5 tips to make a comprehensive digital media plan

Sandeep Balani, Head of India, Outbrain, shares his opinion on the evolving nature of media spends alternatives to break the stereotype and build a digital media plan.

What once was is no more. Agencies

across India are now seeking to diversify budgets away from the stereotype and

expand the horizons of the digital advertising ecosystem. In order to protect

brands and their dollars from brand safety risk, media buy has shifted to

platforms that deliver ads in optimal placements alongside other credible and

relevant content, with access to the right audiences. With a greater demand for

transparency, the two ‘cookie monsters’ - Google and Facebook - have a major

fight on their hands, as agencies look for independent data sources to better

understand customers and create more personalised engagement.

Native advertising

Right person, right place, right time -

that’s the recipe to quality advertising. While display once dominated

publisher inventory, this traditional medium separates itself from other

content on the page - and not fit to brand image. Native advertising, on the

other hand, allows publishers to strike a chord with users through relevant

content that runs seamlessly with the page, providing a consistent user

experience. Indian publishers have observed an increase in CPMs from native

platforms like Outbrain, signalling a changing of the guard when it comes to

digital advertising - all in the name of quality.

With 493 million Indians online every

day, and with different ways to reach them, native is thriving outside the

walled gardens of Facebook and Google. Publishers in editorial environments are

increasingly opening up their inventory due to its combination of quality

content, reach, efficiency, and brand safety. Contextual targeting with

editorial native ads is better controlled, whereas such control is limited with

social or search advertising. Relying on this duopoly is not only a missed

opportunity elsewhere, but it leaves you susceptible to its unpredictable

environment. As audiences seek personalization, there is greater importance to

deliver hyper-relevant content across the different channels where they engage

without putting your brand at risk. As a result, native ad spend continues to

emerge as the most dominating advertising format, and its 18% uplift in

purchase intent is just one indicator of that.

OTT platforms  

Once upon a time in a digital era now

outdated, publishers were relying on YouTube to upload their content and

deliver revenue. The problem with YouTube? Its immense liability when it comes to brand safety, as ads can be easily served within

controversial or inappropriate content. Today, publishers have turned to

building their own platform - examples being the emergence of Hotstar, Voot,

MXplayer, and SonyLiv. Furthermore, video platforms like JW player are now

offering technology to publishers on a SaaS model to build their own offering.

Video views on OTT channels were  63% year over year in 2016, and this

pattern has been growing consistently since then. Hotstar currently stands as

the country's most accessed OTT platform, and ahead of even YouTube, which has

about 265 million monthly active users.

Advertisers are now using this opportunity to target premium content via OTT apps and reach out to higher valued audiences. With this alternative, YouTube has taken a bit of a backseat as ad revenue via OTT is set to increase from 40% to 60% in the next decade.

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Social Networking Applications and UGC content apps.

With the popularity of new applications

to socialize, the user base is shifting from Facebook - millennials are

starting to think it isn’t even “cool” anymore. Other applications, such as

Pinterest, have entered the spotlight - 176 million registered users and 110

million of them active daily users - and, in India, Pinterest is the 6th most

popular social networking site. Other applications like Snapchat have users

that visit 25 times per day, and 63% of Snapchat users access the platform

daily. Above all, with over 562 million users, is LinkedIn - the leading social

channel for business-to-business (B2B) marketers. In fact, 92% of B2B marketers

prefer to use this platform over everything else in the social space.

While YouTube used to be the only UGC app available, many other companies have entered the fray. As a result, the market segment has seen phenomenal growth in terms of user consumption, and has gained much traction for marketers. Today, user-generated apps have more than 5 million users in India, but what was decades ago for YouTube has since changed as media companies, brands, agencies, and publishers have all prioritised contextual relevance.

Utility apps

People have problems they need to be

solved, and utility apps are one way to remedy those specific tasks. The market

for in-application advertising is quickly developing with more applications

becoming indispensable, but it is also important to keep the consumer

experience in mind for proper monetization generation. The best way to engage

consumers in the app is to incite them to keep coming back. Apps like Shareit,

which is a file transferring app, have more than 300 million users in India.

Truecaller is another that has more than 100 million active daily users. Such

utility apps are useful because they capitalise on the user journey, as they

are more need-based and more engaging for consumers to come back again and

again. If less advertisers are spending their budget on Facebook and Google as

a means to advertise, then revenue coming from the duopoly is soon to follow.

• News Aggregators

Users have increasingly begun to use

single apps for all their desired news content consumption. Dailyhunt, as a

result of this trend, has quickly become India’s number one in-app news and

local language content application, and such news aggregators are an

opportunity for advertisers to reach highly engaged users.

Ad tech and media is definitely getting more and more fragmented as users start using different apps for their daily consumption. With the evolution of these trending applications, there are many ad alternatives available, creating a world of opportunity that extends far beyond the duopoly of Google and Facebook.

Sandeep Balani is the Head of India for Outbrain, where he is responsible for advancing the market penetration of the entire range of Outbrain’s product portfolio, managing both the Publisher and Advertiser sides of the business.