BOSTON, MA--(Marketwired - Jul 10, 2014) - One way for advertisers and brand marketers to boost their advertising campaigns is by recognizing current trends in consumer segment costs. ChoiceStream, a full-service programmatic media-buying partner, tracks trends in real-time bidding cost and publishes noteworthy data in its monthly Audience Cost Calendar. This infographic shares changes in segment costs and educates the industry about how IAB standard segments and other consumer data segments rank throughout the year.
Data from June shows that, out of the 315 segments monitored by ChoiceStream, the top 13 segments are all travel destinations. The top five performing segments were Portugal, Greece, Italy, Spain, and France, which is not surprising as all are popular tourist destinations for Americans. South Pacific, Australia & New Zealand (iab), and United Kingdom (iab) segments barely missed the top ten in rank this month, placing as #11, #12, and #13 respectively.
It is likely that advertisers, specifically travel brands, recognize that during this time of year many travelers are finalizing their plans for summer and fall, and are therefore willing to pay more to reach top intenders.
Segments in the bottom 10 for June are similar to the past few months, with one exception: Pet Events. Pet Events is currently the lowest ranked segment, and it has experienced the most severe decrease in cost index out of all other segments, dropping 78 percent compared to May 2014. This can be explained by the unexpected abundance of pet shows in July, with the frequency dropping off by August.
"It is unclear who or what drives changes like this, but it is clear that smart advertisers can benefit from these swings if they can detect them in time to act," says Bill Guild, VP of Marketing at ChoiceStream.
Interestingly, last month broke a similar trend that two segments, Vacation Homes and Cruises, had been experiencing from December of last year to May of 2014. Despite their alignment in cost rank for six months, the two segments performed very differently during June. Cruises decreased 21 percent in cost index, falling 107 places in rank, and Vacation Homes increased 78 percent in cost index, moving up 213 places from 63 to 276 in rank.
ChoiceStream has been tracking these segments for years; the company's analysts explain that the warm weather throughout the U.S. seems to increase the cost of domestic travel segments. They have seen the cost of ad inventory for segments related to cruise lines fall in the mid-to-late summer in past years, as advertising prices for consumer segments related to vacation homes rise.