
Life in Digital · 2026-06-18 · 33 min
Key moments - from our scoring
Substance score
44 / 100
Five dimensions, 20 points each
Chanil Chande, Chief Programmatic Officer at Talon, discusses the rapid evolution of out-of-home (OOH) media and its emerging role in the broader marketing landscape. Having spent 10 years at Tablemo/Hawke where he watched OOH grow from zero to 30% of revenue, Chande explains why brands are shifting investment toward programmatic OOH and away from less trusted digital channels. He details how AI affects OOH differently than display and video - the channel lacks the billions of impressions, standardized metrics, and clean supply chains that enable auto-optimization algorithms in DSPs. Instead, Talon is rolling out Atlas Planner, an AI-driven tool launching in the UK in July that accelerates campaign planning by 60-70% while preserving human expertise for client nuance, strategic thinking, and buying negotiations. Chande emphasizes that programmatic OOH is projected to grow from 11% to 30% of digital OOH investment by 2030, making this an opportune moment for agencies and operators to embrace the channel's unique blend of privacy-safe, brand-safe reach with emerging digital capabilities.
Programmatic currently accounts for approximately 11% of digital out-of-home investment in the UK, with projections to reach 14-15% this year and approximately 30% by 2030.
Atlas Planner uses large language models to automate approximately 60-70% of the campaign planning process by accepting briefs and queries (e.g., 'find millennial gym goers in London'), then generating planning suggestions that human planners refine with client nuance and strategic knowledge.
Out-of-home lacks the three conditions AI needs to optimize effectively: billions of impressions (it only serves thousands), standardized metrics like CTR or VTR to optimize toward, and consistent data feedback loops - whereas digital display and video have all three in abundance.
AI excels at creative optimization (building and adapting assets to scale across screens) and audience discovery (combining disparate audience segments and datasets into one interface for better planning), but less so at measurement where human expertise remains core.
Yes, buying at Talon still occurs primarily through phone negotiations where buyers determine fair pricing with media owners, a practice that doesn't exist in the rest of programmatic where DSPs automatically bid on deals.
Our reviewer’s read on each dimension, with quotes from the episode.
There is some structured thinking - particularly the three-conditions framework for AI (clean data at scale, fast feedback loops, standardised environments) and the OOH-vs-display contrast - but the episode is heavily diluted by career biography, generic AI platitudes, and motivational advice that adds no informational value for a B2B operator.
you need clean data at scale, you need fast feedback logs and you need standardized environments
whereas a display campaign might serve billions or trillions of impressions, to be able to reach consumers out of home probably needs to serve thousands of ads
The framing of OOH's structural limitations as a 'competitive moat' against full AI automation is a mildly interesting inversion, but the bulk of the episode recycles familiar talking points (AI augments humans, use it for efficiency, relationships matter) without genuine first-principles analysis.
creates almost this like kind of competitive moat around out of Home, um, where the human still is super, super valuable
Being the orchestrator of AI rather than a victim of it is probably quite important as well
Shanil Chande is a genuine OOH/programmatic practitioner - 10 years scaling a mobile/omnichannel ad tech business to Commercial Director level and now CPO at a major independent OOH specialist - which gives the content real credibility, though the seniority and scale of operation are mid-tier rather than exceptional.
in 2019 we're 100% mobile business. By 2024 we were doing 30% out of home. 30% audio 30% display and video and about 10% CTV
by the time we exited the business um, in 2023 I was commercial director, um, looking after the UK but a few other territories as well
A handful of concrete numbers appear - the 11% → 14-15% → 30% by 2030 programmatic share of digital OOH, and the channel-mix shift at Hawke - but there are no named client campaigns, no revenue or ROI figures, and the statistics are presented without sourcing or methodological grounding.
about 11% of that last year was Programmatic. We believe that's going to be about 14, 15% this year and probably about 30% by 2030
in 2019 we're 100% mobile business. By 2024 we were doing 30% out of home
The host asks almost exclusively broad scene-setting questions ('tell us about your career journey', 'where do you see it going?') and responds to every answer with 'amazing' or 'yeah, 100%'; there is zero pushback, no challenging of unsupported claims, and no follow-up that extracts deeper specificity.
