• by Michael McLaren , Op-Ed Contributor, May 20, 2021

This week’s intent data points to a rise in searches around “programmatic” and “LED billboards” among both brands and agencies, as measured by Bombora Company Surge.

Despite budget cuts last year, advertisers reported better than expected results for U.S. programmatic ad spending last summer. eMarketer predicts programmatic digital display ad spending will rebound in 2021 to 24.1% (versus just 10% last year) and CTV - which is almost exclusively video – will remain one of digital advertising’s fastest-growing channels as available inventory increases. 

The pandemic hit the out-of-home advertising market hard. However, we are beginning to see OOH channels advertise programmatically through digital screens on bus stations, shopping malls, and billboards as COVID restrictions ease nationwide. Still, regardless of whether you’re advertising on mobile, CTV or OOH billboards, video will continue to drive faster growth when compared to non-video display formats across all devices. 

For the first time in a long time, brands are looking for “advertising solutions” – a category that rose sharply after experiencing little to no interest from marketers for five months. Bombora defines it as “solutions to a means of communication with the users of a product or service.” So why are advertisers looking for solutions? And why are they going about it in this way? 

With the push and pull of various internal and external factors at play, we believe 2021 will be a banner year. The unexpected resiliency of the digital ad market, coupled with the pent-up demand for traditional advertising, will force marketers the world over to adapt and transform quickly. To succeed, today’s organizations need a trusted partner to help them become adaptive digital enterprises to meet the post-pandemic wave of digital business transformation.