[Re:View Takeover] Omnicom Media Group’s Global CEO of Investment on the future of video buying
T H E I N S I G H T S
Unsure how to begin unifying your video media? Here’s how.
As consumers’ viewing experience continues to fragment, brands are looking to take a unified approach to video buying. But in a world without an industry solution for cross-media measurement, they’re unsure where to start. Advertisers can’t wait for scaled industry solutions, so to start tackling this problem systematically, my team at Omnicom Media Group (OMG) partnered with Google and Boston Consulting Group (BCG) to map out actionable and practical steps for a genuinely unified planning and buying process. After interviewing and surveying more than 190 advertisers and 90 agency partners, we narrowed it down to a few tested-and-proven steps that brands can adopt in the short-term.
Calibrate your planning tools with fresh data
As always, data is absolutely key; stale inputs inhibit your ability to plan accurately, making data integrity one of the most fundamental components of media unification. Optimizing your video mix is an iterative process that requires fresh data from publisher-provided forecasts and in-market experiments. Establishing an evergreen model that leverages quality data enables planning tools to reflect the most accurate baselines across publishers and channels – like YouTube Reach Curves, a media planning API that allows teams to accurately forecast the reach of YouTube and third-party video campaigns.
Be objective when evaluating channels
The definition of ‘premium’ content is highly subjective, and what agencies and advertisers have traditionally defined as ‘premium’ doesn’t always align with viewer expectations and behaviors. Many planning processes continue to leverage manual, subjective tactics, so to balance this out, consider objective criteria like brand safety and viewability that can directly translate to tangible business impact.
Use a consistent definition for your audience
Audience definitions are crucial, but since they differ across channels, it can lead to misrepresented reach. To avoid this, it’s important to use a consistent audience definition throughout planning and think beyond traditional parameters like age and gender. This consistency will allow brands to build audience-first strategies and optimize media mix across inventory and formats.
The ad industry is at an inflection point, and as we work toward standardized cross-media measurement solutions and currency, these valuable best practices can create larger organizational opportunities within both agencies and brands to operationalize a truly unified video planning and buying process. At OMG, we’ve implemented these critical steps – democratizing data integrations, advancing our measurement capabilities, and breaking down silos between teams who plan, activate, and measure video campaigns by using a consistent language and taxonomy.
Stay tuned for the next edition where Re:View will dive further into these insights and recommendations, uncovering what long-term actions brands can take to fully adopt a unified omnichannel approach across linear, streaming, and online video.