This year’s Business Information and Media Summit (BIMS) in Fort Lauderdale was one of the best yet.

The B2B space is rapidly evolving, and this was a great opportunity to catch up on the latest industry trends.

A Shift in the Market

Debra Walton of Thomson Reuters did a great job setting the stage for the rest of the conference by talking about the overall paradigm shift in the market.

The internet continues to grow, and with that, so do the audiences for advertisers. There are 1 million new users on the internet every day!

Facebook is a good example of the growing space. In the past, it typically took a new product 25 years to reach 25% of the population. They did it in 5.

With audience accessibility at an all-time high, much of the conference revolved around the most effective means of appealing to viewers.

Below are a few of the strategies that stood out most:

Sell Smarter

Data-Driven

James Arnold of Farm Journal made a great point when he discussed how marketing without data is like driving with your eyes closed.

AI keeps getting better with every iteration, so for marketers, there is no reason why they shouldn’t take advantage of it.

Think about it… For marketers, data builds perception.

Data informs marketers, and helps them better understand their surroundings. In a sense, data helps marketers remain on the highway, within the lanes, moving in the right direction.

For example, having a data-centric mindset can help advertisers understand buying and selling patterns. Timing is everything.

Matt Yorke from SourceMedia asked, “Would you rather be on the call on Monday morning when the budget is already spent and you’re getting the scraps, or Friday afternoon when they are building the strategy?”

Programmatic

Programmatic is no longer bottom of the barrel, low CPM inventory. The process is getting smarter and allowing specific audiences to be targeted.

This is a massive boon for advertisers and publishers alike. B2B possesses the specific, niche audiences advertisers crave, and as such can demand a higher price point for the inventory.

Utilize High CPM

Native

Native is becoming more and more important in the B2B space. Generic display advertising will continue to be less meaningful as native garnishes a more intimate relationship with consumers.

It is a format that allows advertisers to tell more of a story, giving them a greater chance to resonate with the reader.

Mobile

There has been a chronic undervaluing of Mobile in the B2B space.

This thought process needs to be flipped, however. Those in the B2B space should be taking a mobile-first approach.

Desktop viewership is decreasing by a rate of 1% a year, while mobile is growing by 25%. It is also expected that, in just a few years, 80% of all internet traffic will be accessed via mobile devices.

Quartz, for example, is a great app to study for publishers looking to capitalize on this growing audience. They continue to reinvent the mobile experience.

At the end of the day, when you take away Social, it’s all about email and text messages. It is crucial to evolve your mobile experience to continue to reach your audience.

Video

The argument for video is a straightforward one, it is growing at an incredible pace – 204% year over year. It’s the highest CPM format.

While it does cost more to produce than display, video ads are becoming easier and easier to create.

Publishers should be sure to incorporate this format, so they’re not leaving ad dollars on the table.

The amount useful information shared at BIMS can’t be summed up in a single post, but fear not, MediaRadar is here to help.

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