By Enrico Vecchio, CTO, Audiencerate
As we head into Q4 it’s hard to fully comprehend the impact this year’s events are already having on consumer needs and behaviors. From a mass shift to remote working and a rapid acceleration in digital adoption, to an increased focus on health and wellbeing, and a caution born out of economic uncertainty, 2020 will go down in history as a make or break year for brands across multiple sectors.
But it’s far from over yet as a constantly evolving situation continues to impact consumer priorities and preferences on a day-to-day basis. To end 2020 on a high and put themselves in a strong position for the coming year, brands must move quickly, recognizing opportunities and responding rapidly to unpredictable market changes. Achieving this level of agility requires robust and timely insight derived from high quality, real-time data. Brands now have the chance to seize this moment and get a handle on their data and be able to activate it across multiple digital advertising marketplaces to reach consumers with what they want, when they want it. Here are three ways brands can accelerate their data strategies in Q4 to ensure they have the speed and agility to see out 2020.
Prioritize data quality
Brands need the ability to match IDs at scale and activate data across a variety of buying platforms, but their data infrastructure isn’t always capable of achieving this, with average industry match rates rarely reaching 50%. To remedy this situation brands can make use of data platforms that allow them to onboard their own ID universe, without the need to convert to common industry IDs. This results in far higher match rates and increased data scale and quality, as well as enhanced insight on which to base buying decisions. As part of ensuring data quality, brands should also make sure data partners are compliant with the latest privacy regulations such as the general data protection regulation (GDPR) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), and that their practices are in the line with the IAB’s current transparency and consent framework, TCF 2.0.
Demand speedy synchronization
Onboarding data into digital marketplaces is frequently a long process that prevents brands from responding positively and immediately to market trends. Brands often experience delays of many weeks before they can take advantage of granular audience profiles for targeted advertising, by which point consumer needs have likely already changed. But these hold-ups are wholly unnecessary. Speedy segment synchronization is entirely achievable with the right data platform, enabling brands to access audiences within hours. With segments synchronized on demand, rather than according to default time-frame windows, brands can make use of same-day insight to drive effective digital advertising campaigns. They can also combine their segments with third-party data, running run lookalike models or audience overlaps to increase scale and target composite audiences using multiple data points.
Request rapid reporting
Data onboarding isn’t the only thing that takes time in the world of digital advertising. Reporting can often be a protracted process, with brands only able to see how their campaigns are performing via a single monthly report containing information that is weeks out of date. To make reporting work in their favor, brands should to be able to measure campaign success in real-time, understand how individual channels, tactics and audiences are performing, and optimize their campaigns to achieve the best possible return. Same-day reporting allows brands to maximize opportunity and react to the continually changing situation.
The year so far has presented unprecedented challenges for brands as consumer needs and behaviors change dramatically and unpredictably on a continual basis. To make the most of Q4 and get a head start on 2021, brands must accelerate their data strategies, prioritizing data quality through advanced onboarding, demanding rapid, on-demand audience segmentation and requesting same-day reporting that will enable them to optimize campaigns and respond positively to market shifts as and when they occur.