We spoke to James Power, senior sales director, EMEA at Broadsign, about the OOH ecosystem, and why the format is having a moment…

Programmatic now accounts for a growing share of OOH spend, yet many buyers still treat it as a bolt-on to direct deals. What will it take for programmatic to become the default way brands buy digital out-of-home?

Right now, programmatic digital OOH (pDOOH) adoption rates vary by region. While it may be highly adopted in regions like the Netherlands, in other parts of the world, direct OOH buys remain the default. The latter is often a case of buyers not realising that programmatic can provide all the benefits of traditional booking if using the right tech stack. 

Today, pDOOH buys can look and behave more like direct transactions but run through programmatic pipes. Buyers can get the guarantee, creative freedom, and visual proof of a direct buy, but with greater agility and efficiency. Advances in programmatic guaranteed and in-advance booking technology, coupled with AI innovation, have made this possible. 

But for the industry to reach a point where programmatic becomes the default for DOOH transactions, more buyers need to see it as more than just another way to move spend around and start experimenting with available tools. They’ll quickly realise just how convenient it is not to have to connect the dots across different publishers when securing inventory, and how efficient it can be to plan and activate a campaign across multiple publishers.

That realisation will drive more adoption, but change will also require an open mind and more education. The saying 'a rising tide lifts all boats' is highly relevant here, meaning we need to collaborate as an industry to grow the medium. Media owners need to recognise the potential benefits, too. They’ll be able to monetise different sources in a really clever, tech-driven way and sell their inventory to a broader selection of buyers.

The bottom line is that as adoption grows and more success stories emerge, word will spread. pDOOH is already the standard in some regions, and this trend will continue as more buyers educate themselves, understand the benefits of pDOOH first-hand, and start prioritising it. 

Dynamic creative promises ads that respond to weather, time of day, audience data and live events. Which triggers are genuinely driving performance for advertisers, and which are more gimmick than substance?

Nearly any time you pair real-time context and relevance with OOH ad creative, campaign performance improves, and that’s a fact that’s backed by several studies over the years. One that stands out is JCDecaux UK, Clear Channel and Posterscope’s "Moments of Truth", where media buyers and owners came together to take a closer look at the impacts of contextual, relevant OOH ads through the lens of neuroscience. What they found was really interesting and something I talk about all the time. 

Researchers saw a 12% increase in consumer brain response when delivering OOH at the right moment and an 18% increase when using contextually relevant creative based on triggers like time of day, weather, or timely events. The results make sense. 

When you see an ad that is relevant to your environment or whatever activity you’re doing – like going to a sports match, shopping, driving, or going for a jog – your brain is more likely to light up than if the ad doesn’t match your activity or environment.  Not only that, but contextually relevant ads can also increase the time you spend looking at the ad by 6%, and for brands, they were found to deliver a 16% sales uplift compared to normal ads. 

We’ve reached a tipping point, especially in the UK, where more buyers are asking the right questions about DCO and running tests. Weather is one of the most common data triggers we see here in the region, as we’re quite famous for talking about the weather. 

Over this summer, I'd estimate that about 30% of the pdooh campaigns we were running in the UK included some sort of data trigger based on the weather or time of year, but in other regions, a different trigger might be more popular. Across the globe, we’ve seen people experiment with pollen counts, a concentration of local real estate listings, sports scores, real-time financial market data, and more. 

As for which trigger drives the best performance, it depends on the campaign goals, data quality, and execution. That’s why it’s important to discuss all the options with your tech vendor. They might think of a trigger you didn’t even realise was possible. 

Measurement remains OOH's perennial sticking point. How are you helping buyers prove that a dynamically served creative on a roadside screen drove a real business outcome, rather than simply an impression?

I think there’s still an assumption that you can’t measure outdoor advertising, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. We’re already doing it.

At Broadsign, we work with specialist measurement partners to help advertisers understand how their campaigns influence brand consideration, drive store visits, and contribute to sales. Whether it’s a roadside campaign using dynamic creative or an in-store retail campaign, we have ways to measure outcomes that matter to the advertiser.

We’re continuing to expand those capabilities and make measurement easier to include in campaign planning. The more we demonstrate real business impact, the more confident buyers become in investing in OOH and making it a bigger part of their wider media strategy.

With retail media networks, in-store screens and connected TV all competing for the same "real-world" budgets, where does programmatic DOOH fit in the omnichannel mix over the next two to three years?

Over the next two to three years, I expect the lines between traditional advertising channels to become increasingly blurred, creating new opportunities for programmatic DOOH within the broader omnichannel mix. Rather than competing for budgets in isolation, channels like OOH, retail media, and CTV will increasingly complement one another, each bringing unique value to advertisers looking to reach audiences throughout the purchase journey.

Retail media is one area where I anticipate significant growth. As retailers across sectors like grocery, pharmacy, and fashion expand their media offerings into physical stores, programmatic will play an important role in opening that inventory to a broader range of buyers, including non-endemic brands. We're also seeing traditional DOOH and retail media become more closely connected, creating opportunities for advertisers to reach relatively predictable audiences in environments that can influence purchasing decisions. CTV OOH is another emerging opportunity, particularly in shared viewing environments like bars and restaurants, where brands can connect with audiences around major cultural and sporting moments.

At the same time, greater standardisation across planning, buying, and measurement will make it easier for advertisers to activate campaigns across channels and allocate budgets based on validated audiences rather than traditional media classifications. As the distinction between upper- and lower-funnel budgets and placement strategies becomes less rigid, I expect DOOH to play a greater role in campaigns that connect brand awareness with consideration and purchase.

Of course, programmatic won't replace direct buying overnight, nor should it. Direct transactions will remain an important source of revenue for media owners, particularly in emerging retail networks. But as more inventory becomes programmatically accessible and buy-side adoption grows, advertisers will have greater flexibility to incorporate DOOH into their omnichannel strategies, complementing other channels rather than competing with them.