Should we wrap it up there?
Yeah. Amazing. And then moved obviously now to out of Home.
Computed from the transcript - who did the talking, and the words that came up most.
In this episode of Life in Digital, host Ryan Stewart is joined by Shanil Chande, Chief Programmatic Officer at Talon OOH, to explore how AI is transforming the world of Out-of-Home advertising. Shanil shares his career journey and explains how OOH has evolved into a dynamic, data-driven channel at the heart of today’s media ecosystem. The conversation dives into how AI is impacting OOH differently from other digital channels, where the biggest opportunities lie for smarter planning, targeting, and measurement, and how Talon’s new AI-powered planning tool is helping advertisers make better decisions and drive stronger campaign outcomes. Ryan and Shanil discuss the future of OOH, the emerging technologies set to reshape the industry, and the skills marketers need to develop now to stay ahead in an increasingly intelligent advertising landscape. Tune in to discover how AI is redefining OOH, and what lies ahead for the ever changing channel
Transcribed and scored by The B2B Podcast Index.
Speaker A: Hosted by Ed Steer and Dan Boulter, Life in Digital explores the ever changing media landscape with today's industry leaders. We'd like to thank our sponsors Revving the Solution, enabling flexible access to revenue and greater control over capital across the digital economy through their transactional based funding model.
Speaker B: Hi guys and welcome back to another Life in Digital podcast. I'm really lucky enough to be joined here today by Chanil Chande from Talon Chanel. Do you want to introduce yourself to the people?
Speaker A: Thank you Ryan, and thank you very much for having me on as well. Uh, long time listener, um, so really chuffed to be invited on this morning. Um, so yeah, I'm M. Shanil, Chief programmatic Officer at uh, Talon. Been in my current role at Talon for uh, seven months. Um, and I'm sure we'll get into career journey very shortly as well.
Speaker B: We will, yeah, yeah. So I guess do you want to kick us off with that?
Speaker A: Yeah, sure.
Speaker B: Tell us a little bit about your career journey, how you've ended up at your role at Talon today.
Speaker A: Absolutely. So I started my career in 2012 at uh, Sky Media. Um, so, so TV spot sales was kind of where I started off. Um, an amazing entry point to the industry. Um, I really couldn't have asked for a better business to kind of go into at that stage of my career. Um, I thought it was work hard, play hard. It was probably a little bit more play hard than it was work hard looking back on it. Um, but TV was in an amazing place at the time. People were still watching lots of linear tv. Sky had all the kind of broadcast rights for live sports and some really interesting content. Um, still continue to do that, but obviously TV habits have changed slightly over the years. Um, so spent two years, um, working on group M for Sky. Um, I then moved into a digital role. So about two years into my career I really kind of saw the growth of digital and the journey that that channel was going on. And I kind of said to myself, look, that's something that I probably want to learn a little bit more about. Um, so I went to an ad network called IBT Media. So there was two publishers and two ad networks and that's where I really kind of learned about digital, um, from top, bottom. Um, so spent another two very happy years at IBT Media. Um, kind of learned a lot in that time, um, and thought to myself, okay, now's the time to probably apply that learning to a business where I think that I can really make a difference and grow with. So I kind of set about, um, trying to find a startup that I could go into. Um, that was a time where we were seeing lots of new businesses entering into ad tech. It was almost kind of like the golden era of ad tech where you're getting all these sorts of. Yeah, exactly. The boom of ad tech um, and there are a lot of businesses that were kind of landing and expanding, launching in the UK and there was the opportunity to join a business at the time called Tadmo, later transitioned into Hawke and then was kind of bought by Azerian. So um, we focused on mobile specific advertising at the time. Um, which is wild to think that there was this gap for mobile specifically but there absolutely was. Um, so yeah, spent 10 very very happy years at Tablemo, joined as a senior sales manager. Um by the time we exited the business um, in 2023 I was commercial director, um, looking after the UK but a few other territories as well. Um, and then spent two years kind of looking at the integration process of how we bring Hawke and Azerian together. Working with a very tight knit group of people on the Azerian side to make sure that that was a success. So I look back only with very very fond memories of that time at Hawke. Um, learned a lot, um, transformative, not just business perspective but a personal perspective as well. Kind of went in um, in my early to mid-20s and came out um, you know knowing a lot more about the way that businesses operate and the way that ad tech operates. Um, but yeah, recently seven months ago moved to Talon, um after 10 years of kind of being at the same business, um, the opportunity came up to join a uh, really really cool business in Talon. Um and yeah have been there for seven months now building out the programmatic team. It's a fantastic. We know that out of Home is in a really, really good space at the moment. We see brands kind of almost devesting from social and digital, um, out of Home and CTV specifically are in a great spot to kind of help brands to um, continue to reach those audiences in privacy, safe manners, um, in trusted environments with new effectiveness and uh, measurement frameworks. Um, so the opportunity to go and build a whole new team at Talon, focused on the growth of program out of Home was um, an offer that I couldn't refuse. So um, it's been quite the journey, uh worked across a variety of different channels. Um and I feel really really excited about what the next stage of um, my career, what this next chapter of my career really looks like.
