Ahead of his ATS New York speaking engagement, John Snyder, Grapeshot, CEO, and veteran of the digital marketing space, reflects on how companies in the programmatic space can learn from Google's emphasis on simplicity in the workflow process.  

Back in 1997 I sold my keyword software business to one of the largest suppliers of content to big business. Hindsight is often 20:20 and today I scratch my head and think how wrong was I to believe that search was dead and content was king. At that time, I remember speaking at conferences alongside Google's CTO and employee number one, well before they cracked the code – or business model – that changed the world.

To win the largest share of digital advertising is no small feat. Now watching Google’s clear mission to expand its global domination beyond search advertising is very impressive.   However, by rewinding and analysing the history of how Google came to dominate the search market, I believe there are clearly some applicable lessons for the current programmatic era.

Simple to use

Think about how the AdWords interface in its simplicity became the primary tool for small businesses to effectively target lower-funnel prospects. CMOs and the wider business community should think about programmatic pipes in the same manner. Programmatic platforms and technology could stand to be more commoditised or simplified to facilitate the traction for long-tail advertisers both in traditional display as well as in the emerging native ad space.

Facebook and Twitter would be well served to ape the history of its mortal enemy Google in this light. But how are most programmatic platforms designing new simple interfaces for easier self-drive? Is managed service offerings evidence that better workflows are still needed?

AdSense reach

Instead of targeting keywords in the search box, the automated correlation of advertiser keywords to the page inventory of publishers provided a substantial multiple of ad impressions to run. Google's prowess at spreading a wide base of listening points via web analytics, Gmail, and YouTube (acquired for seemingly high volumes of cash at the time) can be looked at as the precursor to Facebook’s move into programmatic with the launch of the Facebook Audience Network and its most recent revamp of Atlas to spark progress in cross-channel ID/tracking.

Similar to Google, advertisers need to spread their pixel fires across all parts of the digital landscape. Data has to be amassed from brands’ websites, apps, display campaign impressions as well as social media campaigns. The data management platform (DMP) becomes the most important investment for CMOs. How are the current programmatic consoles delivering or interfacing with this core need? Facebook has pushed hard for Acxiom, Datalogix, Nielsen and other data overlays, all coupled to its first-party audience profiling.

Tools and insights 

Google Analytics has clearly served the company and its customers well. So why do IBM, Experian and other companies sit on un-leveraged website analytics? Programmatic is a black box for most. Programmatic platforms should be focused on transparent reporting in more accessible ways, including full comprehension of ad campaigns through multi-channel attribution and activity on advertisers’ websites. There also has to be more of a commitment in linking campaign analytics to a brand’s website activity.  How do your ads impact new in-bound users? The programmatic workflow must account for this direct correlation.

Serving e-commerce

Google search assumes intent. AdSense is focused on interest and has historically accounted for as much as 30% of Google’s earnings. This represents a great untapped opportunity for ecommerce brands to leverage search engine optimisation (SEO) in a programmatic sense to generate more robust results, using programmatic to target keywords, viewing content consumption as assumed interest or intent

 Viewability and fraud

Eliminating non-viewable impressions needs to be a primary priority. Google put viewability and ranking at the heart of its search advertising strategy. Programmatic buyers need the confidence that their ads are actually seen by consumers, to reflect fair price, just as Google priced in the confidence of viewability through the likelihood of ad rank.

Google indicated the degree of fraud in their IPO filings. Click fraud is just too easy, and every search engine battles daily to circumvent new meta-tagging methods of gaming the relevance algorithms. Some investors in RocketFuel don't feel the issue was as transparent, as the class actions show.

AdWords control & transparency

Adwords buyers can control the targeting criteria in an open transparent way. They determine the keywords to use, and hence the wastage to avoid. All reporting links back to the keywords deployed, so strategies can be refined, reviewed and shared with colleagues and customers.

Simple human truths

Bill Bernbach – the original Don Draper of Advertising – left us a great legacy in advertising by showing us that communication based on real insight wins. Google’s gave consumers fast relevant search results, but also the simple human truth about which keywords worked. Advertisers had their own control on keywords to target and how to eliminate wastage via transparent performance analytics. To scale programmatic beyond the just the pipes of bids between consoles, we can learn from Google’s emphasis on simplicity, control and transparency.

John Snyder is scheduled to give a presentation on: 'Inter-Connecting Supply & Demand' at ATS New York