When dealing with programmatic advertising, you want to choose the right platform for your campaign needs. Vistar is a demand side platform (DSP) which can help you reach your target audience, drive conversions, generate leads, and increase your brand visibility and awareness.

Vistar DSP allows you to scale your (out-of-home) OOH advertisements, while being able to track and analyze the data to make any tweaks necessary to improve your campaign. In this article, we’ll go through the step-by-step process behind setting up an ad campaign using Vistar DSP.

Vistar DSP Features

There are multiple DSPs available on the market, which can make it difficult to choose the right one for you and your business needs. Vistar provides marketers with an intelligent platform for OOH advertising to truly connect with your audience.

Other benefits offered by Vistar include:

  • Automated buying, while still providing complete control
  • Highlighting new avenues for growth by collating all data solutions
  • Dynamic creative advertising to adapt to various screens
  • Granular customization to create a tailored advert for your campaign
  • Clear reporting for optimizing campaign performance
  • Scalable solutions that grow with your business

Now we know what features and benefits Vistar offers, we can go through the steps to setting up your first Vistar DSP campaign.

Setting Up A Vistar DSP Campaign

Step 1: Define Your Campaign Goals

Before you start building your campaign, you need to define what you consider to be success. Knowing what the goal of your campaign is will affect how you build out your DSP ad, what your creatives will look like, and who you’ll be targeting — to name a few.

Campaign objectives you might want to consider are:

  • Brand awareness — This is for new audiences who may not be customers or even serve as a reminder to audiences who have heard of your brand.
  • Product consideration — This highlights industry and user problems, showing how your product is a solution.

User conversion — These ads are meant to encourage users to make a purchase.

Step 2: Add Insertion Order

In the Vistar DSP dashboard, add a plan within the ‘Insertion Order’ section. Set your campaign name, dates, timezone, budget — which is usually your total cost — and your revenue tracking.

Your revenue tracking can also set your total cost markup, and you’ll be able to change this markup depending on your budget.

Once you’ve input all the data, click save.

Step 3: Add Your Campaign

Now, you should be at the Insertion Order (IO) level, and have clear visibility of your campaign. Click ‘Add Campaign’ and name it. You should also double check the dates (start and end) for your campaign, and input your Bid CPM, keeping your total cost markup in mind.

Click save.

Step 4: Set Campaign Targeting

Now, you should be in the Campaign view. Click ‘Add Targeting’ and input your specific target parameters for your campaign.

You can choose to drill down into a number of specific targets, to make sure your ads are being broadcast across a number of different screens, depending on your audience.

Targeting aspects you can set using Vistar DSP include:

  • Points of Interest (POI) — This can be a custom-set POI or you can use FourSquare to target popular attractions, shops, and even areas.
  • Zip codes — Input a list of zip codes in order to target very specific areas around the country. Vistar currently does not have city geographic options to choose from, so if you want to target a specific city, you’ll need to manually enter the zip codes. You can, however, import zip codes as a csv file to speed the process up.
  • Neighborhood & boroughs — Vistar DSP allows you to target separate boroughs and neighborhoods, depending on your products or services. For example, you may want to advertise a specific deal for residents and visitors in Greenwich Village of New York City, and not have to waste money having your ad appear in other areas of New York.
  • DMA — This is a Designated Market Area. Bear in mind that more popular DMAs (ie. New York City) may be more expensive than others, with a higher CPM.
  • Venue type — This can ensure your ad is being shown on screens around very specific venues, from colleges and schools, to bars and restaurants.

Step 5: Add Creatives

Once you’ve saved your targeting aspects, you can hit save and move to your creatives.

You should always research the creative specs, as it will show you the availability of screens, the sizes, and the type of advert that can be shown, depending on your campaign targeting.

For example, you may find that more than half of the screens being targeted in your campaign can only show a static image, as opposed to a video or even audio advert. This means you’ll need to have a really clear, persuasive image first and foremost, as this is what most audiences will be seeing in your target location.

If you want to drive audiences to your website, consider having a QR code on your advert that users can quickly scan to learn more about your product offering.

Step 6: Report on Campaign Using OOH Metrics

At the Insertion Order level, you can check your OOH advertising metrics of specific campaigns. Simply click through to your specific campaign.

Vistar allows you to report on metrics such as estimated impressions available, spend, and plays.

You can also view your profit margin, as well as your campaign budget and budget delivered in this view.

Take care to analyze the data in this viewpoint, as it can influence how you continue with your strategy. You may find that you need to make tweaks and changes to your adverts, based on the success of your campaigns.

Target New Audiences and Boost Sales With Vistar DSP

Carefully planning and executing your campaign can lead to a number of conversions for your business. Or, at the very least, can boost your brand recognition, as more people will be exposed to your OOH advert.

In order to get the most out of using Vistar DSP, we suggest working with programmatic advertising experts, such as Grapeseed Media. Our team has years of experience setting up and maintaining campaigns, and our experts will be able to guide you through your marketing strategy.

Get in touch with our team to find out more about how we can help you. Or, chat with Grape Bot by clicking the ‘Ask Grape Bot’ button in the bottom right corner.