, it’s important more now than ever that they have an easy way for sales teams to know what ad inventory is available and ready to sell and upsell to customers.
Automation of the Media Ad Sales Process
With more ad space being purchased by advertisers, it’s important to get bills sent out quickly to assure that payments are made on campaigns before moving too far ahead with other campaigns.
Media groups are experiencing increased ad sales due to higher demand from advertisers for ad space, now omnichannel campaigns are an option for media companies. This has led to an increase in the number of order confirmations and invoices that need to be sent out to advertisers. Media groups need to adapt to the high interest in their offerings and look for a way to automate their processes as much as possible, removing some of the manual work for their teams. Reducing manual tasks gives more time for media companies to focus on more meaningful projects that require human input. Automating smaller tasks afford the ad ops team more time to spend on larger clients to plan effective campaigns and build relationships with them.
Transparency
Advertisers are requesting more campaign performance data and want the data quickly in order to make informed decisions about their campaigns and react without delay to ensure that precious ad dollars aren’t being wasted on ineffective campaigns.
Therefore, ad ops teams need to have transparency across customers and their campaign data to provide fast insights to advertisers to enable them to make better decisions, faster. Transparency has become even more important to media companies with teams working from home and hybrid working becoming the norm, teams need to have easy access to customer data, available inventory, and campaign data, no matter what location they are working from.
Self-service advertising portals
Another change in media ad sales processes has stemmed from past behaviors, when media companies treated all customers equally, small customers were treated with the same level of customer service as larger companies. But media companies are now realizing there is a better way to satisfy their smaller customers and give them what they need while saving the media group time and money in the process.
Smaller companies often make campaign decisions significantly faster as they are not investing as much money in the campaign and have fewer individuals on a team to make decisions. However, when working with a media company that deals with hundreds of companies (both large and small) on a regular basis, the smaller company does not receive the timely replies that they demand.
Therefore, media companies have started to incorporate self-service portals into their business. The self-service solution is typically provided to their smaller customers in order for them to acquire their own ad inventory in real-time without having to involve a sales agent, were waiting for a salesperson to respond may take several days and the ad spot they wished to purchase could be sold in that time.
Removing smaller customers from the manual media ad sales process and instead offering a faster alternative for smaller customers to access ad inventory and acquire the placements they desire benefits both sides. Smaller businesses are booking their advertising, giving the media organization more time to focus on larger businesses and assisting them in planning their ad campaigns.
It’s an effective way to satisfy the needs of everyone involved and it’s becoming a popular buzzword in the industry.
Conclusion
One thing is certain: when media firms get it right and develop a media ad sales process that is more automated, has better transparency across teams, embraces omnichannel advertising, and manages ad inventory, they will be in a very strong position. By having a more efficient and productive media ad sales process, the organization will save time and money. They will also build a loyal customer base, with customers enjoying quicker processes and larger customers having more one-to-one communication with sales reps.
Originally published at https://www.advendio.com on April 26, 2022.
