Ninety per cent of media and marketing professionals believe ‘programmatic is the future’, but only 46 per cent have a programmatic strategy in place, a new report by AppNexus in conjunction with WARC and IAB Europe has revealed.
Seventy-six per cent of the UK professionals surveyed expected advertising agencies to coordinate both the creative and technical aspects of programmatic in the future. However, overall use of programmatic was lower in the UK than elsewhere in Europe.
Meanwhile, 32 per cent of advertising agencies, 29 per cent of publishers and 29 per cent of marketers in the UK have never heard of programmatic.
Media buying agencies are leading the programmatic in the UK, with 88 per cent using programmatic advertising, compared with 41 per cent of publishers, 24 per cent of general advertising agencies and only 15 per cent of marketers.
In addition, the study showed that UK organisations see reacting in real-time as the biggest benefit of programmatic (51 per cent), followed by improved targeting (50 per cent).
Eighty-six per cent of those surveyed stated that the wealth of data collected via programmatic is being used to help determine strategy for future campaigns, while 84 per cent said programmatic advertising allowed them to evaluate the success of campaigns.
Graham Wylie, senior director, EMEA and APAC marketing at AppNexus, explained: “This study for the first time has given us a clearer view on why programmatic is growing so fast and how publishers, media and advertising agencies and marketers are already using it and what holds them back.
“Programmatic offers advertisers the agility to target their audience anywhere on the internet, and as we are witnessing the rise of the always-on, multi-screen, mobile consumer, programmatic has emerged as the major driver of real-time engagement at scale.”
