Teresa Sperti, Head of Marketing & Product for realestateVIEW.com talks about media buying and the importance of striking a balance between brand and performance. She adds with 50% of all Australians accessing online via their mobile it makes the channel a crucial part of their media mix. While Australians are one of the biggest consumers of online video in the world, the lack of inventory is constricting their growth.

Sperti also welcomes the efficiency the ad exchanges, DSPs and RTB are bringing to the marketplace - and highlights the need for media agencies and publishers to rapidly embrace the evolving landscape.

Can you give an overview of realestateVIEW.com.au and its offering in Australia?

realestateVIEW.com.au is the 3^rd largest property portal in Australia and is operated by the real estate institutes across Australia. Our unique connection with the industry enables us to deliver value to consumers looking to buy or sell through leveraging data & commentary on the property market.

What is your role and remit at realestateVIEW.com.au?

I am the Head of Marketing & Product for realestateVIEW.com.au.  In this role, I am responsible for development of brand, audience attraction and retention strategies as well as agent communications.  In addition I am also responsible for the creation and execution of product strategy for the business.

What is realestateVIEW.com.au’s relationship with BigPond and Telstra?

realestateVIEW.com.au has a strategic partnership in place with BigPond and TradingPost.  As part of this partnership realestateVIEW.com.au benefits from being featured within the BigPond header.  In addition realestateVIEW.com.au is also a key content provider for the new BigPond Money site.

Can you provide an insight into media buying and how it works with agencies, ad networks and publishers in Australia?  What does a typical media plan look like for you?

The online media industry in Australia is still small in comparison to overseas markets however due to the rapid increase of online marketing spend by brands in the past 12 – 18 months  we are seeing more global publishers entering the Australian marketplace initially offering Australian eye balls on global sites.  

From realestateVIEW.com.au’s perspective, a typical media plan for us is probably not the norm for most Australian brands.  As an online site we are obviously focussed towards growth of audience and therefore a typical plan is heavily weighted towards online media with a much smaller spend allocated to offline mediums.  From an online perspective, the plan usually contains a mix of display options – rather than just 1 type of buy ie performance / behavioural etc.  

As a marketeer what challenges do you face buying media? How involved do you get in realestateVIEW.com.au’s media buys? 

We have utilised a few media buyers over the past 2 years and one of the biggest challenges we have faced is knowledge.  Traditional media buyers who have moved into the online space place too much emphasis on the buying side of the equation and not enough time on optimising the media in the campaign period. The performance of media is integral to future purchase decision making and therefore we do invest a lot of time analysing deliverables from spend to guide future media buyers - thus we do get quite involved in decision making of the type of media we are buying.

As a big display buyer do you think real-time audience and data-driven display buying will increase buying efficiency and scalability?

At times, we have experienced difficulty in reaching budget caps on display media and therefore I do believe Ad Exchanges and Demand Side Platforms will improve visibility of available inventory and the real time nature of it will enable buyers to be able to be more proactive to optimise the campaign based on performance or issues related to over / under-spend. It is however not all good news - the downfall of Ad Exchanges and DSPs is that it does somewhat commoditise display buys and I do believe there will always be a role for the personal relationships in media buying over and above these – particularly when advertisers are looking to gain access to more unique placements and sponsorships opportunities that are not out of the box.      

With DSPs and Ad Exchanges fast gaining traction in the marketplace do you think media agencies will need to evolve and become more entrepreneurial and data focussed?

Not only do media agencies need to evolve, publishers need to evolve and embrace the changing online media buying landscape.  Visibility of online inventory and real time bidding is not new to the online industry – Google has been doing it for years – yet the online display sector has been slow to catch up. 

As a marketeer, are you doing a lot of behavioural targeting or re-targeting?

At realestateVIEW.com.au we have definitely began to experiment with various media buys - particularly behavioural / audience buys.  One of the biggest mistakes marketers are making at present is channelling all of their display spend into performance advertising with little to no focus on the value delivered both in the short term and the longer term.  Whilst our eCPC / eCPA rates are higher with behavioural advertising - the level of engagement and interest shown from these buys far outperforms our performance advertising and therefore we aim to balance our media schedule with various display media buys.

Over the next 6 – 12 months what trends will we see in both the real estate industry and the display market in Australia? E.g. mobile and video?

In general industry terms, whilst video advertising has grown aggressively in Australia over the past 12 months, the portion of media spend allocated to video advertising vs other display inventory is minimal.  Whilst this is already beginning to change, mainstream usage is and will continue to be constrained in the short term by knowledge along with accessibility to inventory. Having said this however publishers are already experiencing a significant increase in demand for pre / post-roll advertising for popular TV programs viewed online.  As a result publishers are already increasing inventory options to cope with demand. With Australia's video consumption one of the highest in the world - there is no doubt that video advertising will ultimately represent a much larger slice of the online advertising pie in the coming years.  

From a real estate perspective, mobile is one of the significant growth areas for any large portal.  As a large portion of the property search process is completed “in the field”, the mobile device becomes core device to navigate the search process.  

The growth in mobile internet usage is not however confined to the real estate industry.  Australia’s use of mobile internet has grown substantially over the past 12 months in Australia, with up to 50% of all mobile owners in Australia accessing the web via their phone.  As a result mobile advertising is also one of the growth area in the display market in the years ahead.

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