It’s full steam ahead for the team at The Trade Desk, and with Advertising Week APAC just around the corner, they’re preparing to make an appearance at Luna Park’s marketing extravaganza.
James Bayes is the ANZ general manager at The Trade Desk, and told Mediaweek all about what punters can expect at Advertising Week, as well as giving a glimpse into the state of the wider industry and where the team will be focussing their attention next.
Advertising Week 2023
The Trade Desk is a global partner of Advertising Week, and that extends to the APAC event. Reflecting on their presence at Ad Week APAC 2023, Bayes says that The Trade Desk has “got a really busy agenda in Sydney.”
“We’re really fortunate that we’re going to be joined by our chief strategy officer, Samantha Jacobson. She leads some of the most important initiatives for the company globally, and probably the biggest one would be the global rollout of Unified ID 2.0, which just has incredible momentum around the world.
We will be hosting a breakfast on Tuesday morning with 100 or so advertisers, brands, partners, and agency staff. She’s also keynoting AdWeek on the first morning, which should be a bit of fun. We had our CEO Jeff Green on stage at AdWeek about five years or so ago, and he made some predictions about the industry – so Sam is going to do a bit of a retro and see how on the money Jeff was. She’s also going to share some of her own predictions for the next few years.”
As well as taking a peek into the crystal ball regarding the future of the wider industry, Bayes says that The Trade Desk will be discussing what comes next in retail media.
“We’re also hosting a panel focused on retail media, with our partners at Zitcha and Zuru, a really progressive retail marketer that does a lot of work with us. There’s a bunch of case studies that we’ll be sharing there around retail media and retail data, and what we can expect from that space I’m here in Australia over the next 12 months.”
The industry in 2023
In his position as The Trade Desk’s ANZ general manager, Bayes has a front-row seat to some of the biggest trends emerging in the industry. Whilst he admits that “The industry is moving so quickly, it’s difficult to isolate only a few,” Bayes says there are four major ones that stand out.
“First, I think, would be that the acceleration of audiences out of linear TV and into streaming and OTT is probably occurring faster than any of us expected.
“Secondly, there’s just a growing urgency around the need to replumb the Internet to ensure that there’s an effective and sustainable open internet with a funding model for journalism and content creation that works for all of us. That was probably kickstarted with Google’s announcement around the deprecation of third-party cookies, but I think it’s now a lot bigger than that.
“Third is really the emergence of retail media. If I was to look at that through an Australian lens, I think Australia’s probably been a little bit slower to move in this space in some other markets – other than a few high-profile exceptions – but I think we’re really playing fast catch-up as a market.
“If I was to throw in a cheeky fourth one, I’ve been really fascinated locally by the emergence of programmatic out-of-home over the last 12 months or so. We have an incredibly vibrant and sophisticated out-of-home market in Australia, that has really embraced technology, probably for the last 10 years or so, through the digitisation of screens here in Australia.”
Continuing to focus on Australia, Bayes refers to the country as “a small but really progressive market.”
“We’re probably the market that is the most analogous with the US in terms of market maturity and technical infrastructure globally.
“We’re very similar to the US in terms of the acceleration of audiences moving to streaming – I think that’s playing out here as fast as anywhere in the world, and the broadcasters here are doing a really good job of navigating that. It’s not an easy job, but when we talk to international markets about what the industry is doing here around measurement, we really are leading the world.”
Whilst we may be on par with the States when it comes to streaming, Bayes says that Australia also has its own strengths and weaknesses.
“We’re probably a little bit further behind on retail media here in Australia than we are in the US and even parts of Asia,” says Bayes. “But we’re playing fast follow on that, and I think the next 12 months will be really instrumental.
“Plus, we’re really leading the world in terms of the acceleration of programmatic out-of-home alongside markets like Germany and the UK.”
Looking Ahead
With H2 underway, Bayes says that The Trade Desk won’t be slowing down in the second half of the year.
“A few weeks ago, we launched what’s probably one of the most important upgrades to our platform in the history of the company – it’s called Kokai, which means open waters or open for business in Japanese,” says Bayes. “Kokai is really in response to some pretty significant developments across the industry, around things like the demise of third-party cookies, first-party data activation, retail, media, and television.
“That will be a really major focus for us over the next six months as we continue to roll that out. You’ll also see us continuing to advocate for greater transparency within the ad tech ecosystem, and we’ll be building and launching a lot of products to support that.”
See Also: The Trade Desk launches its digital advertising innovation, Kokai
Into the future, Bayes says that The Trade Desk will continue to work towards its overarching goal of bringing data to digital media all over the globe.
“We fundamentally believe in a future where all media is digital, and that all digital media is better when it’s underpinned by data – but that’s getting far more complex with the erosion of things like third-party cookies. Brands have spent years building up those trusted relationships with with with consumers and that first-party data asset, and we just want to make it easier for them to leverage that trust and activate that more seamlessly.”
See Also: Stephanie Famolaro reveals what the buzz is at The Trade Desk
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Top Image: James Bayes