While buying ad space in digital channels has become relatively pain-free, like being able to book a campaign within minutes or make changes to your campaign parameters within a couple hours, out-of-home (OOH) has only started to reach that level of agility through its programmatic channels. Securing directly sold OOH inventory, also known as guaranteed OOH inventory, typically involves a long trail of phone calls, email threads, and back-and-forth negotiations that could last days. For media buyers juggling tight timelines and dynamic campaign requirements, this friction could be a deal-breaker.
You’ve probably experienced this first-hand, but did you know industry data shows that agencies spend over 60% of their time managing manual OOH workflows? Because of this, OOH budgets are sometimes reallocated to channels seen as more flexible due to rapid deployment and revisions. However, given OOH’s unique strength, like its ability to deliver high engagement and broad reach, excluding it from your media plans isn’t a sustainable long-term approach.
While programmatic digital OOH (pDOOH) offers some relief to this pain point, it doesn’t support the full spectrum of buy types, like directly sold or static placements, that many advertisers rely on for reach and impact. This is where automating the OOH planning and buying process, beyond just programmatic, comes into play.
Automating beyond programmatic digital out-of-home
While pDOOH has played a key role in modernizing OOH by introducing more automated and data-driven workflows, it still represents only a small fraction of all OOH inventory. In fact, most OOH inventory remains outside of the programmatic ecosystem. Static OOH still accounts for over 70% of OOH inventory, while pDOOH makes up less than 10% of global DOOH placements. This highlights a significant opportunity to bring the same level of automation, intelligence, and efficiency that programmatic offers to the entire OOH planning and buying process, regardless of format or transaction type.
Moreover, access to premium inventory that is typically reserved for directly sold or static placements is still dependent on manual-heavy transactions. While some advertisers may choose to limit their buys to programmatic channels for ease and automation, they do so at the cost of certainty and control.
In an open exchange programmatic transaction, inventory is auction-based, meaning that impressions or placement bookings are not guaranteed. You’re competing with other buyers in real time, with access determined by bidding strategy and inventory availability at the moment of purchase.
While programmatic guaranteed allows buyers to negotiate upfront for a fixed number of impressions or placements, delivery is still done in real time, giving you no control over when or where your ad will run. What buyers now need is a transaction capability that not only allows them to secure placements without needing to bid, but also book and schedule them in advance in an automated fashion.
To unlock the full potential of OOH, the industry needs a more unified and automated approach, one that bridges the gap between traditional and programmatic buying. By streamlining planning, buying, and execution across all inventory types – digital and static, programmatic and direct – buyers gain the flexibility to build truly integrated, high-impact campaigns with greater transparency, efficiency, and strategic control.
How Broadsign In-Advance makes buying guaranteed inventory easier for media buyers
As part of Broadsign’s longstanding mission to transform how brands, agencies, and media owners buy, sell and deliver OOH campaigns, we’re introducing Broadsign In-Advance. This new capability gives media buyers a new way of buying DOOH inventory. In addition to real-time programmatic buying, media buyers will now be able to buy DOOH inventory that was previously only available through direct sales, and reserve it months in advance of campaign delivery – bringing greater control and predictability to your OOH planning and execution.
The technology behind Broadsign In-Advance is built on top of the automated trading tools that programmatic buyers know and love, removing the previously complex learning curve for those new to the medium. For buyers already familiar with direct DOOH buys, this streamlines the historically lengthy buying cycles, giving them back the time that was previously used to discover, curate, and reserve DOOH placements manually.
Beyond the ease of transaction, Broadsign In-Advance enables your programmatic and direct buying teams to collaborate more effectively through one platform. The increased alignment simplifies campaign planning and budget allocation, ensuring a cohesive strategy and offering your teams a consolidated view of performance across all selected OOH channels.
Finally, Broadsign In-Advance brings data-driven targeting capabilities that were traditionally available only through programmatic buying platforms to traditional DOOH buyers. Media teams can now make more informed decisions that will maximize the performance of their campaigns and deliver measurable results. While the capability currently only supports DOOH campaigns, there are plans to support static campaigns in the near future.
As part of the early release, the new transaction capability is first available to media buyers through Broadsign’s DSP OutMoove with plans to expand its availability to more DSPs. To learn more about Broadsign In-Advance and how to access the new capability, talk to a Broadsign media specialist.
Benefits of Broadsign In-Advance for direct OOH buys for media buyers
Access to previously unavailable OOH inventory
Through the OutMoove DSP, media buyers can now access a significantly broader and more diverse pool of DOOH inventory. With Broadsign In-Advance, high-value placements that were once exclusively available through direct deals, and out of reach for real-time bidding, are now accessible in a more streamlined, automated way.
For instance, imagine planning a DOOH campaign around a major cultural or sporting event, where premium screens are usually in high demand. With pDOOH, there’s no guarantee that you’ll secure the placements needed. With Broadsign In-Advance, you can reserve key inventory months in advance, securing the premium placement and ensuring your campaign maximizes reach and impact. This level of control is invaluable for campaigns that require strategic coordination, market exclusivity, or align with larger brand moments.
Maximize campaign performance with data-driven targeting
Broadsign In-Advance elevates the performance of your OOH campaigns by allowing you to leverage the targeting capabilities and audience insights typically available through your preferred DSP for guaranteed DOOH campaigns. These new capabilities ensure that your campaigns reach the right consumer, in the right place, at exactly the right time – every time.
By combining automation, data-driven targeting, and guaranteed delivery, Broadsign In-Advance transforms OOH into a channel that delivers not just reach and visibility, but measurable performance. You gain greater control over your media strategy, and ensure every campaign is optimized for impact from day one—maximizing ROI across all your OOH touchpoints.
Broadsign In-Advance also resolves one of the biggest limitations of traditional direct buying methods in OOH which is the lack of visibility into real-time campaign performance. Rather than waiting days or weeks until after the campaign is done for a report, you can now access real-time metrics that show how your campaign is pacing and delivering.
The future of out-of-home advertising hinges on automation, flexibility, and data-driven precision, qualities that until now have been largely reserved for digital channels. With Broadsign In-Advance, the OOH industry takes a significant leap forward, bridging the gap between direct and programmatic buying. It empowers media buyers with a smarter, faster, and more transparent way to plan, secure, and execute high-impact campaigns across premium DOOH inventory. No more tedious back-and-forth, no more uncertainty about availability – just streamlined access to the placements that matter most, when they matter most.
