What is Programmatic Direct?

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Infographic: Programmatic Direct

The Pubmatic blog created a much needed infographic to define programmatic direct. Programmatic Direct really are two concepts combined. Programmatic is the buying and selling of advertising via workflow automation and algorithms. Direct simply means that the buyers and sellers of ad inventory know each other.The term programmatic direct tends to generate much debate within the industry but it really is a simple concept.

Really it is just the automation of direct ad buys from set digital campaigns. Call it whatever you want, programmatic buying, programmatic premium, programmatic reserved, just make sure you know what your talking about! Check out the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s Programmatic Simplified paper to learn the key terms in programmatic buying.

A large percentage of ad buying is programmatic direct. If you are a large, reputable network with a advertiser campaign that will be served programatically, you are most likely sourcing high quality ad inventory and negotiating to buy within the publisher server with your ad tags. The contract varies in each deal, but generally you are paying a fixed CPM to the publisher at a price priority within their ad server. Programmatic Direct aims to eliminate inefficiencies for buyers and sellers top tier inventory directly and implement automated processes to do so.

To learn more about Pubmatic, check out our Pubmatic Review.

What is Programmatic Direct - PubmaticTwo Quotes about programmatic Direct:

Tom Shields, Co-Founder CSO of Yieldex

“The industry has long understood that direct sales is fundamentally different from the bidded ecosystem. We’ve heard consistently from our dozens of top 100 customers that terms like ‘programmatic’ and ‘premium’ are too confusing, and while we previously advocated ‘automated direct,’ we are happy to help adopt ‘programmatic direct’ as a consistent, well-defined term in our industry. At Yieldex, we work with direct sales teams on some of these key differences: guaranteed impressions which require accurate forecasting, and guaranteed pricing which requires solid supply and demand knowledge, as we help to bring the efficiency of RTB to the direct sales process.”

Roy Pereira, Founder CEO of ShinyAds

“Programmatic direct at its core is about removing inefficiencies from buying and selling class-1 inventory directly by the advertiser and publisher. While that inventory can be categorized as premium, reserved, guaranteed, first-look, direct sold or class-1, the term ‘direct’ is meant to represent the notion that that inventory is being handled directly on the publisher’s ad server, and that that transaction happens direct from the advertiser to the publisher with minimal interference. Shiny Ads and other ad-tech vendors formed a group to define this industry term as it best describes how publishers can use automation to make the selling process simpler, while advertisers can buy inventory direct on sites with the same guarantees they would get when dealing with the publishers’ ad sales team.”

CPXi Programmatic Direct Primer Infographic

Programmatic Direct Primer