Initially, the only way we targeted online audiences was through endemic advertising. The assumption was that only people interested in a certain industry and its products, such as agriculture, would visit certain websites. For instance, you might place digital ads for ag equipment on the site of an ag equipment publisher. This is endemic advertising, meaning that the publisher or site itself is contextually aligned with the topic of your ad.
However, that has changed.
When it comes to planning the use of digital media to reach customers, marketers have begun to view ad placement the way they view themeslves– multifaceted. Where we used to assume digital ads were best suited to appear on websites specific to the ag industry, the rise of big data and analytics now enable us to reach customers wherever they are.
In this blog, we break down the differences to help you see what goes into how you use digital to reach your current and potential customers.
Endemic advertising has competition
When display advertising was first taking off, endemic ads were the only way we targeted online audiences. We would reach them in the only place we could guarantee they were, so our ads were contextually relevant to boot. This guarantee of the right audience in the right environment enabled endemic publishers to charge a premium for direct buys with advertisers.
The introduction of programmatic advertising changed all that.
Programmatic is all about the targeting and optimizing – finding the right person regardless of where they are on the internet and what kind of content they are consuming, getting them to take the action we want – whether it’s visiting the website or signing up for an email, and then looking for more people like that. For instance, you might also see that ad on a seemingly unrelated site, such as a weather website. That’s not by accident. This approach can often be just as, or even more, successful.
The assumption, though, is audience targets are engaged with content relevant to them even if it is not directly related to the brand. This is why an equipment ad might show up on a weather site. Programmatic ad partners aren’t tied to specific websites, they can find the audience for almost any business vertical based on an algorithm that takes into account browsing histories. Using the example above, at some point, the algorithm found that person interested in ag equipment and weather.
There’s still unique value in endemic media
We wrote about the rise of programmatic advertising in 2017. when nearly three-quarters of U.S. display advertising spend was directed through programmatic media, according to eMarketer, though a typical ag digital mix had much less. The latest eMarketer report, US Programmatic Digital Display Ad Spending, shows that the number has risen to 83.5 percent.
As programmatic advertising has emerged as the most efficient way to target customers, endemic sites have transitioned to become the best places to align with relevant content. In this instance, those that focus on agriculture are perhaps a place for brands to benefit from association with the media brand of the publisher that owns the website.
Endemic sites have also become a place where information from relevant brands is expected and even welcomed. Building a content experience for a brand in an endemic website – or a path to one – aligns with the audience's expectation to find that type of content there.
The evolution of ag publishers
Programmatic media buying allows us to use the full ad inventory of the web as used by our target audience, instead of being limited to the much smaller (and often much more expensive) pool of impressions available through endemic advertising.
One very significant development in this dynamic for the agriculture industry has been the evolution of Ag publishers. Over the last 18 months or so, Ag publishers have created a hybrid, of sorts, between endemic and programmatic advertising. Ag publishers are creating new paths to their audience by partnering with programmatic providers to create site retargeting programs. This hybrid approach means an Ag website can use its own audience (traffic) as a targeting pool for programmatic ads outside of their site. It combines a valuable layer of targeting (the Ag website’s audience) with the increased ad volume and efficiency of programmatic. We've been using it quite a bit with good results.
If you’re trying to determine whether endemic, programmatic or this new hybrid is the best approach for your business model and products, always start with testing.
Keep learning about programmatic advertising. See why our B2B clients love programmatic and the three main benefits.
Our Paid Media team is happy to work with clients on the best way to achieve measurable results. Drop us a note to learn more.