OAAA applauds the wide release of the Digital Out of Home (DOOH) Taxonomy published by a consortium of tech companies, featuring several of our longstanding members. This work is an iteration of the venue definitions that OAAA (and others) originally established in 2017, which were included in the DOOH Primer (Section 1: Environment Types). The consortium has added to the parent naming conventions “child “ and “grandchild” levels to the venue hierarchy as a means to enhance both transparency for Open Real-Time Bidding and integrations for demand and supplier side platforms integrations.
As a former agency professional who oversaw DOOH programmatic buying, I appreciate the need and value of greater transparency into which venue your ad will serve when trading on a non-transparent ad exchange. I dare say that I have gotten burned a few times thinking an ad was going to one venue when it actually was being served to another.
“This standardization of venue types is another step towards making our media easier to interact and purchase in the Programmatic Space with clearer targeting by media buying platforms,” said Ian Dallimore, VP of Digital Growth, Lamar Advertising Company and OpenRTB Committee Co-Chair. “OAAA’s involvement will expand the adoption and evolution of venue standards and will develop the industry at large.”
To that end, classification of venues and format types cannot start and stop with programmatic trading. It’s imperative that these virtues are embedded across the entire OOH ecosystem –whether printed or digital or purchased programmatically or direct – using the same consistent nomenclature is a requisite to remove friction from the buy-sell process.
As acknowledged in the DOOH Venue Taxonomy report, the current version “is not exhaustive and amenable to changes based on feedback from new participants.” Changes will need to be made, but at a cadence that respects the amount of effort that it will take to adopt these updates.’
OAAA’s OpenRTB working committee, co-chaired by Leslie Lee Vice President, Marketing, Vistar Media and Ian Dallimore Vice President of Digital Growth & GM of Programmatic at Lamar Advertising Company, will oversee the process – reviewing, vetting, analyzing and providing confirmation of the work issued by the consortium, and then expanding as needed, to ensure it meets with OAAA member approval. Once this work is finalized, the venue taxonomy will be included in our OpenRTB specifications, which are currently under development, and also included in other relevant OAAA standards.
“Programmatic technology can provide tremendous value to the OOH community, but needs to be built in a way that protects the unique nature of the medium and can drive healthy growth from digital buyers,” Lee shares. “Our aim is to develop OpenRTB specifications that align with the broader advertising industry’s standards but facilitate transactions to properly reflect the nuances of DOOH. Our process will incorporate input from OOH publishers, platforms and omnichannel buyers to develop a clear OpenRTB spec for DOOH.”
It is OAAA’s mission to continue to convene and lead our membership in the development of unified standards, guidelines and definitions, to simplify our value proposition and reduce friction, by making OOH easier to plan and buy.
Published: December 22, 2020