Speaker B: Yeah. And what a journey. You said joined Tadmo as a sales manager was it?
Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. Senior sales Manager, sales manager, commercial director. Yeah, yeah. And I think that's kind of the risk reward element of when you join a startup. Right? Um, yes, there are, there are opportunities to grow with a. Grow with the business. And I was very fortunate that, um, we managed to do that and we managed to grow the business and as such, myself and lots of others within the, uh, business managed to grow at the same rate. That kind of exponential growth. Um, but for every.
Speaker B: Loads of competition.
Speaker A: Yeah, I was going to say for every tableau, there's probably about, you know, Hawk, there's probably five other businesses that don't quite go on that journey for any one reason. It's not because of bad tech or bad people. You know, it could be market forces, it could be anything.
Speaker B: Of course. Yeah.
Speaker A: Um, so I was very fortunate to kind of join that business, go on that journey, um, and kind of see the growth both for the business and on a personal level as well.
Speaker B: Yeah. Amazing. And then moved obviously now to out of Home.
Speaker A: Yes.
Speaker B: What kind of made you want to go into the out of Home space and what do you think about the out of home space and how it affects the broader media and marketing landscape?
Speaker A: Yeah, sure. So, um, I was really lucky because as part of the journey at uh, Hawke, um, we diversified the channel mix quite significantly. So I already had a little bit of exposure to out of Home through the omnichannel work that we were doing from probably about 2020 through to when I left the business. Um, so that was a nice entry point to kind of start learning about Programmatic out of Home. M and I thought I knew lots about Programmatic out of Home. And then actually I joined Talon and I realized I knew a drop in the ocean compared to what there is to know when you join a business that is solely, singularly focused on doing best in class out of Home. Obviously there's so much to learn when you join a business like that. Um, but I saw the growth that out of Home was going on, um, by the time I ended up leaving Hawke, I think out of Home accounted for probably about 20% of the revenue that we were doing in the UK, 30% of the revenue that we were Doing in the UK. Um, so, you know, moved, um, quite a long way in quite a short amount of time when it comes to. And that must have been a massive
Speaker B: challenge when you first came through. Right.
Speaker A: Well, I mean, we took it from scratch.
Speaker B: Right.
Speaker A: So in 2019 we're 100% mobile business. By 2024 we were doing 30% out of home. 30% audio 30% display and video and about 10% CTV. Um, so I'd seen some of the changes and um, new technologies that were emerging in out of Home, um, some of the new data that was available in Programmatic out of Home, um, the growth of the channel itself. So Programmatic accounts for more and more every year now in terms of overall share of digital out of home. To put it into context, um, about of UK investment in out of home is in digital out of home. And about 11% of that last year was Programmatic. We believe that's going to be about 14, 15% this year and probably about 30% by 2030. So that shows you the growth of that channel. Um, and what an exciting time to be in a channel that's growing. Right? There are some channels that are growing, there are some that are seeing brands divesting slightly, um, away from them. Um, and I think it's really important to kind of, if you can position yourself in a channel that is growing, um, and you know, when you look at all the options that are available in out of Home, you know, Talon is the largest, uh, the world's largest independent specialist agency. We have significant market share in the UK and globally as well. Um, which kind of you put those two things together and you start to get a sense of why it's such an exciting time to join a business like Talon that's this huge presence in the out of home landscape but is going on this programmatic journey, uh, as the channel moves in that direction and how fortunate am I to be part of the launch team that helps it to do that?
