An Open Letter To The BuySellAds Team
A Small State Of The Union For 2017
“Learn the art of patience. Apply discipline to your thoughts when they become anxious over the outcome of a goal. Impatience breeds anxiety, fear, discouragement and failure. Patience creates confidence, decisiveness, and a rational outlook, which eventually leads to success.” — Brian Adams
Greetings,
I had a revelation this year. I realized that, as a company, our patience is an asset that we need to leverage. What do I mean by that? Well, on some level, our fate as a company is largely determined by external forces. Sure, we control the inputs and where we position ourselves, but the results of our decisions often rely on a set of variables we can’t fully control.
No matter how hard we work, no matter how many right decisions we make, we relinquish some of our control to external forces.
I understand that the above may not be an encouraging thing for me to say, but embracing this reality has provided me with clarity over the last couple of months and afforded me with an entirely new perspective for evaluating our situation.
Despite the external market realities we’re all held to within the advertising technology sector, I sleep well at night knowing that another fact also remains true:
Advertising on the web needs to be fixed; it’s just not healthy anymore.
While market forces have dictated the direction of our industry, it’s also providing us with a tremendous opportunity to cement ourselves as a leader in the market. I believe we have the skill and talent to fix most of what plagues advertising on the web. Yes, this is a big problem for us to tackle, but I’d encourage you to not underestimate our ability to solve it.
The small nuggets of innovation that change entire industries tend to come from where the incumbents least expect it. I doubt Bill Marriott had much concern about a company that called itself “Air Bed And Breakfast.”
I’ve been reflecting a lot lately on the idea that probability and timing is something we cannot control.
Why do we do this work? What can we offer?
Unsurprisingly, thinking about these questions has had me looking back at the roots of BuySellAds.
Way back in 2007, when I first started rubbing some brain cells together, early concepts and ideals eventually evolved into the first version of BuySellAds. The ideals behind that first version are still something that governs the decisions we make today. BuySellAds’s mission was pretty clear in those early moments, and it’s still just as clear today:
Online advertising shouldn’t be so complicated.
Over the last 4–5 years, advertising on the web has become more complex, and with that migration towards complexity, things have begun to unravel for a lot of people involved in our industry today.
Advertising is no longer as simple as a publisher putting a few snippets of code on a website. It’s no longer as simple as an advertiser allocating their budget to AdWords, Facebook, or BuySellAds. The number of technologies and techniques a publisher is required to master in order to properly monetize their website has grown significantly. The number of budget line items and ad formats for the typical advertiser has doubled or even tripled in some cases.
Part of the advertising and monetization evolution has yielded fantastic results. But, naturally, part of that evolution has led to less-than-ideal changes (see adblocking, fraud, and the pricing race to the bottom).
There is no truer measurement of success than our ability to make our customers more money. It’s the most satisfying thing we can do at BuySellAds.
When publishers make more money, we help them to do more of the things they enjoy. It’s not just small publishers; the sentiments apply to our larger publishing partners as well.
Instead of a sales rep spending time trafficking ads and executing campaigns, our partners can spend their time consulting with clients, and as a result, deliver those clients more value. It’s win-win.
On the advertiser side, when we help them acquire new customers profitably, their company grows. That results in more jobs for everyone.
Why do I love BuySellAds, and why do I love what we’re building? We’re helping people realize their goals. We’re helping people realize their dreams.
Advertising is too complex and together we can simplify it for everyone. Ad tech has its problems, and we can be the ones to fix them.
So, What’s The Plan For This Year?
In 2017 I am expecting us to make considerable progress on all of our products, continue to increase the size of our team, and continue to prove that great ad inventory not only performs but is also sellable. The market for programmatic direct is maturing and finally catching on to our core mission, slowly but surely.
Demand for quality inventory increased substantially in 2016. I expect the demand for high-quality inventory to accelerate even further in 2017.
This year at BuySellAds we will focus specifically on:
- Building out our enterprise-level programmatic direct software. We’re seeing huge traction already. It’s the best solution on the market. It’s just going to keep getting better thanks to everyone’s efforts.
- Renewing our focus on high-impact, sellable, display inventory in our Marketplace.
Back To The Whole Patience Thing
BuySellAds’s approach to growth has always been methodical. Fast and magical can be a fun ride, but when the magic runs out, the free fall can be painful.
A measured approach is part of our DNA, and it’s always been our approach to running this business. We’re not going to change. We’ll continue to take measured risks and make measured bets. When we see a great opportunity for a magical moment, we will meet that opportunity from a position of strength and preparedness.
If you’re a race car driver going into a turn, you don’t take your foot off the gas because you want to slow down, you take your foot off the gas so that when you hit the straightaway you can put the gas to the floor. Putting all of your momentum and energy behind you at an ideal moment. That moment can then be met with predictable results.
When I refer to patience, I’m not talking about waiting. I’m talking about timing. Knowing when to hit the gas and how hard to hit it is more important than just keeping the gas to the floor.
It’s the BSA way. I look forward to another year working alongside each of you, and pursuing our vision together in 2017.
Welcome to 2017, you’re already 6 weeks behind,
Todd Garland, CEO and Founder.
