SINGAPORE — Rubicon Project, the world’s largest independent sell-side advertising platform, released its Programmatic Ad Buying in Asia report, highlighting the bright future for programmatic in Asia.
The report found that 76 percent of respondents reported high or medium levels of adoption, and some 88 percent indicated they expect programmatic budgets to remain the same or increase despite the impact of COVID-19 on overall advertising budgets.
The report found that media buyers are championing OTT as the major growth format for 2020, with 47 percent of respondents ranking OTT in the top three formats that will experience the most programmatic advertising budget growth over the next 12 months, and 17 percent of respondents placing it in the number one spot.
COVID-19 was also found to be accelerating this growth across the region, with media buyers shifting programmatic advertising budgets to take advantage of the surge in demand by consumers for content on demand.
The research, conducted by Campaign Asia for Rubicon Project, surveyed 185 marketers across nine countries in Asia in December 2019 and again in April 2020.
While buyers across the region recognize the immense opportunity that programmatic presents to digital advertisers, Asia has been more hesitant to move budgets towards programmatic in comparison to other regions across the globe.
Singapore, Hong Kong, and India self-identified as mature programmatic markets, while Thailand, Indonesia, and Malaysia identified as “medium” adoption markets. The Philippines, Taiwan, and Vietnam all identified as “low” adoption markets, noting that they expect to increase programmatic spend this year.
The three levels of adoption reflect the extent to which programmatic buying is utilized, the sophistication of buying strategies, and the level of programmatic knowledge among media buyers
According to the report, clients are taking a more active role in driving advertising spend towards programmatic. As clients’ awareness and understanding develop, media buyers are reporting having more freedom to allocate a greater portion of digital ad budgets to programmatic.
Media buyers also indicated that they believe the single biggest challenge hindering further growth of programmatic advertising budgets in Asia is a lack of understanding and a lack of appropriate skills to effectively plan and execute programmatic ad campaigns, particularly outside of the walled gardens.
Read more on the report here
