What's the difference between SEM, DSP and information flow advertising?

DSP is a very popular concept in recent years, which contains many terms, such as RTB, SSP, AK47 (What the hell? ) ..... Many people equate DSP with information flow advertising, but they are not the same concept. So what exactly is DSP?

Let's talk about the buyers and sellers of advertisements first.

For online media (such as app, website, etc. ), generally there will be some advertising space to sell (otherwise how to make money 0.0). For example, the commonly used APP for checking buses includes open-screen advertisements, head banners, and bottom banners. So how do you sell these advertising spaces? Sell one by one? It sounds laborious and inefficient. So these apps package jobs that can be sold to the SSP platform. The SSP platform is dedicated to managing the advertising inventory of the media, so that its inventory advertisements can obtain higher unit display cost and sales rate and maximize revenue.

For advertisers, they need to know what their advertisements look like, such as who the target audience is, where to put them, how much the advertising bid is, and so on. So they put all the requirements of advertising on the DSP platform. The DSP platform is actually the service platform for advertisers. Advertisers want to buy advertising space in those media, so they tell the DSP platform about their needs.

Take "shopping" in daily life as an example. Vegetable farmers have arranged their own dishes for sale, and consumers have already booked the menu for dinner. So where can they trade? Vegetable market, of course. In the field of advertising trading, we call this "vegetable market" ADExchange, that is, the Internet advertising trading platform, referred to as "ADX". We are familiar with Baidu BES, MOMOADX, Tencent social advertising platform, Inmobi and so on. , all belong to ADX. The transaction process is realized through RTB (real-time bidding) mode, which is familiar to everyone, so I won't go into details here.

Broadly speaking, what we usually call DSP advertising actually refers to the internet advertising that trades in the above mode.

In fact, there is a lot of knowledge in it. The current Internet advertising companies can actually be divided into several sects:

1. Advertising platform with media. This concept is easy to understand, that is, Guangdiantong and today's headlines have their own media (QQ space, today's headline APP, etc. ) and rely on their own media traffic to sell advertisements. In fact, they sell advertisements and have a huge number of users, so we must pay attention to the user experience, retain users with good services or content, and realize the realization of traffic. Therefore, such platforms are more critical for advertisers.

2. No media advertising platform. Such platforms don't have their own media, so they go to some media that don't have their own advertising platforms to cooperate, buy out some of their advertising spaces and sell them. For example, the multi-effect advertising platform acquired before 360 bought out some advertising spaces of Sina, iQiyi, PPTV and other media, and connected with online alliances such as tanx, Google and Tencent. It is equivalent to taking the position of other media to sell, so at the same time, we must take into account the interests of both advertisers and media.

3. Independent DSP. In fact, this is a narrow definition of DSP advertising. Such companies do not directly connect with advertising space providers (that is, media parties), but directly enter the advertising trading market. For your convenience, here is another example:

A big shopping mall, with brand stores, is directly under the jurisdiction of the brand headquarters, and the shopkeepers and shop assistants are all from brand companies, which is equivalent to a media advertising platform;

Some retailers, such as Intersport, sell many other people's sports brands in a big storefront, which is equivalent to a media-free advertising platform;

There is also a special sales area. There are often many brands in the sale area, and occasionally there are some unknown brands mixed in. These goods are often stacked on shelves for customers to choose from. At this time, their mission is not to maintain the charm of the brand like the goods in the window, but to let customers buy at low prices and make customers happy. Just like independent DSP, they are not responsible for the SSP platform (media) and can serve their advertisers wholeheartedly. However, just like the out-of-season goods or defective products in the special sale area, the traffic quality obtained by independent DSP is not high. It is rumored that major media have given some corner positions or click data to independent DSP. Of course, there are still a large number of small and beautiful apps that contribute high-quality traffic to independent DSP. Although the amount of a single app is not large, a large number of apps are also competitive.

In fact, with the development of the industry, the boundaries of the three categories mentioned above have become increasingly blurred. For example, Guangdiantong's exhibition location also includes native advertising alliance, which has access to many third-party apps. However, I still hope that everyone has a concept of the classification of DSP and an insight into the platform.

Why is information flow advertising so hot?

Information flow advertising is actually a way of advertising display, interspersed with the original information of products. Information flow represents not an advertising model, but only a display model. The modes behind the information flow advertisements we usually see may be DSP advertisements, mobile advertising networks and native advertisements. The display form of DSP advertisement is not only information flow, but also patch and banner. ).

Why are information flow advertisements so popular now? Due to the explosive growth of its users and the change of people's habits. Once upon a time, people encountered problems and got used to "Baidu once, you will know"; Now people spend more time paying attention to what is happening in the world and the information they are interested in. With the rapid development of mobile Internet, the increase of fragmentation time and people's fear of "boredom" and "embarrassment", the mobile phone screen has become the screen with the longest staring time. Their dependence on the internet is no longer limited to "what is XX", but has become "what is the world". There is a recommendation mechanism behind every information streaming media to keep them in a fresh and interesting information environment. This positive user experience is habitual and addictive. From brushing Weibo to brushing friends circle to brushing today's headlines, I never tire of it.