Speaker B: And did you consider anything like CTV or Audio or anything like those?
Speaker A: Yeah, it's really interesting. So um, I did, um, I did. I'd already worked in TV at Sky, so I'd started to see um, the kind of Birth of Sky AdSmart When I was at, when I was at the business. Um, so CCV was a consideration, um, audio was a consideration, staying in display and video was also an option as well. Like every single channel has its place on the plan, of course. Yeah, M. But uh, I just think it's such an exciting time in out of Home right now. I think I really, really do believe that. Um, and that's kind of what really drew me towards the channel. Um, and you asked about, you know, kind of the role that out of Home plays in the wider media mix. As I mentioned, every channel has its place on a plan. Um, but I think that uh, what we're seeing at the moment is a real shift back towards trust and transparency and trusted environments from brands. Um, Programmatic has facilitated lots of benefits in the marketplace. Um, but it's also led to a point where um, on certain channels there's a lack of trust and transparency about where ads are being placed and how they're being transacted. Um, there's a lot of work that's being done to address that. Um, but as brands are starting to divest from, from those channels, out of Home is perfectly positioned to help with that. Ah, um, important to note that out of Home is still great for like reach driving. It's still great for brand fame, it's still great for all the things that paper and paste made it great for. Um, but now it can play in that digital space. It can play in those conversations around data, it can play in those conversations around effectiveness and kind of full funnel measurement, but do it in a way that's privacy safe because it's one to many. Um, inherently trusted, inherently brand safe. And now kind of being, borrowing the best of digital and applying it to uh, the best of traditional, um, and straddling those two spheres, which I think is a really unique, um, place for the channel to be right now.
Speaker B: And it is amazing to see its growth as well. Obviously working in recruitment. I'm speaking to so many different people. So many people are talking about out of Home every time I speak to on a day to day. It's such a cool channel to be in. So, yeah, amazing. Um, and then when we come on from that AI, I feel like I speak about AI every podcast I do.
Speaker A: Yeah, you're going to be a podcast
Speaker B: about huge as well.
Speaker A: Yeah.
Speaker B: How is that affecting out of Home and how does that compare to how AI is affecting other channels differently?
Speaker A: Yeah, so important to note, like AI will completely revolutionize the way that we all work. Right. It's going to have a huge impact on out of Home as well as other channels. Um, but you kind of alluded to it there a little bit in the way it's being applied. And the way it's being used in out of Home is slightly different to the way that it's being, um, used in other channels. Um, so I, in Out of Home, um, AI more generally kind of needs specific conditions to do its best work. Um, so broadly speaking kind of boiled down into three key areas. So you need clean data at scale, you need fast feedback logs and you need standardized environments. So you need the data to largely look uniform. You need lots of data to be feeding back really quickly to be able to then kind of make decisions on how something gets optimized or what a machine can learn from. Um, and then you need to apply that in a standardized manner across uh, a buy. So if you look at how that shows up in digital, for example, you've got DSPs that have built um, auto optimization algorithms, right? Um, and those are all powered by machine learning and AI. Um, that is a fantastic application in the DSP landscape for digital display and video because you have standardized ad units, you have billions or trillions of impressions playing out all the time, which means that you can learn really quickly. And you also have standardized metrics. So you have CTRs and VTRs and other metrics that are available that you can optimize towards M. So DSPs can make really quick informed AI led decisions on optimization because those three things exist. And then if you look at the supply side, that's the demand side. There's some really good work going on from AI LED businesses on supply path optimization, cleaning up that supply chain, um, looking at the actors that sit in that supply chain and finding the fastest route to an impression being served on a publisher. And again the same conditions kind of exist on the supply side. When you look at out of home, those conditions don't really exist to the same degree that they do for the display and video. Um, so if you look at the ad units, there's no, there is kind of standardization but there's a lot of variance in the way that ad units look like D6. Roadsides are very different to D6 models, for example. So even when you've got a D6 which is a standardized format, the environment makes such a big difference in that. Yeah, you are also serving less