Why The Drum is on a mission to reward clarity, transparency and effectiveness with the Digital Trading Awards

I remember the rumours that automated trading tech was actually just a bunch of blokes in a room on Excel.

I remember the agencies telling us that this was the future and that we as publishers needed to adapt fast.

I remember my first view of the Lumascape chart and thinking that if I didn’t understand this, how the hell were the brands going to get it?

You remember the brands? The advertisers? The actual people who pay for this labyrinthine industry to actually function.

And what of the publishers? It’s fair to say that the publishing community is not always quick off the mark to recognise the potential for advertising technology. Indeed, for many, the default position has been, and still is, suspicion. I cannot tell you the number of discussions I’ve had about direct contact with advertisers.

On 3 July this year at The Drum Live event I interviewed Simon Haynes, then of Digilant, now UK MD of IgnitionOne. He’s a real breath of fresh air in this space and always straight to the point. “Its very simple,” he said. “Either the industry changes, becomes more transparent, more open, offers more clarity to advertisers now or we risk not hitting our full potential.”

That’s where this project was born and it’s those frustrations that we want The Drum Digital Trading Awards to address. It’s obviously very clear that automated trading, RTB, the exchange space, DSPs, SSPs, private marketplaces etc are all a good thing for the advertising world. The figures are incredible. One stat has it that RTB is predicted to grow from $1.4bn in 2011 to $13.9bn in 2016. That’s a fair chunk of change in anybody’s books.

We are passionate believers in all thing digital and want the digital trading space to get better. For advertisers to know where and how their budget is being spent. For publishers to understand how to optimise their digital assets. For agencies to retain a personal touch whilst embracing the full potential of the amazing adtech that is out there. This programme aims to bring all elements of the display trading community together, to recognise those tech companies, agencies, platforms and publishers who do it right. Those who offer clarity, transparency and operational effectiveness are surely those we should hold up as role models that the rest of the industry should emulate.

We don’t want this to follow the traditional awards model. This is part of an ongoing campaign from The Drum to keep urging the digital media world to focus on the needs of the advertiser and to become more transparent. So following the awards ceremony next year we will be publishing a manifesto document outlining what we have learned from the winning entries and what we feel are the values the industry should adhere to as we move forward.

We urge industry bodies, agencies, platforms, exchanges, advertisers and publishers to get involved. It’s your future and you should play a role in shaping it.

Andy Oakes is head of media solutions at The Drum. You can find out more about the Digital Trading Awards and how to enter at digitaltradingawards.com. The deadline for entries is 6 February