Four theses for the future of media planning

Digitisation has changed media planning extensively in recent years. New developments and progress in the field of AI also mean that advertisers are faced with new opportunities but also challenges. One topic is becoming increasingly important for marketers: data.

In our live event “JOM MEDIA BYTES”, our Managing Director Sai-Man Tsui presented four theses on the future of media planning that show advertisers why they should intensively deal with data and its potential.

THESIS 1: Classic media target groups will lose relevance

In traditional media planning, the first step is often to focus on the desired target group and its media usage behaviour in order to determine the appropriate media mix for a campaign on this basis. But nowadays, available data also allow other approaches: Google, for example, offers an automated playout of campaigns across the entire Google inventory with its in-house service “Performance Max”. Advertisers simply provide the creatives and the objective of a campaign, which is then controlled via machine learning. Could this be the future of media planning? At the moment, there is still a lack of data and the infrastructure behind it. But the better this is developed and the more data can be collected and used, the more the predefined target groups will disappear. The future of advertising will go in the direction of hyper-personalisation.

THESIS 2: The provision of the technical infrastructure is becoming essential for the success of campaigns.

Already today, there is a very broad range of media – and the media market is becoming more and more fragmented.If we look at the area of moving images, for example, the older generations can still be reached via linear TV, but the younger target groups are spread across a multitude of offers in non-linear TV, such as in the area of streaming.And the number of providers in this segment is continuously increasing, so fragmentation will continue to grow.

At the same time, it is important for advertisers to accompany the entire customer journey and to be present with the right message at the right time.In order to be able to address the target group in a targeted manner, first-party data is required for the targeting of advertising.Many companies already have some of this data – but it is often hidden in the various departments, is not linked with each other and therefore cannot be used optimally for media planning.The main task for advertisers will be to break down these data silos and build functioning infrastructures so that this data can be used holistically for advertising.

THESIS 3: No longer think in terms of channels, but in terms of platforms.

But what does this mean for media planning?The big companies in particular, such as Meta or Amazon, have accumulated large amounts of data about their various products and have now developed into huge data companies.This data is already being used for campaign planning – for example, to play out advertising on DOOH via movement data.In addition, it can be observed that other players are emerging in the market and establishing data sovereignties.What does this mean for advertisers?These companies offer them the possibility to access external data pools for campaigns in order to play their advertising to their target group on end devices, via OOH or the big screen.

Nonetheless, they also need to collect their own first-party data. Because only those who have their own data can link it with that of the data companies via platform matching and thus target advertising as precisely as possible. In addition to dealing with the big data companies, it will therefore continue to be essential for marketers to build up their own data pool.

THESIS 4: Trading companies become important data suppliers

In addition to the big data corporations, it can be observed that retail companies are also increasingly becoming important data suppliers.Schwarz Media, for example, whose group includes Lidl and Kaufland, has built up a large data pool and developed into a relevant retail media provider.From its own apps, loyalty programmes and payment systems, the group has a lot of data that it can offer for campaigns, for example on its own digital channels or in-store. Especially for advertisers from the FMCG sector, retail companies are therefore becoming exciting advertising partners with whom they should engage in the future.

Conclusion:

Data is and will remain indispensable for advertisers. If they have not already done so, brands and companies should take care of functioning data infrastructures and the collection of their own first-party data now at the latest. At the same time, it is worthwhile to follow the current developments in the market and to check which advertising partners are the best options for targeting which campaigns.

By the way: The full-length video recording of the article is available on our video platform JOM+.