Such targeting works particularly well when it is accompanied by “programmatic” advertising methods, a term that describes the use of data to automate and improve ads. In the past year billboard owners such as Clear Channel and JCDecaux have launched programmatic platforms which allow brands and media buyers to select, purchase and place ads in minutes, rather than days or weeks. Industry boosters say outdoor ads will increasingly be bought like online ones, based on audience and views as well as location.
That is possible because billboard owners claim to be able to measure how well their ads are working, even though no “click-through” rates are involved. Data firms can tell advertisers how many people walk past individual advertisements at particular times of the day. Advertisers can estimate how many individuals exposed to an ad for a Louis Vuitton handbag then go on to visit a nearby shop (or website) and buy the product. Such metrics make outdoor ads more data-driven, automated and measurable, argues Michael Provenzano, co-founder of Vistar Media, an ad-tech firm in New York.
As the outdoor-ad industry becomes more data-driven, tech giants are among those to see more value in it. Netflix recently acquired a string of billboards along Hollywood’s Sunset Strip, where it will start advertising its films and TV shows. Tech firms, among them Apple and Google, are heavy buyers of OOH ads, accounting for 25 of the top 100 OOH ad spenders in America.
The outdoor-ad revolution is not problem-free. The collection of mobile-phone data raises privacy concerns. And criticisms of the online-ad business for being opaque, and occasionally fraudulent, may also be lobbed at the OOH business as it becomes bigger and more complex. The industry is ready to address such concerns, says Jean-Christophe Conti, chief executive of VIOOH, a media-buying platform. One of the benefits of following the online-ad trailblazers, he notes, is learning from their blunders.
