• by Tobi Elkin , Staff Writer @tobielkin, March 23, 2016

Audience measurement firm Quantcast and the American Association of Advertising Agencies (4As) on Wednesday announced a partnership that will offer programmatic and real-time advertising training and education resources to 4As members. The program is the first of its kind for the 4As.

The announcement, made during the 4As Transformation Conference in Miami, comes as adland is rapidly losing talent and confronting ongoing problems of diversity, inclusion and gender bias. Compensation issues and lack of advancement plague the industry, and talent has migrated to ad-tech companies, startups, publishers and high-profile brands like Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter.

Programmatic media, a growing part of the media mix that’s projected to reach $27 billion this year, requires a variety of new skills that need to be cultivated by agencies, publishers and marketers. Publicis Groupe has rolled out a programmatic training program and others are addressing the talent gap. That’s a good thing.

Quantcast and the 4As will offer customized training and education on programmatic advertising, where media professionals, audience and data analysts are needed. The new 4As Programmatic Workshop features content from Quantcast’s existing industry training program called the Real-Time Advertising (RTA) Academy. The curriculum and content will be specifically tailored to the interests of 4As members. A self-paced curriculum, the workshop comprises four video modules and short quizzes. It’s free to 4As members.

“We believe strongly that better understanding of the landscape, challenges and opportunities of programmatic will lead to accelerated adoption industry-wide,” Quantcast CEO Konrad Feldman told RTBlog via email. Quantcast and the 4As will work with association members in North America and the Interactive Advertising Bureau in the U.K,. and is seeking more collaborations with partners in the U.S. and around the world.

The target audience for the training? Agency professionals and brand marketers, but Feldman said it’s “really anyone within a marketing organization that wants to learn more about the programmatic space. …There aren’t any specific skills required to take the workshop, as it serves to provide an overview of the landscape and get people familiar with the tools and technology.”

Quantcast has trained some 3,000 individuals who work at agencies, ad-tech firms and brand marketers. Its RTA Academy launched in 2013, developed from Quantcast’s annual “Quantathon” for employees that addressed programmatic and real-time knowledge gaps.

More education on programmatic and real-time marketing and media is needed. Any moves like this by industry organizations, ad-tech firms and others are steps in the right direction.