Just 8 years ago there were 150 ad tech companies in the market, today there are over 7000! It can be pretty intimidating for people trying to navigate through this rapidly evolving ecosystem of complex, programmatic and data-driven marketing.

We’ve come a long way from the 1990’s way of direct paid media transactions, where the process went as follows: publisher sales rep submits proposal to an advertiser (in most cases ad agencies); Negotiations go back and forth until the marketer is happy with the proposal; and signs off on the deal with an IO (Insertion Order). The process of managing these ad campaigns was manual and very labour intensive, especially when buying media at scale across multiple providers.

Fast forward to 2019: ad servers have evolved into sophisticated programmatic demand and sell-side platforms known as DSPs and SSPs. Overlay that with a multitude of sophisticated data analytics and management tools, paid media is now a heavily performance and data driven form of advertising.

Campaign managers of yesteryear must evolve into Programmatic Media Traders with skills ranging from negotiation, sales, data analytics and even highly technical competencies in working with various sophisticated ad-tech platforms.

Performance advertising has developed into a likeness of how the stock market operates. Media agencies are dedicating entire divisions within their organisations to data analytics and programmatic advertising. This opens major doors in terms of career opportunities for people looking to future-proof their careers in advertising and digital media. Programmatic technology is expanding into traditional media such as billboards, audio and TV.

With the rapidly growing demand for skilled programmatic ad specialists, there’s a major skills shortage and a need to fill these roles in South Africa. Pragmattica and Red & Yellow have been discussing the best way to address this issue, our solution? Comprehensive and practical training in performance advertising, covering subjects such as PPC, data analytics, performance reporting, ad operations, and programmatic media trading. Part of our research includes finding whether there is a real interest in this field, what topics and areas should be included and what the preferred delivery format is. We would love to hear from you so please send us feedback and suggestions.

For those of you who are already in the advertising, media and related industries, Red & Yellow has several corporate training programmes that will boost your team’s skillset and keep it relevant. We know this for certain as we, Pragmattica, collaborates with Red & Yellow; our customised in-house workshops form an integral part of the programme.

For more information on how to incorporate digital and programmatic solutions within your organisation contact Amanda, Founder of Pragmattica Consulting Pty Ltd.

Want to upskill yourself or your team now? Try one of Red & Yellow’s online short courses. Digital Marketing: Professional Certification and Performance Media might be of particular interest to you.

About the author:
Amanda is a thought leader for digital advertising and publisher monetisation in Africa, with a keen focus on mobile. She has spent 11 years in the digital media industry working with leading brands, agencies, media and ad tech companies. Amanda founded Pragmattica Digital Consulting, a full-service digital consultancy advising businesses on commercially viable digital strategies and solutions within the digital media and ad tech landscape. When she’s not running her business and flying from city to city, Amanda runs up and down mountains to sustain her appetite for wine, chocolates and all things yummy, her definition of a “balanced diet”.