• by Connie Garrido , Op-Ed Contributor, February 1, 2017

Thanks to the proliferation of geotemporal data sources that have shed light on consumer behavior, in the next five years, mobile revenues driven by location-based data will outpace the entire out-of-home (OOH) industry.

Mobile marketers are using these data sources to reach audiences on-the-go and measure offline and online returns on location-based ad spend.

Awareness, reach, cost per GRP or digital proxies no longer suffice in demonstrating accountability for media investment. The future of OOH depends on heeding the success of mobile’s entry and rapid share gain within the industry’s space.

How has mobile successfully infiltrated OOH?

Targeting in a Broadcast Environment

Mobile advertisers have been using data based on device behavior since its infancy to deliver tighter targeting, efficiency and more measurable metrics. OOH has relied on the opportunity to be noticed as the key metric.

Now, more advanced media models are evolving, tapping into geotemporal datasets to enrich OOH targeting based on mobile behavior in an online and offline world, covering the intersection between the two.

The result is an opportunity to reach more relevant audiences based on their journey rather than a given location. Also, this ensures a more efficient investment of OOH dollars.

For example, if a fast-food restaurant was opening in Birmingham, Alabama, a traditional OOH targeting might be within a five-mile radius. Using geotemporal data, one could map the journey of frequent QSR visitors in the area to better understand what other environments may be relevant to them.

Geotemporal data will inform where that audience lives, works, plays and shops, online and offline. A smart media planner will use this data to create cohesive client solutions designed to convert audiences.

Across our brand portfolio, we have witnessed up to 60% increased engagement when geotemporal data has been effectively used to develop cross-platform solutions, including OOH. The results clearly demonstrate the value of adopting mobile targeting data in developing more targeted OOH solutions within a broadcast environment.

Contextual Relevance Amplifies Disruption

The advent of BLE, WIFI and GPS allow people to be tracked when out of their homes and messaged when exposed to a relevant environment off and online.

OOH has always sold itself as being “the right place,” and with the introduction of digital out-of-home (DOOH) and more recently, programmatic, OOH has extended its proposition to include “the right time.”

According to PQ Media research, DOOH is the second-fastest-growing ad medium worldwide after mobile, based on average weekly consumer exposure.

Out-of-home disruption can be expressed through media placement or creative adaption, based on a clear set of business rules, including weather, time of day, day of week and event.

The combination of the two creates the greatest disruption with OOH and can easily be complemented with mobile media to amplify or extend brand engagement.

Audience Behavior the Measure of Success

With smartphone penetration at 77% in the U.S., according to data from Pew Research, mobile is much more than a channel, it is the connective thread that links online and offline consumer behavior.

Just as cookies became the online currency for tracking exposure to ads encountered across desktop media channels (display, search, social), location data from mobile devices enable advertisers to better understand consumers’ exposure to media across screens in the physical world.

Mobile identifiers for advertisers such as IDFAs and Android IDs can be used to identify a consumer exposed to OOH ads. Companies that specialize in data management collect pools of these IDs that are mapped, like cookies, which advertisers then use for tracking.

Mobile location data can not only verify a device’s precise location, it can also track the device to a home address and cross device, thereby verifying ad exposure by channel and subsequent behavior within a given time frame.

Cross-channel attribution can be modeled based on a geographic envelope, such as a census block, by leveraging continuous sources of location data to determine a consumer’s home census block and connect this information to data communicated on a census block level, such as demographic information from the U.S. Census Bureau.

For OOH, this provides an opportunity to move beyond traditional broadcast metrics of reach and frequency.

That being said, upper-funnel branding efforts are crucial to lower funnel success. Using OOH media to drive relevant awareness increases the potential to drive foot traffic and interest amongst a relevant audience.

A VistarMedia case study for an automotive brand demonstrated that against the control baseline, exposed store visitors were 3.8 times more likely to inquire information about the new product and 1.6 times more likely to purchase it.

With the introduction of geotemporal data, OOH can now enhance its role within the media mix. It can map an audience journey beyond location and provide the sweet spot between campaign scale and accurate targeting, delivering a new measure for success we refer to as Relevant Reach. No longer just a destination, out-of-home now encompasses the whole journey.