European Publishers Predict Revenue From Video, Mobile and Native Ad Formats To Grow by 26% in 2019

For upon |Maximising revenue through simple and innovative ad solutions is key for publishers to succeed in programmatic, a new study by Oath in association with IAB Europe finds.

Research released by Oath, in association with IAB Europe, has revealed that European publishers believe revenue generated by video, native and mobile formats will grow by more than a quarter (26%) over the next 12 months. With over 60% claiming that these formats are paramount to the success of their business.

The study entitled ‘Understanding Programmatic Challenges for Publishers’ was commissioned by Oath in order to gain insights on the biggest opportunities and challenges that the publishing industry faces in programmatic advertising and technologies. Industry professionals from across the IAB Europe and national IAB networks in Europe, responded to the survey which revealed that publishers are looking for partners to simplify their offerings, develop new ad solutions focusing on multi-user living room experiences through audio and in-stream video technologies.

Previous research carried out by IAB Europe found that €12 billion was spent by advertisers through programmatic display across Europe last year, with a third of this spend on video and 57% spent on mobile (including native formats), so it’s no surprise then that video, mobile and native ad formats are top of mind for European publishers.

The competitive edge of programmatic trading

Programmatic trading is high on European publishers’ agendas, with 76% stating its extreme importance ‘today’ in the survey, with 83% saying it will become even more important over the next 12 months. In the UK 61% stated it was extremely important both today and in the next 12 months and 52% of European publishers believe that it provides a competitive advantage, although there is still a large proportion (30%) that remain unsure. This is of particular importance in the UK with 59% publishers stating it provides a competitive advantage.

In-housing continues to be a hot topic as the research showed 59% of European publishers are carrying out their programmatic trading functions in-house. With 55% in the UK bringing trading in-house – significantly lower to France 65% and Germany 81%.

Giving value to every impression

Two-thirds of all European publishers identified ‘giving value to each impression’ as their top challenge whilst managing GDPR and consent was down in 4th place in their list of concerns.

Connecting inventory to all demands sources and maximising mobile revenue further came in joint second at 47%.

Publishers want their partners to simplify programmatic ad sales whilst ensuring that premium ads are allocated to their inventory. Through this streamlined solution, publishers can sell their inventory at a reasonable price without compromising on the quality of ads hosted.

Obstacles for audience growth and maximising value of inventory

Better monetisation and higher quality ads remain key to optimise audience growth amongst European publishers in the owned media space. 57% of UK publishers ranked monetisation as the top factor to realise this audience growth.

63% of European publishers’ content distribution solutions are on-platform, whereas 37% are off-platform, using partners such as Oath, Twitter, Google and Facebook; a trend set to continue for the next 12 months.

Control, price and reach equate for 78% of all responses as the top challenges for publishers in off-platform audience growth. In the UK these were the top ranking factors – with 63% voting control as the biggest challenge to their off-platform content strategy.

Resources are being allocated to driving audience growth over the next 12 months, with 30% of European publishers claiming there will be a greater focus on earned media vs paid media. However, audience growth continues to face challenges, with 38% of European publishers citing revenue as their main concern in driving audience growth, with lack of control on where their content is shown, quality of inventory, fill rates and video play technology worrying them too.

Scale and key formats are big issues when it comes to maximising the value of publisher inventory.

Henk Van Niekerk, Head of EMEA Supply Platforms said: “Programmatic trading continues to offer clear opportunities and growth for publishers across Europe, but many challenges still remain. Maximising revenue is still top of mind for most publishers even as GDPR and managing consent drops down their list of concerns. As a publisher ourselves, Oath understands many of these challenges and we strive to develop our Oath Ad Platforms solutions for publishers based on our own experience and learnings through partner research like this with IAB Europe.”