• by Ray Schultz , Columnist, August 14, 2024

Programmatic advertisers are largely satisfied with the business impact of their investments, but they have many worries, judging by The Future of Programmatic 2024, a study by Warc. 

While two-thirds are somewhat happy with their programmatic results, they list these concerns:

• Brand safety/suitability—60%
• Deprecation of third-party cookies—52%
• Viewability & accurate measurement—51%
• Ad fraud—46%
• Complexity of adtech/martech—31%
• Short termism/downward cost pressures—19%
• Supply chain transparency—9%
• Diversity and inclusion—6%
• Sustainability & the carbon impact of advertising—5%

Among these worries, cookie deprecation remains a concern despite Google's backing off its plan. 

The report arrives in “the wake of the announcement from Google that third-party cookies will no longer be fully phased out from the advertising ecosystem," says Paul Stringer, managing editor research and insights, Warc. “While it represents a reversal of sorts, this should not encourage complacency. The industry still needs to evolve to meet the demands of a privacy-first ecosystem.”

Stringer adds, “Declining addressability, brand safety and ad fraud, continue to concern marketers, and addressing these concerns becomes even more important as increasing volumes of spend are transacted programmatically each year.”

But advertisers apparently are alert to the danger: 76% are implementing first-party data strategies. And 57% see this as their most promising option. 

At the same time, sustainability is at the very bottom of the list of worries. 

Of the companies polled, 59% do not list this as a strategic focus. And 68% have not adopted a framework, set of methodologies or models to measure the carbon emissions of their digital advertising. The 32% that have deserve kudos.

As for investment, 76% are spending 40% or less of their budgets on open web advertising. Moreover, 56% are buying display inventory using programmatic methods.

Warc surveyed 100 programmatic experts in July 2024 in partnership with NewtonX. Warc operates out of the US, UK, Singapore and China.