• by Gavin O'Malley , Staff Writer @mp_gavin, July 23, 2013

Who’s winning the battle for display advertising’s planning and creation? Is it “science,” i.e., programmatic processes, or “art,” i.e., human intuition and experience? The agency panel is presently battling it out at the OMMA Premium Display conference in L.A.

No question, “Science is winning,” according to Ryan McArthur, Executive Vice President, US Interactive Media. That said, “I don’t think we’re there yet… we need to continue to rely on art until there’s (sufficient) business attribution in place,” McArthur conceded.

“We can be so much smarter about it,” Greg Pomaro, SVP, Executive Media Director, T3, said regarding the increasingly scientific nature of display advertising.   

That said, “Communication … remains very artistic,” said Alan Smith, Head of Media, NA, Essence. “But (the industry remains) 50/50 on a strategy level,” he added.

“It depends on where you are in the sale funnel,” Rocio Ibarra, Director, Digital, MEC, pointed out. The higher you are, the more art (still matters) … the lower you go, the more scientific it gets.”