It is a challenge for every advertiser to broadcast the right message to the right users at the optimum frequency and at the right time. Programmatic advertising has its advantages, but in order to use it in full, it is important to know who they are and to use them in your campaigns. Here are some of the features we use to optimize creatives and compare them with the Google Ads platform.

So, what makes a programmatic ads better than Google Ads, for example, when managing advertising campaigns:

 

We can pre-select where our ad will appear in programmatic

One of the disadvantages of Google Ads is that you have no information or very limited information about where your ad will appear on the site. This is a major problem because many banner positions lack viewability or are located in websites and apps that do not meet the goals of the campaign.

Unlike Google Ads, the programmatic gives much more control to the brands as to where their ads will appear. There are several types of settings that allow you to target your ad:

 

According to the positioning of the programmatic ad in the visible part of the screen

Above the fold

This feature is very useful for campaigns that need quick product placement, increased ad visibility, and fast sales promotions. Helps you get a good balance between your final CPM cost and the visibility of your ads.

 

Below the fold

If you don’t have a lot of requirements for your ad but want it to show to the right users and to good sites, choosing this feature helps. It is positive that the overall price is an idea better. We rarely choose this option on our own, but if we choose it, we always combine it with a selection of sites where we can use it. And these are sites that have proven to perform well with below the fold campaigns over time.

 

According to the position of the ad in the content of the site

For banner ads (display and native), you can choose between in-article, in-feed, interstitial, in-banner, unknown.

For video advertising, you can choose between pre-roll, mid-roll, post-roll.

For audio, the ad can choose between pre-roll, mid-roll, post-roll or unknows.

 

 

We can choose which sites (not) to show the ad on

Experienced advertisers want their ad to appear on more reputable sites because this increases the consumer’s confidence in the quality of the advertised product. One of the drawbacks of Google Ads is that we cannot have good control over where the ad will be positioned. We can choose to direct it to the desired sites, but here.

In a programmatic environment, we have complete control over where we want or not to show our banners or videos. We have no hidden sites (almost, if you know how to limit them). For a quick reference, you can check out Placements / Where my ads are shown in Google Ads. You will surely see that a lot of impressions have been aired on the so-called anonymous sites. If you know who they are, you may not be so pleased with the presentation of your campaign. Not to mention that the results at different anonymous sites are quite different, so you cannot have good control over where your ads appear, the price you pay for it, and the audience it is shown to.

 

At our agency, we have developed lists of quality sites to which we target our ads to customer needs, such as financial information sites or sites read by IT professionals. This helps us target and optimize our inventory from the start of the campaign. Programmatic platforms only allow you to target your ad to those sites where you want your ad to be broadcast.

 

For example, based on our experience in a programming environment, we have over 20,000 sites that we have identified as ineffective and prohibit the broadcast of advertising to them. Some of these sites are positioned locally for the company where our campaign is targeting and part – abroad.

 

 

We can choose the applications where we want or not to show our ads

We find this feature super useful because apps are both a hidden diamond in the ad business and a place where, when mismanaged, your money can easily go to the wrong user (most often the child of the one you’re targeting). Each one of us uses dozens of applications, most of which are ad-supported. Choosing the right apps right can be an easy and effective solution to boost your ad performance and get the results you want.

 

Good programmatic platforms allow you to choose the applications in which you want your ad to appear. You can specify:

• Or the name of the desired / unwanted application;

• Or the category in which you want or not to broadcast your ad.

• You can control AdExchange from which to buy positions.

 

This is a very underrated channel for us to control our inventory and the cost of advertising. Different AdExchanges work in different environments, with different publishers. Depending on the type of campaign, it may be worth targeting or restricting your display ads to individual AdExchange. The topic is for more experienced digital marketing professionals, but it is worth considering.

This type of targeting is important for some customers for whom there are advertising restrictions (understand nutritional supplements, alcohol, gambling).

This feature is not available on Google Ads, where you can only advertise on the Google Network and its affiliate sites.

 

 

You can choose how often your ad is displayed at the account level

With programmatic platforms, you have much more precise control over how often your ad is shown. This is another important difference compared to Google Ads. You can manage different situations:

• Number of views based on day, week, month

• Number of campaign views, insertion order, line item.

• A combination of the above two.

• Optimizing how often your inventory is displayed helps reduce your advertising costs and improve your performance.

 

 

You have a super detailed report

The reporting that you receive on programmatic platforms is at a level that allows you to see each impression where it appeared, at what cost, in front of what audience. A close look at the data can help you improve your campaign performance, reduce the average cost of your ad, expand your audience when needed, or broadcast to a smaller audience.

Looking closely at long excel files can result in over 20% optimization of results. It can be frustrating, but it does a great job.

 

These are just a few of the optimization methods you can achieve in a programmatic environment.

 

Programmatic advertising is not applicable for everyone, but if you want to test it as part of your marketing, you can contact us to discuss your goals and advise you on how to properly position your digital ad. We work mainly with Google Display and Video 360, but for some specific sectors we can provide additional platforms and solutions.