Three Questions with Headway Digital’s CEO & Co-Founder on Programmatic in LatAm

We asked Martin Kogan, CEO & Co-Founder of Headway Digital, three questions on the proliferation of programmatic technology in the LatAm region. Prior to founding Headway Digital, Martin was Director for southern Latin America for MySpace, where he was in charge of sales, monetization, business development and audience initiatives. Prior to that, he led sales, marketing and business development efforts for Yahoo! Hispanic Americas, covering Argentina, Chile, Venezuela, Colombia, Perú and Mexico. Below are Martin’s answers.

Were there barriers of entry to market? If so, what were the challenges and how did you overcome them?

Back in 2010, the biggest barrier was the lack of education. There were no markets for programmatic, and there were no dedicated budgets for it among agencies and advertisers. Now I see more and more companies popping up today that have followed our lead in the region, and programmatic is on everyone’s minds.

Also, I now hear the word ‘data’ used in every conversation. Advertisers have realized the value of harnessing and leveraging their first-party data, and are investing in DMPs and DSPs to organize and activate their data. As little as just a year ago, it would have been nearly impossible to convince them about the benefits of data-driven marketing. Now the brand managers and digital guys inside the agencies are pushing for the activation of data in every campaign.

Headway Digital was the first DSP to enter the market, what has changed since then? Where do you see programmatic heading in LatAm?

When we founded Headway Digital back in 2010, programmatic was virtually unheard of in LatAm. We’d mention RTB or DSP to senior members of the industry and most of them didn’t know what I was talking about, and those that did associated it with cheap, long-tail traffic. There was no notion of programmatic, so we needed to evangelize the market about its benefits.

Fast forward to today, and so much has changed. Almost everyone has heard of it and they want to know more. We’re frequently asked to come to local offices to teach about programmatic and how it is changing the way brands buy media. I guess all of the evangelizing has paid off, because now I see that among the top agencies and publishers, programmatic is a major agenda item.

Perhaps the most striking change is that programmatic is now associated with high-quality brands and traffic. It’s not just remnant inventory, it is premium plus remnant in a programmatic way.

We also see a healthy and growing marketplace for programmatic mobile in Latin America, whereas two years ago there was no market at all. Mobile advertising is growing, though like the rest of the world, there’s still a disparity between time spent on mobile and ad spend. Still, brands are focusing on providing a mobile-first experience for their customers. Of course, the demand is driven by the incredible adoption rate of mobile phones in the region. Some 42% of the population now have Web-enabled mobile devices, and that number will grow by 23.7% in 2014, with projections of further growth in the coming years, compared to other regions. And mobile app penetration has reached 28%, so the market is prime for programmatic mobile.

What does this new partnership with MediaMath mean to Headway Digital?

It feels very natural to us that the leading marketing operating system  in the US and the leading programmatic media company in Latin America chose to join forces. MediaMath provides the powerful global TerminalOne™ technology, and we have highly skilled teams with local in-market knowledge and contacts in the region.