How has the rise of technology changed the advertising?

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As anything that had touched or been in contact with, the rise of technology changed or at least had a great impact on advertising. From the launch of e-mail, the boom of the Internet and social media, to the new channels that arrived and are changing every day, technology plays an enormous role in our business lives. A role that deserves to be acknowledged and appreciated.

Some of the most important ways in which technology has changed and impacted the advertising scene are:

1. The video and content video popularity

If 10-20 years ago it was all about the TV, with the internet and the rise of platforms like YouTube, Facebook, SnapChat , video advertising has become increasingly widespread and its content’s importance grew along with it. As people become accustomed to watching videos, static images such as traditional billboards can seem dull by comparison. People are also getting savvier and savvier and how what to expect and ask from the advertising they receive. Therefore, they are not waiting anymore, they are reacting, creating their own media and interacting with the existing one in new, innovative ways.

2. Videoblogging

It is not even about blogging anymore, but about video blogging and video bloggers taking control of social media and its endless opportunities offered. The speed with which the new, extremely performant smartphones, tablets, notebooks are launched helps the content and video creators be even better, faster, and smarter in their communication. The advertising campaigns are involving them more and more and making them part of the whole 360 communication, even stars for some of their campaigns targeting a younger audience. Therefore, instead of being only a one-dimensional flow of communication, the latest campaigns are showing all kinds of new smart and innovative approaches.

“For a time, the digital age meant that free advertising was everywhere. Social media channels, pioneered by Facebook, have brought back the idea of paying to play. In other words, you have to dedicate a small budget to reach people via social media. (…) The digital age has heralded an era where everyone can join the advertising dogfight. Yes, those with huge budgets still have an advantage, but it’s no longer the decisive advantage of before. Even the smallest companies have good reason to play,” wrote AJ Agrawal for Forbes.com.

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3. The rise of some is the demise of others

Along with the rise of digital and mobile, channels such as print media and radio are decreasing in their audience and reach, being forced to think outside the box and find new ways to keep them from disappearing. Even TV is not the king anymore in some parts of the world, where digital investments are conquering the top spot.

4. Message personalization and new targeting tools

Nowadays, every client and consumer wants and demands to be touched by the advertising campaign, to feel like the messages are personalized for him/her, that they are addressing him/ her and him/ her problem and desire particularly. Something that due to the new technologies and the digital growth is becoming more and more possible.

Behavioral profiling has gone viral across the internet, enabling firms to reach users with specific messages based on their location, interests, browsing history, and demographic group. “Ads can now follow users from site to site: a customer who looks online for flights to Frankfurt will be inundated with German holiday offers. Conversant, a digital-marketing firm, uses an algorithm to deliver around 800,000 variations of an ad to its big clients’ prospective customers to make it as irresistible as possible. Kraft, a food company, monitors online opinions on its brands in an office which it calls <<the looking glass>>,” wrote Business Insider.

Moreover, in the classic advertising model, firms used to place ads with media that brought together the audiences they were after. They would go for business executives in the Wall Street Journal, for example, or youngsters on MTV. But now advertisers no longer have to rely on media as proxies for consumers, because they have more tools and data to target precisely the people they want to reach.

5. Programmatic is the new KING

Programmatic buying represents a new system for targeting consumers precisely and swiftly with online adverts or DOOH. Publishers, advertisers, and intermediaries can now bid for digital ads electronically and direct them to specific consumers as fast as they want to. Programmatic media buying allows the “owner/brand” to tailor a specific message and creative to the right person, at the right time in the right context – using audience insight from the brand (the customers you want to target) around the kind of audience they want to target. This methodology should deliver far more precision and personalization of messaging and media, resulting in more efficiently targeted campaigns, and less of the “spray and pray” methodology of digital advertising – which is less targeted and based on sheer volume (mainly of impressions).