Creating a culture of transparency
The Drum hosted its inaugural US Digital Breakfast Briefing, where attendees interacted with panelists to debate some the burning issues in the programmatic landscape.
This was hosted in the wake of the Association of National Advertisers (ANA), who issued guidelines to its members (i.e. brand-side marketers) on measures to take in order to ensure further transparency in the landscape, and an issue that helped frame the conversation (see video above).
The course of the debate saw panelist Michael Chock, Media IQ VP of sales, North America, argue that the quality of audience data, plus the equal sharing of it (as well as measuring the performance of ad campaigns with a relevant attribution strategy) is necessary to ensure all players within the media ecosystem are fairly rewarded.
All panelists agreed that if this can be achieved, consumers are likely to see programmatic advertising as less intrusive, with panelist Rob Leathern, Optimal.com’s CEO, using the platform to voice his opinion that the industry’s current status quo has ‘systemic problems’, with the recent rise in ad blocking a direct result of this.
Meanwhile, Benjamin Dick, IAB US director of industry programs, echoed the earlier sentiment arguing that “the industry has a KPI problem”, adding that if these issues are addressed properly, then marketers can truly understand how their media spend is driving their organization forward.
Equally so, fellow panelist, Mack McElvey, SalientMG, CEO, advised those in the ecosystem to think like a brand-side marketer and act accordingly so they will remain on any marketing plan.
See video above for snippets of more germane moments of the debate, plus 1:1 interviews with panelists.