The Outdoor industry is stepping up its push for more ad revenue with a plan to build the world’s first one-stop hub for the buying and selling of out-of-home advertising in all formats.
The Outdoor Media Association (OMA) has called for Expressions of Interest (EOI) to build an Automated Transaction Platform (ATP) that will create a single transaction portal for the buying and selling of OOH in Australia across all formats in 2016. EOI are due by 3pm Monday, 3 August, 2015.
“This transaction platform will not just amalgamate the industry, it will make it easier for agencies and clients to buy outdoor media in Australia,” said Charmaine Moldrich, OMA CEO. “The outdoor industry is the only traditional media channel experiencing record growth, and our audiences continue to grow. We know that each day nine out of 10 Australians leave home, and as a consequence of our growing audiences we are seeing OOH on more media plans. OOH revenue has grown 26% in the last five years and technology makes our once static channel dynamic. It is our intention to capitalise on this growth and invest in making it easier to brief, plan and buy our signs across the full array of outdoor formats nationally,” she said.
Major industry bodies, including the Australian Association of National Advertisers (AANA) and the Media Federation of Australia (MFA), support the project.
“Developing the world’s first Outdoor Automated Transaction Platform is an exciting and significant leap forward for the OOH industry,” said Peter Horgan, CEO OMD and Chair of the MFA. “We are pleased to see the OMA embrace automation as a priority and we believe there is a need to make buying and selling media more efficient for our clients.”
Establishing an industry-wide platform is a world first for the OOH industry and the first time any representative media organisation has united to develop a single source transaction system. The industry joined together over five years ago to launch its audience measurement system, MOVE, again the first of its kind in the Australian market.
“Five years on from MOVE we wanted to build on our success, and in listening to our clients: media agencies and advertisers, we believe automation is the next obvious step,” said Moldrich.
The OMA says it’s seeking expressions of interest from individual organisations, or consortiums, which specialise in software development, specifically those that can develop a portal hub to amalgamate the various OOH formats under one transaction platform. The platform should be accessible via a mapping interface and have the ability to pull various data sources, including consumer and geodata. It is envisaged that the platform will have four components, and those interested in tendering can bid for the entire transaction platform, or one or more of the four components.
Phase one will concentrate on automating the current processes including the integration of industry formats and inventory; selling and buying; as well a post analysis and billing. Phase one is expected to be in market in 2016.
OOH is the second fastest growing media in Australia and OMA members - including major players APN Outdoor, Adshel, JC Decaux, Ooh Media, Goa and Torch Media - represent 90% of the OOH industry, accounting for $602.1 million in advertising revenue in 2014.