ads which is better for the environment but not so good for AI. So whereas a display campaign might serve billions or trillions of impressions, to be able to reach consumers out of home probably needs to serve thousands of ads, uh, rather than billions to be able to reach the same amount of people. Because it's a one to many medium. So therefore you suddenly have less data feeding back to make decisions on as to how they might. Yeah, exactly. And then if you take that point around kind of optimization and um, optimizing towards a metric out of home, aside from reach and on target, Reach doesn't really have that, that similar um, vanity metric of like CTR or BTR to be able to optimize towards. And it also doesn't have the supply side issue as well because the supply, the supplier path is so clean. Um, so therefore it kind of doesn't need to Use AI for the same things that display and video do. Um, does that mean that it's not going to affect out of Home? Like, absolutely not. Um, but I think that those conditions that I've talked about for out of Home almost act as a bit of a challenge as to how we can embrace AI and make it, um, power the channel more effectively, but also creates almost this like kind of competitive moat around out of Home, um, where the human still is super, super valuable because you still need that expertise, you still need that strategic thinking, you still need all of the things that make great out of Home planning great. AI can't do to the same level on out of Home that it can do on the other channels. Um, there are specific areas where it can form a huge function. So creative optimization, for example, like building assets, adapting assets that scale to be relevant for all of the screens on which they're going to appear, um, audience discovery, so taking like disparate, um, audience segments and kind of bringing those together, or different data sets, bringing those together, making sense of that in one kind of user interface place. Um, and that will lead to better planning, for example. So there are instances where AI is really going to revolutionize the way that we think about out of Home. It's just going to look slightly different to the other channels that I've kind of described there.
Speaker B: Yeah, and I was going to ask as well, in terms of AI to enhance planning and targeting and measurement, specifically
Speaker A: for out of Home, how is that
Speaker B: going to make an impact? Or is it making an impact already?
Speaker A: Yep, absolutely. So, uh, for planning, it's going to make a huge impact. Um, so I think we may come on to talk about it, but we can talk about it now. We are releasing, um, an AI driven planner. So that is very importantly not to replace the role of a human being, that is to enhance the role of a human being. So it's kind of like two ways that companies are thinking about AI at the moment. The number one is use it to drive efficiency and to ultimately drive down cost, um, of employing people. Um, the second is how do you use it to enhance the people that you already have within the business? And we are firmly in that second camp of using, um, technology to enhance the human behavior rather than completely replace it. Um, so again, using those disparate data sets, um, using large language models to be able to plan more effectively, um, will definitely be something that we bring to the table and I imagine others are working on as well. Um, measurement is probably slightly less affected by AI, I would say. Um, we have a brilliant set of effectiveness, um, people within our business and a brilliant effectiveness team. A lot of what they do is not just looking at the micro, but looking at the macro as well. And AI will help them to sift through the data. But ultimately their expertise is still going to be the core of what we offer there and I think what out of Home can offer there as well. Um, so, yeah, I'd say for planning and for targeting, I'd say that it has probably the biggest effect in out of Home.
Speaker B: Are you seeing that right now or is that something that you think will come in the future?
Speaker A: Because I'm seeing it now.
Speaker B: Really.
Speaker A: Yeah, seeing it now. So, um, as I mentioned, we're kind of releasing, uh, a, uh, planning tool adding to our technology stack. It's called Atlas Planner. Um, so we are already starting to roll that out. It's been rolled out in the us. It will be available in the UK from July onwards. Um, so the goal there is, is to make planning more visual, um, speed the planning process up, get to a point where you can kind of query, you can enter a brief, you can kind of conversate with the planner and say, I want to run a campaign that targets millennial gym goers in London. Um, where can I find them? Um, and the AI will kind of use all of its kind of training and the machine learning that it has to be able to get you probably like 60 to 70% of the way to being able to, to respond to a brief. But crucially, it won't be able to bring in client nuance yet. It doesn't know that Client X doesn't like that environment or doesn't want to be seen in that environment.
