AI-powered curation: the future of programmatic advertising

Curation is being hailed as the ‘next big thing’ in adtech. And with a recent ANA report identifying up to $31 billion wastage in global open web advertising - due to non-measurable, non-viewable, MFA (Made For Advertising) or IVT (Invalid Traffic) placements - it’s clear to see the need for more carefully curated inventory.

In response, many industry players are now working with specialist partners to leverage curation as they strive to unlock the potential of the open web. In fact, recent research showed that 90% of European media buyers are already directing ad spend to curation platforms. 

What’s more, as we are now firmly in the age of AI, it goes without saying that tools such as ML (Machine Learning) will play a pivotal role in shaping the future of most advertising practices, including programmatic curation.

What exactly is curation and why does it matter?

Curation is the sell-side process of optimizing online ad inventory to include relevant and high media quality placements in ready-made programmatic deals, providing the ability to build and target relevant audiences at scale. This also enables brands, retailers, and data providers to combine their first-party data with inventory sourced from third-party publishers within PMPs, ready to deliver to DSPs as easy-to-activate Deal IDs. 

Sell-side programmatic curation provides significant operational benefits for DSPs and advertisers. It facilitates more efficient bidding with better user matching for greater scale, and faster outcomes without having to contend with deal throttling. Control is increased for advertisers through the ability to immediately apply and manage unique campaign targeting directly at the source of supply. The net result is better campaign performance, with lower CPAs and CPMs.

The dawn of smart curation 

AI-driven technology takes the curation process one step further, specifically by leveraging applications like ML to turbo-charge optimization for advanced auction packages built for inventory quality, attention and core performance KPIs. 

Benefits of AI-powered curation

• Continued relevance and longevity - without cookies: Curation offers the ability to create targeted ads within a fully compliant, cookieless environment - a fundamental requirement for anyone to continue to thrive, but one for which over a third of the industry (34%) remain unprepared. However, the use of ML delivers an even more effective and future-proofed solution. Research from ExchangeWire demonstrates that 87% of European marketers reported enhanced ROI as a result of implementation. And, as ML begins to pervade not only adtech but every facet of our daily lives, we are only at the start of that journey. 

• New, engaged audiences through semantic data: Advertisers who apply ML-driven contextual data into their campaigns have the ability to reach new, often untapped and deeply relevant audiences through the open web - safely bypassing low-quality media placements in the process. Semantic data is an advanced form of contextual advertising focused on the meaning of page content, delivering a richer solution than site classification and keyword targeting. With this approach, advertisers can blend broader relevant content with highly targeted pages for the unique contextual advertising they require. The combined effect of high user match rates and real-time, dynamic changes further strengthen campaign performance, and can even enable access to predictive audience data to inform future planning. 



• Sustainability: With carbon emissions a hot topic on everyone's lips, and more and more data exposing the carbon footprint and waste generated by established advertising practices, smart curation supports an agenda which puts environmental considerations at the forefront of any marketing strategy. Optimized, higher-performing campaigns are by their nature more efficient. Fewer wasted impressions, higher-quality user attention, and green credentials are central objectives for any marketeer - and can all be delivered through the integration of smart curation that cuts programmatic advertising wastage from the supply chain.

As a ready-made solution for the challenges that programmatic advertisers, agencies and publishers continue to face - namely increasing media efficiency, managing operational overheads, building cookieless environments, keeping brands safe, and creating a sustainable ecosystem - the advance of smart curation solutions couldn’t come at a better time. 

These are exciting times as we observe what AI-powered curation can bring to the world of programmatic media.

Also published in: MartechRecord