Programmatic ads vs. traditional pay-per-click (PPC) advertising
Wondering how programmatic ads differ from traditional paid advertising?
It’s important to note that programmatic advertising is a form of PPC. However, as noted above, programmatic advertising focuses more on buying a certain audience vs. a particular ad space.
Here are a few key differences between programmatic and traditional paid media buying.
Bidding: While traditional search ads are based on a bidding model alone, programmatic ads use real-time bidding and allow you to set a floor price with certain partners. In addition, programmatic ads allow you to work with a fixed CPM cost for direct deals.
Ad setup and implementation: Traditional search advertising campaigns require tremendous attention to detail to drive maximum impact with minimal investment. Failing to accurately input and monitor bids can result in thousands of dollars of wasted ad spend.
While programmatic ads also require attention to detail, automated bidding and daily spend limits help to maximize your budget and drive the best possible results.
Key metrics: Traditional PPC campaigns often focus on click-through rate (CTR), which is directly tied to quality score and ultimately ad cost. Typically, higher CTR equates to lower cost per click.
However, with programmatic ads, high CTR can indicate fraudulent traffic. Programmatic ads focus more on viewability or what percentage of people actually viewed your ads.