Speaker B: And is that where the human element.
Speaker A: And that's where the human element is really, really important. It gets you 70% of the way there. The human then needs to go from everything that I know. Does this plan look like something that the client is going to want to execute? So you've got that element of things. You, you've also then got the buying of out of home as well. And one of the things that I've really loved about coming into Talon is seeing the fact that buying still happens on the phone. Like people ring up and get better rates and all these sorts of things. Right. Um, and that just doesn't exist in the rest of the programmatic ecosystem. Now you surface a programmatic display deal within a DFP and the DFP bids on it. No one's negotiating on whether that should be a better profit price. Whereas one of the core value propositions that a business like Talend brings to the table is yes, you've got all that expertise of planning, um, all that technology at your fingertips, but you also have this amazing team of buyers that can know inherently whether that is the right price to be paying for a certain format. And if it's not, then working with the media owner to bring that more in line with where the client wants it to be. So yes, to answer your question, it's already happening, um, but it's not happening across like 100% of everything that we do. We're not automating that full process, we're automating about 70% of that process. So the other 30%, number one, can still allow us to give our competitive advantage, but also gives the client the best output rather than just a machine driven output. I think that's really, really important.
Speaker B: Yeah, it's really interesting. And do you think as AI develops over time that, uh, kind of human element, that 30% might get taken more or, um, less?
Speaker A: Yeah, I mean you could probably, you could probably argue that it may be more than 30%, but I don't know if it will. And this may come back to haunt me. Um, yeah, I don't know if it will ever be 100%. You know, we're sitting here in 10 years time listening to this being automated out of the business. But, um, yeah, I don't know if it can ever get you to 100% of the way of knowing everything. And I, I don't think that we should allow it to either. I think that programmatic, as I mentioned previously, has been brilliant for so many things. Um, but we have somehow in some cases lost the craft of really, really good media planning and buying on some of those channels because we've allowed it to be automated to a point where everything is bogged down in numbers and metrics rather than what we think a client actually strategically wants to do. Um, and I think that out of home, as we go on this journey, probably needs to, um, learn from some of those pitfalls, mistakes, call them what you will, um, so that we don't get to that point where it's automated fully so that you can still have that human integrity, that human led planning, that understanding of what the client wants, the understanding of how something ties into a strategic goal, and ultimately creativity as well. M One of the other things that we've seen on potentially other channels is as technology has taken over, uh, creativity has almost fallen by the wayside. And out of home is an amazing creative Canvas, as is tv. Um, those two channels specifically are very, very visual channels and therefore targeting is important but creativity is also really important as well. Yeah, um, and it may be me more in hope than anything else. I hope that um, we don't get to a point where the human element of that uh, disappears because I think it's so important to the way that we execute good out of Home and good tv.
Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, I agree. I think for everything really. I'll be very surprised if AI takes over 100% of any process.
Speaker A: And look, it can do, it can do a lot. There's also a lot that it can't do as well. And it's only as good as the data that informs it. Um, and ultimately um, the output still needs to be interrogated by a human. Um, especially when we work in a very people driven industry.
Speaker B: Relationships, right?
Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. Relationships are absolutely key, but also understanding where things are going. So those relationships lead to conversations where you get information about what your clients actually want, what they're building. And then the job of a human really is to think about, okay, well we have technology and you have technology. What's the best way that we bring that together? And that can't yet be done by agents speaking to each other. That's still really relies on strategic thinking. Um, and therefore that's why I'm fairly optimistic about the role of AI in Out of Home and why I think it will impact the, the channel. Um, but why? I think there is some sort of competitive moat that we are also dealing with with the channel as well.
Speaker B: Yeah, 100%. And then looking forward to the future of out of Home, where do you see it going?
