This year’s OMMA Global Conference was a great turn out, with sessions covering widespread marketing topics from video,  mobile, display and more. If you didn’t get a chance to come out to OMMA, here are some key trends.

• CMO to CMTO
  

As mentioned by more than one  speaker at this week’s OMMA conference, the marketing and technology are continually becoming intertwined. No longer will brands need CMOs to cast their marketing strategies and global planning, but the rise of Chief Marketing Technology Officers are going to be needed to oversee technology implementations, allowing for true transparency end-to-end into each campaign. Without this integrated technology piece, marketers run the risk of loosing visibility and insights from their campaigns, resulting in over-targeting, under-targeting, and wasted ad dollars.

• Balance of storytelling and use of big data
  

According to Omar Tawakol, CEO of BlueKai, marketers need to be mindful when balancing their reliance on subject matter experts vs. algorithms. He argues, that while experts seem to have a full grasp on the ad technology industry, there are instances where an algorithm can provide superior results. With the growth of big data, there are expanding abilities that marketers can rely on technology and algorithms to dependably provide results. Specifically, algorithms can dependably buy media, target audiences, optimize, determine reach, and frequency. In his opinion, marketing professionals should leverage their expertise to tell great stories with their campaigns, by creating powerful creative and determining excellent strategies to connect with target consumers.

• Scale continues to be a struggle for many advertisers
  

A panel lead by Diane Anderson from WIT Strategy, Skip Rand (Martini Media), Ezra Doty (Think RealTime), Dave Hendricks (LiveIntent), John Kelly (Criteo), and Dave Marsey (Digitas) discussed the struggle that marketers from all ends of the ad tech industry face scale issues. Scaling solutions including having access big to high quality inventory, leveraging customer insights to reach in moments of emotion or passion, and spreading media strategies through as many channels as possible (digital, mobile, video, email). Major pitfalls that advertisers should avoid include over-targeting, or over complicating the experience for target consumers. Keeping media buys fast, simple, and inclusive are the number one way to keep high volumes of target consumers engaged with brands.

• Quality Engagement comes from Quality Content
  

Sarah Keeling (Director of Integrated Communication) and Noah Tratt (GVP, Expanded Media Solutions) from Expedia presented an in-depth case study on Expedia’s ‘Friendtrips’ campaign. This social based campaign had far reaching implications for Expedia, raising bookings for the travel company, as well as their partners, and growing their fan base and engagement rates across their marketing platform. Sarah’s comments on the Friendtrips campaign is one that can be impactful to advertisers, as she indicates “ Quality engagement comes from quality content and quality partners…[and] sustained engagement leads to more transactions.”