By Erik Brydges, Head of Political at Xandr
Imagine: You are a political trader, and it’s 7 p.m. on a Friday night in October 2022. A customer needs to launch 13 CTV-focused campaigns that target districts in four states – immediately. Do you have the tools to make it happen?
Quick-turn requests like these are commonplace in political advertising. With media planning already in full swing, it’s a strong reminder of the importance of having access to a reliable advertising platform in today’s political climate. Even without a presidential election, political advertising spend in 2022 is projected to be roughly the same as 2020, which provides a huge opportunity for appropriately supporting CTV and down-ballot spending.
Buyers are going to be looking to access the most voter-targeted CTV and premium video inventory available in all 50 states on a platform with efficient built-for-political tools designed for trading teams.
Efficiency is key for political buyers
Political customers require a platform that can do it all, and they don’t have a lot of time to do it. They need to launch campaigns of all sizes simultaneously across all 50 states, not just some of them. With voter eyeballs increasingly shifting to CTV, buyers need access to the most CTV and premium video inventory – and they need it to be voter targeted to optimize campaign dollar efficiency.
To keep pace, political traders need to unlock quick efficiency wins for faster campaign building. They need to deliver access to all 7,000+ US political districts for targeting – and provide essential feature sets like bulk creative upload and bulk campaign management levers, so they can get ads running instantly. Platforms not purpose-built for political can’t guarantee these integral capabilities for traders.
Much of this work must happen after hours and on weekends, due to the unique nature of political timelines and news cycles. In this always-on landscape, consistency and reliability are table stakes for traders. They need a platform that’s in it for the long haul, not one that shows up right before election day. Clear and easy-to-access support frameworks, which are politically knowledgeable, are a force multiplier for those traders and their organizations.
Publishers want to get off the sidelines – and political buyers want them to
Political buyers will bring a tidal wave of demand this election season, and publishers want to be ready to collect on that opportunity. This climate makes it critical for sellers to work with a monetization platform with a strong set of political credentials that can meet the demand in all 50 states amidst an ever-changing landscape of state-by-state regulations.
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Risk-averse publishers not already accepting political dollars need the ability to easily preview and approve political creatives. To unlock high-value political budgets, they require a platform that offers increased control and ease-of-use at scale.
It’s even better for both buyers and sellers when the creative approval process is frictionless for the political buyer. Politically savvy platforms provide inventory-monetization strategies, such as creating robust catalogs of deals for their demand-side partners to leverage, to help extend those publishers’ sales teams this political season.
Nuance is everything in the political vertical – and, likewise, a nuanced, purpose-built solution is paramount to unlocking opportunity for buyers and sellers this election season. Xandr has taken some of the best and broadest political know-how and is making the right investments to best support both advertisers and publishers throughout the entire 2022 election cycle and beyond.
So, what platform do you want to log into at 7 p.m. on that Friday?
