As a business owner, you want the maximum number of people to find, view, and buy your product or service. So, you need to advertise.
Customers today are increasingly digital and consume content, shop, and watch movies on a digital device. Therefore, your company must have an online presence and advertise its products or services on digital media. “Digital media” includes websites, social media, streaming services, and apps.
If you are a small business owner (like over 90% of businesses worldwide), you probably handle all your marketing and advertising yourself. Nearly 47 percent of small business owners handle their marketing in-house (data source: https://www.leadpages.com/blog)
There are many digital advertising options available, and you can get confused with the wide choice of formats, types of advertising and choice of devices. You must therefore understand the options.
Remember also that most searches and internet browsing now happen on a mobile device. This also affects the kind of advertising you need to do.
Image source: https://headerbidding.co/native-ads-vs-display-ads/
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Programmatic vs Native advertising – what do they mean?
A very common phrase you will hear in digital advertising is “programmatic vs native advertising”. But what does it mean for you as a business owner? Simply put, programmatic and native advertising are different parts of digital advertising. You must know the difference to decide where to spend your advertising budget.
Programmatic advertising provides an immediate result by displaying the product/brand prominently. This is called a display ad. It gives a clear line of action to be taken by the customer (“Call To Action”).
Programmatic advertising is usually seen as a banner ad, video commercial, or sidebar. Programmatic advertising, therefore, is more tactical.
Incidentally, the first display advertisement was published on the internet in 1994. It was for a company called AT&T McCambley. It was a banner ad and it looked like this:
Image source: https://www.outbrain.com/blog/native-ads-vs-display-ads/
Native advertising is for long-term or strategic brand communication. It does not present the brand or product up front and does not ask the website visitor to take immediate action. Native advertising is more informative and provides a larger picture of the category or industry.
What is programmatic advertising?
Programmatic advertising is the use of automation for media buying or buying advertising space. It uses algorithms, software, and data to automate and scale your ad-buying process. You can target your ad campaign, and use your advertising budget, far more efficiently using programmatic advertising. Programmatic advertising does not require you to use an agency as a middleman to buy your ads.
Programmatic advertising can be used for any ad format – image, video, audio, or even text. Here is a graphic on the process of programmatic advertising:
Image source: https://www.wpromote.com/blog/paid-media/intro-to-programmatic
What is native advertising?
As we mentioned earlier, programmatic advertising includes different ad formats such as display ads. Native advertising is a type of advertising format under programmatic advertising.
A native ad is designed to blend into the web page’s content design. It is very similar to “advertorials” in print media and mostly as an editorial layout.
A typical native ad looks like this:
Image source: https://www.thundertech.com/blog-news/june-2020/native-advertising-vs-programmatic-advertising-in-2020
To make a proper decision on which type to use, you need to understand the benefits of each.
Benefits of programmatic advertising
- Provides better opportunities to reach the target audience
- Allows better control over ad distribution
- Reduces wastage and improves the ROI of your ad spend
- Easy to set up and manage a campaign
Benefits of native advertising
- It is less intrusive or disruptive
- Can give a higher engagement rate
- Improves brand image
- Better brand experience
Similarities between programmatic vs native ads
Programmatic and native advertising have some similarities:
- Audience targeting
- Both offer advanced audience-targeting options
- You can choose to have a wide or narrow audience profile depending on your strategy
- Both can complement each other
- You can use a blend of programmatic and native ads in your overall advertising strategy
- Use tactical programmatic ads for a short-term, immediate, product-led communication campaign. Remember to use a clear call to action
- Use native ads to create a longer-term brand image or impression. Provide content that supports your product or service. Do not “force” an action from your audience
Main differences: programmatic vs native ads
There are several key differences between programmatic vs native ads. You must keep these in mind when deciding which of the two to use in your advertising strategy.
| Programmatic advertising | Native advertising | |
| Visibility | Stands out on a webpage as a “digital ad” | Does not look like an ad |
| Duration | Short term | Long term |
| Brand mention | Speaks directly about the product or service being advertised | Rarely talks directly about the brand |
| Call to action | Has a clear Call To Action | Does not contain a direct Call To Action |
| Impact of ad-blockers | Can be affected by ad-blockers in web browsers | Is not affected by ad-blockers |
| Click through rates | Approximately 0.05% (source: https://www.outbrain.com/blog/native-ads-vs-display-ads/) | Approximately 0.2% (source: https://www.outbrain.com/blog/native-ads-vs-display-ads/) |
How to choose between programmatic vs native advertising?
As a business owner, you must be clear on your goals and expected advertising reach to decide when to use programmatic and native advertising.
- Tactical goals (programmatic) and Strategic goals (native advertising)
- Use programmatic advertising if you want to promote a specific product or service
- It is therefore a tactical, product-led communication
- It is usually short-term
- Use native advertising if your goal is to establish your brand credibility or industry leadership
- It is a strategic, brand-led communication
- Native advertising is a long-term approach that has a strong ROI over a period of time.
- Reach (wide or narrow)
- Programmatic ads can have a wide reach
- Programmatic can help you place your ads in the widest possible inventory
- However, programmatic can have a lower engagement rate
- Native ads usually have a narrow reach
- Their choice of inventory is tightly defined
- However, native ads have a higher engagement rate
“Programmatic native” – a new trend?
The relentless growth of mobile devices and the increase in mobile advertising has led to a new trend in digital advertising. It is called “programmatic native”. This type of responsive ad format allows you to serve ads that fit the form and content of mobile devices. This naturally results in better performances for you as an advertiser and allows you to engage an increasingly mobile-first audience.
To sum up
Your digital marketing and advertising strategy must start with an understanding of the target audience. You can use a wide basket of online marketing tools to address your digital advertising requirements.
Programmatic ads allow you to reach a larger audience at scale but cannot provide a deep engagement. Native ads allow you to gain higher engagement by targeting a narrower audience.
Remember that your advertising strategy must cover both, a short-term, product-led approach and a longer-term, brand-led approach. This will give you the best returns on your advertising budget.