LOCATION BASED Programmatic ADVERTISING

No longer is LBPA an immature marketing tool

The technology for LBPA has been in use for many years now and many advertisers and agencies have gained experiences, both good and bad. The LBPA market is considered chaotic and many players claim to have the best tech/solution available. We, as a company, offer solutions, tech and services to improve and maximize our clients’ chances of running a profitable/successful location-based campaign.

80% of mobile activity is in-app

Research shows that about 80% of mobile activity is within apps, leaving only a mere 20% on mobile sites. For this exact reason, it’s necessary to have large amounts of in-app inventory available when the goal is to run a profitable location-based programmatic advertising campaign. Secondarily, transferring lat/longs within an adrequest is only accurate when its an adrequest coming from an app. Although an adrequest coming from mobile web can contain information about the users location, it’s not as accurate in comparison to an adrequest coming from in-app. Very few tech vendors acknowledge this fact, with this being most likely down to an insufficient technical infrastructure.

The simple fact is that when an advertiser or agency wants to serve ads on a hyperlocal scale, the ability to reach as many in-app publishers as possible is going to determine the outcome of the campaign, whatever its goal may be.

Dedicated vs all-round platforms

In our opinion, too many tech vendors have unfounded claims of having a "powerful" location-based proposition. We also consider it a fact that a lot of the ‘big' cross-device platforms (which almost always originated as desktop first platforms) do not have the technical infrastructure and reach to match a dedicated Demand Side Platform, which mostly has mobile-orientated ad exchanges connected to it. Furthermore, in most cases the application of a GEO-Fence tool is not as diverse and all-round as one that can be found in a dedicated mobile advertising platform. Also, the option to have an unlimited bid option comes in handy.

In most cases, a location-based mobile advertising campaign is implemented to reach an audience in the vicinity of the advertiser (e.g. a physical store). As well as this, the campaign method is used to target specific audiences who reside in specific locations (e.g. students targeted at locations of schools and IT Professionals in IT related companies/locations). In both cases, the ability to reach as many publishers as possible, on a hyperlocal scale, will define the outcome of the campaign.

When implementing Location Based campaigns for our clients, these learnings - and appropriate technology based on these - is implemented.

In depth – more facts to consider

Location determination by GPS is considered the most accurate. Only apps will actually provide impressions or bids that have their location determined by a GPS signal. This is another reason for using mobile dedicated platforms, which are usually connected to vast amounts of in-app traffic. It must be said that mobile web is improving fast (although not there yet) in regards to transferring accurate location data within an adrequest.

A true GEO-Fence tool can process, serve and report on thousands of locations. Our tool is able to serve in more than 1.000,000 GEO-fences simultaneously/in one campaign.

Tools to prevent fraud are a necessity. Rogue publishers offer impressions with fake location data because they are worth more.

Integrations with Data Management Platforms that offer location-based data can be very useful - although, at least in Europe, new regulations (GDPR) are limiting the usage of previously gathered location data (while the GDPR was not yet active).

Knowledge and tools to serve Rich Media dynamic banners (that can show individual information based on the location where these ads are served) can be of great value and often determine a successful outcome of a campaign.