Creative: What (what kind of ad) will be delivered?
Targeting: Who to reach
Bidding/budget: How much (bid strength, delivery volume) will be delivered?
Design: How to design your account and what features to use
Analysis and reporting: How to evaluate and communicate the results obtained
*In addition to the above, the upstream processes such as "Why do you do it (programmatic advertising) = setting the objective," "What and how much do you aim for = setting goals," and "What do you want to solve = setting the problems" are also important tasks for managers, but they are outside the scope of automation (at least for now), and so we will not include them in the definition in this article.
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Now, based on these definitions of "role" and "scope," let's learn about the evolution of automation functions in programmatic advertising by looking at AdWords, a representative example of programmatic advertising.
Changes in AdWords automation features
The diagram below summarizes the automation-related features(※) that have been released by AdWords so far, along with the approximate timing of their release. With the vertical axis representing time, and the horizontal axis representing the "scope" and "role" defined earlier, we can see the evolution of these features.
* In addition to the features listed here, various other features, large and small, have been released, but we have arbitrarily selected the features for this article. The roles and scale of the features vary, so we hope you will take a look at this list to get an overall idea of the features. This content was created by collecting information from the " Google AdWords Official Community " and " AdWords Help ."
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Role Trends
Around 2011-2012, whereas up until then, automation functions had primarily been to "assist and expand the work of operators, and present options" to operators, they later implemented functions such as allowing operators to "instruct the goals they want to achieve (profitability and CPA)" and "prepare the groundwork for the automation functions to operate", and then leaving it to the automation functions to make choices, make decisions, and take action.
We can see a trend where roles range from "replacing phone number database free existing work" to "performing tasks that require intelligence ."
Substitute for existing work
Keyword optimization tool: Suggest keyword ideas
Automation rule function: Parameters are controlled according to the set conditions
Enhanced CPC: Bids are automatically adjusted based on the maximum cost per click you set.
Performing tasks that require intelligence
Dynamic Search Ads: Automatically select keywords, ads, and destinations from the destination LP
Product Listing Ads: Automatically select keywords, ads, and destinations from data feeds
Dynamic Remarketing: Auto-generate creative and targeting segments
Target return on ad spend: Calculate the bid amount that will achieve the desired profitability and place a bid
Range Trend
The "scope" of automation is also expanding. As shown in the diagram above, AdWords makes it possible to replace "who," "what," and "how much" with automation functions by using the same functions .
Of course, when looking at the account as a whole, the role and scope are still limited, and the rules must be followed to ensure that the automation function functions properly. However, looking at this trend, we can imagine that the role and scope of automation will continue to grow, and its use will become the norm.
So, what about performance? Will the automation feature deliver better results than a programmatic advertising professional? First, let's look at the performance of automation in terms of "how much = bid" using AdWords as an example.