Programmatic ad technologies have flipped the ratio as it relates to reliance on human gut versus machine processing, says Bret Leece, global chief analytics officer at Initiative.

An audience member at Tuesday's Programmatic Insider Summit in Scottsdale, AZ, told the private exchange panel that he has been told from some "open market exchange people" to look into private marketplaces because his company isn't winning enough bids on the open exchanges. How common is this, the ad buyer wondered, and is it a legitimate suggestion?

The "private exchange" panel at the Programmatic Insider Summit got off on pretty fundamental note: defining what a private exchange actually is. Remarkably, it means somewhat different things to the different experts participating in the panel. To eBay Director of Advertising Operations Brian Brownie it has "three flavors" ranging from straight up "deal ID" buys to slightly higher funnel level pre-negotiated prices and inventory to full-blown "programmatic reserve deals." To Careerbuilder.com Vice President-Media Services Randy White it is basically a "deal ID" deal. To The Media Kitchen Director of Programmatic Media Buying Brian Nadres it is "anything that's non reserved …

Will the programmatic media and marketing industry move toward verticalization? Like all other forms of marketing, it sort of depends on what kind of marketer you are, according to panelists on the "Does One Machine Fit All?" panel at the Programmatic Insider Summit. "We believe fiercely that the general approach is better than the vertical approach," asserted James Green, the CEO of Magnetic, adding, "With site retargeting you need to have access to media everywhere." He said from a media reach point of view, programmatic audience buying is going to work better "the more ubiquitous you are and connected to …

You don't have to be a weatherman to know what the most obvious ways of pre-planning programmatic creative. The answer according to the programmatic creative panel that opened Day Two of the Programmatic Insider Summit in Scottsdale, AZ, is right outside your door. "Putting creative together ahead of time that is weather-related," suggested Jeremy Leonard, COO and executive vice president of Colorado digital shop IMM, adding, "Weather is the kind of thing that doesn't throw anyone off-message or off-strategy, per se."

Programmatic Insider Summit attendees kicked off Day Two by getting schooled on programmatic creative by someone who, well, markets a school: Emory University Associate Dean of Marketing and Communications Angela Lee-Bostick. Contrary to conventional wisdom, she said, big universities don't have big marketing budgets and therefore are embracing programmatic technology as a means of punching above their weight -- both in terms of audience targeting, but also in terms of targeting the universities messages to them. The reason, she said, is that Emory isn't really marketing one product -- it markets a suite of products, which are actually individual degree …

The so-called "programmatic direct" marketplace is disrupting relationships between agencies and publishers right now, but that's a necessary step to get to a smoother world where they can interact more optimally -- and more directly -- to the benefit of brand marketers. That was DigitasLBi's Carol Chung's point-of-view on the "Programmatic Direct" panel discussion at the Programmatic Insider Summit in Scottsdale, AZ.

Leave it to a senior Accenture executive to come up with a higher-level way of describing the shift toward in-house programmatic media-buying. Presenting at the Programmatic Insider Summit this morning, Craig Macdonald, Managing Director, Pacific Lead, Communications, Media, Technology, Accenture, used the term "insourcing" to explain the phenomenon.

Got your attention? Good. Well FTD Companies marketing, advertising and media chief did just say that following the Programmatic Insider Summit panel on branding. It was during the Q&A and I asked the panelists to what extent kickbacks and AVBs are impacting the way they think about programmatic as a branding medium. Also, because Jon Mandel recently drew attention to the issue with his recent expose at the Association of National Advertisers' media conference. To be fully transparent, what Fairbairn said in its entirety, was: "I'll pay a 40% kickback out of my media dollars, if my media efficiency is …

Programmatic Insider Summit "Branding" panel moderator Chris Wexler kicked the opening panel off on a pretty fundamental note. "What is branding," the Senior Vice President-Director of Media and Consumer Engagement at Cramer-Krasselt asked the panel of agency and brand marketers.