The Rise of Programmatic Marketing: and what it means for B2B

Digital marketing has evolved vastly in the 25 years since the infancy of the internet. Online marketing efforts have been  in constant flux as new technologies come into play that change the game, and advertisers have more tools available now than ever before. It’s a great time to be in the online marketing world, and the perfect time consider programmatic marketing.

So what is programmatic marketing?

Programmatic marketing is a system that allows companies to utilize big data and technology to automate and tailor messages to the right audience, in real-time, with the right message. It allows companies to utilize all screens, all channels, and all insights to create campaigns. These campaigns are targeted to push boundaries of timeliness and immediate response marketing to specialize in interested, connected, and engaged targets.

How do I get started with programmatic marketing?

There are a plethora of companies running programmatic marketing platforms to help get you off the ground. Some of the top players are:

• DoubleClick by Google
• Xaxis
• Chango
• Multiview

Depending on your specific goals and needs there are hundreds of companies online that can help you develop and implement a strategy for your specific industry and goals.

Think with Google outlined the processes for getting started with programmatic marketing in great detail, and you can see the comprehensive guide here to get a more in depth understanding of programmatic marketing and how it operates.

The high level steps they outline to developing a strategy are: Organize, Design, Execute, Reach, and Measure. Through a properly implemented strategy, you can achieve phenomenal results.

Some action items to be aware of when setting up a programmatic strategy include:

• Programmatic marketing is dependent on marketing to all devices. Ensure you’re using HTML5 and your marketing collateral works for all devices, and you have all the appropriate sized imagery for your needs.
• Use data to drive smart messaging and targeting to your audiences.
• Use a unified platform for all your programmatic needs to limit overlap in efforts.
• As with all marketing, experiment, see what works for you!
• Don’t be afraid of videos, or mobile. To succeed in marketing of the future, you  must embrace and utilize all of these platforms.
• Think like the consumer, what do you want to see?
• Measure your results.

What does this all mean for B2B Marketing?

The options are limitless. The CEO of Choozle Andrew Fischer outlined just a miniscule example of what programmatic marketing looks like for B2B. And here are just a few options you could be utilizing:

• retargeting via Web data
• Web-based “nurturing” via uploaded CRM records
• so-called “lookalike” audience targeting modeled on a marketer’s own customer base or top prospects
• audience creation leveraging third party data sources
• contextual targeting

or some combination of all these angles. Today’s programmatic solutions enable B2B marketers to test and evaluate multiple digital channels at a scale, and with an efficiency, that’s simply never been available.

Automation is king for digital marketing efforts in 2015. If you’re already adopting marketing automation, or social automation, you should be using programmatic ad strategies as well. Being able to automate ad strategy with data is just another tool to add to the B2B tool belt. Big data allows us to have extremely targeted marketing campaigns, and easily convert and increase our ROI.

Programmatic marketing is still in it’s infancy, and the adoption into the B2B space is even lower. If your company wants to stay ahead of the game, utilizing such a powerful tool while it’s still being overlooked is the way to go.