Earlier this month, Dentsu released an ad spend forecast that projected Digital Out of Home (DOOH) spending to grow by a modest 4.2 percent YoY in 2025. But programmatic spending is forecast to grow at twice the rate, increasing 8.4 percent this year. That’s why Vistar Media, a DOOH company operating in more than 35 global markets, is looking beyond traditional OOH budgets to drive growth.
“OOH is a brilliant canvas that has not necessarily seen the growth that it could have done for the medium that it is, when you look at it comparative to other channels such as CTV,” Karan Singh, General Manager UK at Vistar Media, tells VideoWeek. “For me, the way in which we facilitate that growth, drive growth, be additive to the industry, is not go after the pot of money that’s already been there and been recycled year after year, but is really driving new money into OOH screens. And that’s really looking at the success of programmatic buying.”
Custodians of OOH
Singh argues that OOH budgets have long been concentrated in the hands of big brands and major agencies, “who have done a really good job within OOH for a very long time.” But that perception has also imposed a ceiling on the channel, placing it “at the back of the queue” when it comes to programmatic buying.
“People think it’s always been bought this way, it’s always been the domain of the big brands who are buying through big agencies, we should leave that alone,” he comments. “Whereas display is almost seen as abundant; there’s enough inventory for everyone. So programmatic budgets have unlocked spend from new advertisers that maybe never thought they could get on the same web page as a Coca-Cola or a Unilever. And that’s what we’re trying to unlock in OOH. We call it democratising the channel. I don’t think it’s been democratised today, because that perception has been holding it back for a long time.”
Vistar is looking to bring programmatic buyers to the channel by offering a full suite of ad tech products, including a demand-side platform (DSP), supply-side platform (SSP) and ad server, as well as software solutions for DOOH players and a creative studio for design purposes. This not only enables the company to reach new OOH advertisers who are already buying programmatically, but helps to bring incremental budgets for media owners.
“That incremental money is not going to come from recycling the same money that’s being bought direct, and doing that programmatically; it’s by bringing new budgets in,” says Singh. “We’re going after a completely different pot of money. Our strategy has been to ask brands, are you overinvesting in social? Are you overinvesting in certain areas within programmatic where the value is starting to decline? And how can taking some of that programmatic money and putting it into an outdoor screen actually supercharge the whole media buy across all the channels that you’re operating in?”
Outside the boxÂ
That is not to say Vistar is bypassing the traditional big spenders; the company works with major brands and the agency groups, alongside indie agencies and small businesses “who might want to do something around pharmacies in Milton Keynes.”
“Our core concept is that a buyer from anywhere can buy everywhere,” notes Singh. “So you can sit there at your screen in London and buy screens in Sweden or New York.”
And the offering is similarly broad on the sell-side, from media owners that have large screens on the side of highways and at bus stops, through to smaller businesses that run screens in gyms, office spaces, apartment buildings, taxi toppers and chicken shops.
“When you think about where that screen is, that in itself tells a story and allows a brand to use that context to do something really creative,” adds Singh. “How do we use that as another screen for video? How do you take your video assets that you’ve got on social and CTV, and use a screen in a gym to amplify that message with a good creative video message, which has got people thinking at a very specific point in their day?”
Again, the programmatic element is key to using those screens in a dynamic way. By bringing in first- or third-party data, advertisers can follow audience patterns throughout the day, with the flexibility to buy smaller units across multiple media owners in a single media buy. “That’s what we really encourage people to do, because for me, there’s no point in buying what is marketers’ most creative canvas, and then not being creative within it,” says Singh. “And programmatic allows you to do that, because you can use the data to inform what that creativity looks like.”
He uses the example of a big pharma brand that was able to change the product being advertised depending on the pollen count in the area of each screen. “The ability to switch that in and out is a really cool way of doing it, because when people are suffering the most, they’re looking for the strongest product, and when they’re suffering the least and it’s more preventative, it’s a slightly different message.”
That ability to launch dynamic activations also came into play at the end of lockdown when pubs were opening again. Heineken ran a DOOH campaign in European markets with outdoor screens advertising where the nearest pub was, along with a countdown to opening time, and social imagery from Heineken’s social media feeds.
And for sports events, programmatic OOH can allow brands to pop up in the location of the event. Vistar recently launched a 3D ad for the HSBC Rugby Sevens in Singapore, for example, using 3D creative on the “iconic” Ten Square digital screen.
No fixed addressÂ
The business can then measure the impact of these campaigns using brand lift studies and sales uplift measurement. Vistar recently ran a campaign for Arla Foods, which distributes Starbucks pre-made coffee drinks in Tesco stores. The company ran test and control sites around those Tescos, and demonstrated “significant uplift” in the stores where the OOH ads were placed compared with the other shops.
And while OOH does not operate as a one-to-one mechanism, Singh argues that the channel can still “be addressable to a degree”, by targeting based on postcode sectors, certain audiences or specific locations, “without being intrusive by being on your personal screen or in your home.”
“I’m actually quite glad that we don’t have to have those conversations around cookies and privacy,” comments Singh. “And that’s also good for advertisers, because it creates safety for them; they’re not getting fines for privacy violations.”
This also allows marketers to be more creative in their messaging and targeting, according to Singh, without the regulatory pitfalls of hypertargeting. He uses the example of a “men’s libido product” that was advertised on a bus shelter, displaying how many metres away the local pharmacy is where the product is available.
“OOH allows you to take those sensitive topics, and be fairly targeted in that you’re near enough a store, but lets you be a bit tongue in cheek without getting intrusive. It gives marketers that freedom to be a bit playful, and definitely less risk-averse when it comes to OOH. You can get still get it wrong, but not so easily!”
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