US Media Market Grows 8%, Driven by Programmatic and Retail Media

Guideline announces expansion of Programmatic Spend Intelligence to include CPM Pricing, providing increased transparency across digital media landscape

The continued quest for premium inventory and brand-safe environments in the programmatic ecosystem led to +47% growth YoY in the Premium Programmatic market, inclusive of Private Marketplaces (PMP) and Programmatic Guaranteed (PG) deals, during the first 8 months of 2024. In addition, Retail Media grew +33% YoY in the same period, contributing to an overall +8% YoY in the US advertising market.

That’s according to new data from Guideline, the single source of truth for advertising spend and pricing data, which captures actual agency investment from all agency holding companies and most large independents.

“When the COVID pandemic hit in March 2020, only a quarter of programmatic investment was bought via premium deals, with open exchanges dominating the programmatic landscape,” said Alberto Leyes, Head of Product Strategy, Data Solutions, at Guideline. “That number has since grown to 48% in the first 8 months of 2024 – posting +47% growth YoY – with a projected share of 50% by the end of 2024”.

In conjunction with the release of this data, Guideline announced today the availability of Programmatic Marketplace Insights, providing marketers with a holistic view into the entire programmatic marketplace.

Released just months after the launch of its Programmatic Spend Intelligence, Guideline’s Programmatic CPM Pricing provides media buyers and sellers with the intelligence they need to power informed advertising efforts across the programmatic marketplace.

Additional data points include:

• Overall, Digital media spend grew +16% in the year-to-August, while Traditional media dropped -5%.
• Total DSP/SSP-transacted programmatic buying (+26% YoY) doubled the pace of direct-sold insertion orders (+13%) in Jan-Aug 2024 YoY – a trend Guideline has seen for the past two years.
• Within Programmatic, ad spend in open exchanges grew +10% YoY, a moderate pace when compared to the +47% YoY growth of Premium Deals (PMP/PG).
• Travel Services was the product category group growing its programmatic premium investment at a fastest pace (+75% YoY) and Technology the one investing a higher share of Premium vs Open Programmatic (66%/34%).
• Retail Media (+33% YoY) and Social (+27%) were the fastest-growing digital media segments beyond Programmatic Premium.

“We’re launching Guideline Premium Programmatic Pricing as a response to the industry’s demand for greater transparency, and the growing preference for quality content and controlled ad environments,” said Alberto Leyes, Head of Product Strategy, Data Solutions, at Guideline. “Long gone are the days when top content was reserved for direct-sold inventory, and there couldn’t be a better example of this than the Olympics having been traded programmatically for the first time this year through the agreement between NBCU and The Trade Desk”.

The new Guideline Programmatic Pricing data evidences that the growth of Programmatic Premium Deals comes despite CPM price reductions in two out of three key programmatic ad types. Both Streaming Audio (-6% YoY in Q2) and Standard Display (-14% YoY in Q2) eCPMs adjusted down, while OTT pricing grew moderately (+4%).

In Q2 2024, buying OTT under Programmatic Deals commanded a 10% CPM premium over Open Exchanges. Such premium was 25% in the case of Direct-Sold vs Open Exchange. This trend is accentuated in the case of Standard Display, with the CPM premium over Open Exchange was 32% for Programmatic Deals and 68% for Direct-Sold.

For more such updates, follow us on Google News Martech News