At Ad:tech in San Francisco today, AOL unveiled plans to launch a new global programmatic advertising platform for brands, agencies and publishers called One by AOL.
The platform will be an open ecosystem that will leverage the teams and tech behind AOL properties like Adap.tv, AdLearn Open Platform and Marketplace and will be rolling out into market over the next eight months, Joe Strolz, general manager, AOL Canada, tells MiC.
One by AOL will be sold as an enterprise solution to clients and will also be used internally by the company as its dedicated programmatic platform, according to a release on the announcement. Both AOL inventory and that from sites not owned by the media co will be available for purchase and measurement on the platform.
IPG Mediabrands is AOL’s partner in the launch, building on its commitment to automate half of its media investments by 2016, which was announced earlier this month.
“The announcement of One by AOL is about letting the industry know about our philosophy around programmatic,” Strolz says. “It is declaring to the industry where we are going so they can get ready for it, and as an agency they need to be thinking. And this announcement helps them to know where we are going.”
He adds One by AOL is a step towards helping marketers to simplify the message they are putting out to consumers, who have never been easier to know yet less understood in their media habits.
“Media companies used to control the use case for the media, and TV broadcasters had the only screen in the living room,” he says. “It was much more reasonable then for marketers to be able to guess about the experience that consumers were having with their brands. Now there are 16 different devices in the living room and the user is ultimately controlling the media. There are now a number of variables that need to happen in order for a marketer to land a message, and we aren’t currently helping the marketer to simplify the way they get the message out.”
Strolz says One by AOL also points to the importance of agency trading desks, which he calls the “most important stakeholders in our business.”
