As a 20+ year advertising veteran, it’s interesting to see how the phrase ‘re-invent’ keep showing up when talking about any new ad exchange or ad auction system.  Yes I agree that the ability for advertising transactions to take place online in a ‘bid’ environment is new and exciting, there will only be a segment of the market that will be comfortable with this ‘transactional’ self-serve model.

Advertising agencies, representatives and sales people have been around for a long time and I believe that the challenges around advertising transactions usually center around questions like ‘what should I buy’ and ‘how can I make advertising work’ and less about ‘can I purchase this using my pay pal account or visa’.

Accountability is a huge factor in the advertising transaction.  When dealing with advertising as a commodity and making your own buying decisions, the customer will ultimately hold responsibility if the campaign is not successful and believe me, it is a lot easier to fail in advertising then succeed.  If the wrong creative runs or there is a challenge with billing, dates etc… In the self-serve world of ad-exchanges, there is no AE or agencies butt to kick when things go sideways and things always do in the advertising world.

Our agency is launching an ad exchange using an eBay store in June and will have remnant TV, Radio and other inventory available for our clients to bid on.  That being said, all campaign executions and transactions will ultimately be made by the agency and responsibility and accountability will be with our agency...as it is now.

The ad exchange is here to stay.  It will be interesting to see how long until traditional and old-school media start auctioning off their products directly.

Could CNN Exchange and NBC Exchange be far off?

Mitch

Mitch Drew
President
BECK Agencies
http://www.beckbc.com
BLOG: http://mitch-tv.blogspot.com