Where there are users, there is a market. At the same time, advertising is also the most important way to realize traffic in some information apps, so information flow advertisements appear together. Almost every app with a little traffic has its own advertising trading platform, such as today's headlines, Mo Mo, and a little information.

At this time, the information distribution in the form of information flow has replaced the distribution portal of search engines to a certain extent, so the installed capacity of information apps has been rising all the way, and there is a saying that SEM is weak.

Who will dominate the future Internet advertising?

In fact, advertisements such as SEM, DSP and information flow are not competitive.

Let's talk about their respective advantages first.

Let's look at the display position (where DSP and information flow overlap):

SEM- search engine page

DSP-an APP or a web page, covering almost all types of apps.

Information flow-information reading APP and social APP.

(1) audience coverage

Obviously, if you want to display SEM advertisements, you must search first; Information flow /DSP active display. From this perspective, the amount of information flow /DSP coverage will be relatively larger. For brand building, the advantages of information flow exposure are fully revealed. In contrast, SEM is slightly inferior.

(2) Applicable industries

However, it can also be seen from the display position that SEM is not the same as the other two usage scenarios. The former is based on the user's active search, and the latter is in the user's leisure time. This also illustrates the usage scenario of information flow products: under normal circumstances, users are mostly in a relaxed state when browsing information. At this time, he may need to recommend a game, a course, or a promotional product. And if the pushed advertisement is replaced by a boiler, a glass of water, or an office automation system, will the user feel that the push is sick? At this time, a great limitation of information flow is highlighted: it is only applicable to TOC industry. In contrast, SEM covers more industries, at least TOB and TOC industries.

(3) accuracy

From a precise point of view, the appearance of SEM advertisements begins with the active exposure of users' needs, which is equivalent to users telling search engines what I want; The advertisement of information flow is hidden in the information that users normally browse, and the advertisement push mechanism is based on the information content that users have browsed in the past. To put it bluntly, it's just guessing.

I want to tell a little joke here. I have a good friend who is a very filial girl. Most of her Taobao records are bought for her mother and brother, so most of the content pushed by an information platform is related advertisements such as "Second Spring", "Making Friends with Divorced Women" and "Single Mom" ... It can be seen that big data will re-examine people's hearts and is not as accurate as users say.

Let's talk about their shortcomings.

Search and promotion advertising space is limited, the competition is too great, the unit price is on the high side, so be careful of the bad spots and not enough for brand building and publicity;

Information flow /DSP advertising grabs more, which is prone to Matthew effect-the stronger the strong, the weaker the weak. Because the advertising space will be constantly refreshed, the exposure will be large and the consumption will be too fast, which is not suitable for small and medium-sized customers. In addition, because of the scene switching, it is not suitable for TOB customers.

Since each has his own strengths, we should foster strengths and avoid weaknesses. These two kinds of advertisements can't coexist. The promotion needs of each advertiser are different, the product characteristics and audience characteristics are different, and the channels are good and bad, so we can't generalize. The key is to find out the characteristics of products and the purpose of promotion, so as to choose the appropriate promotion channels in combination with the characteristics of channels.

Finally, pour cold water.

The reason why many people have information flow advertisements that are ten million times stronger than SEM will replace the illusion of search promotion is probably because almost all the head customers in the market have put in information flow, and the investment amount is very high. Games, finance, e-commerce, tourism and other local customers. They are all frequent visitors to information flow advertisements, and most APP promotion also uses information flow /DSP. You know, most of the apps that can be promoted in a budget today are those that have slipped away in terms of capital. In the early stage, users need to be accumulated quickly, or the foundation is deep, and it takes money to grab the quantity, but there is no quantity.

A small partner is engaged in the DSP of an e-commerce, and spends thousands of dollars every day. I still remember the pity in his eyes when he looked at Semel, who was desperately cutting his budget. Large companies spend money like water, and startups are characterized by "more financing", "small but beautiful" and "high standards". Over time, people have the illusion that "information flow" is equal to "high standard", and Chinese people like to follow suit, which makes information flow advertisements extremely popular.

However, SEM has developed for so many years, which is tepid, weak in industry supervision, with long-tail enterprises as the main force and limited in promotion expenses. Coupled with the low employment threshold and impetuous people, it is easy to look at another mountain and create a low tide atmosphere. In fact, not only customers have more money, but also lower costs and higher returns. Buying quantity is an art, there is no distinction between high and low, because of the level of funds.

Information flow is a good product, which conforms to public behavior habits and caters to the general trend, but it is not omnipotent. No product is omnipotent, they will upgrade and iterate in the process of the times, not die out. It is very good and even necessary for everyone to actively learn DSP knowledge and strive to optimize the delivery, but it cannot be accompanied by cynicism about SEM. What we have to do is to be down-to-earth, learn modestly and win a foothold in the ever-changing rivers and lakes.