Speaker A: Good question. Um, so more digital environments. So I think there's going to be um, a lot more kind of contextual opportunities for advertisers to tap into. We're already seeing that. So the advent of retail media, for example, there's a lot of retailers now that are putting digital inventory within their um, storefronts, within their stores. Um, there's a whole nother debate as to whether that's out of home or whether that's retail media or whether that's something in the middle. But we probably don't have time to go into that today. But ultimately more and more digitally led environments will be created. Um, and I think that offers brands a huge opportunity to tap into new contexts, into new mindsets, reach new audiences. Um, but as a specialist it also means that we have to be on top of that growth as well. So we pride ourselves on understanding all of the placements, where they are, whether it's the right thing to buy. That expertise, we also need to make sure still rings true in this kind of digital first world. Um, again using that technology but also inherently understanding the channel and the placements and where they are and whether that's something that our clients want to buy. So that's, that's an opportunity and a challenge for us as well. Um, more data. Um, so as we see m more brands, more companies moving into out of home, there's going to be more conversations around businesses that weren't previously doing out of home that are decoupling their data sets and making that available for both targeting and for measurement as well. Um, again, as custodians of out of home, we need to interrogate that, we need to make sure that if there is a new data provider on the market that is offering something for out of home specifically, um, then we've done our due diligence. Does it add something to what we're currently doing? Um, does it use the models that we use so our data is backed up using industry standard currency? Does it kind of play in that space or does it play in a slightly broader space of using postcodes to target? That's going to create complexity. And for us we need to make sure that if we're offering something to a brand and we're bringing something new to a brand, that we've done our due diligence and we firmly believe that that's the right thing to do. So there's going to be a lot of interrogation that happens with regards to new data set that comes into the market, measurement opportunities. There's going to be more and more ways to measure out of home. Um, I think we're already there to be clear on that point.
Speaker B: Is there a lot of that going
Speaker A: on at the moment? Yeah, totally. And I think there's almost this misnomer in out of home that out of home is hard to measure. Um, and I think that it can be if you don't know how to do it. Um, but we've been doing it for years, years and years and years. So we have like really, you know, effective frameworks to make sure that we're measuring things in the right way. Um, so we are seeing more and more technology being made available to not just quantify those kind of up and mid funnel, um, kind of strategies that out of home has been amazing at in the past, but also moving that into mid and lower funnel attribution as well. Exactly. And that's where as we see the channel move into digital teams within agencies. That's something that they're challenging us with uh, us on as well. So as they run out of Home alongside social and display and video and they're used to seeing this sort of attribution to drive lower funnel metrics. How does out of Home justify itself and what models are we using to make sure that we are clear on the role that out of Home play, both from a priming perspective and from an attribution perspective. Perspective as well. Um, so it's really exciting. And then finally creativity, um, creativity I think um, is going to see a huge step forward. Out of Home has always been brilliant at creative and creatively led campaigns. Um, but technology and potentially the use of AI gives us a chance to really be dynamic, really allow us to reach um, audiences on a perfect personalized uh, on a personalized level at scale. It's probably the easiest channel to run personalization at scale. Um, and I'm surprised. Um, and it's one of my kind of missions from my time at Talon, um, is to make sure that DCO is adopted in a more kind of uh, mainstream and widely used way than what it, what it currently is. Um, and I think that there's a, of number of ways that we can do that, but I think that that's
Speaker B: going to be at the forefront right now for you.
Speaker A: Yeah, it's one of the many things that are at the forefront for me at the moment. There's probably um, a variety of different things that we're working on, not least the launch of this planning functionality, not least educating our clients on kind of the benefits that out of Home brings, where that sits in our business, how we push things forwards when it comes to data and measurement. And it probably plays on that list of things, things that's really, really important for us to be looking at as to how we use the creative capabilities either that sit within the agencies themselves or through our team at uh, Grand Visual because we have um, a creative arm to our business as well. How we make sure that that fits really nicely within the programmatic story that we have. So it's definitely the forefront of what we're trying to do.
Speaker B: Amazing. Cool. And then for those in the industry at the moment, what should they be doing to stay ahead with things like AI and emerging channels coming through and shape in the market?
Speaker A: Yeah, um, education absolutely key. Um, we are in a place now where there's more resource than ever before to be able to go and educate ourselves on new emerging channels, not least through AI, you know, you can, you can type that into any sort of um, AI tool. Yeah, exactly. And you can get a pretty good answer as uh, to you know, the benefits that it brings and also some of the challenges that it brings as well. So I think education is absolutely key, key. Independent learning, um, I think is really, really important. There are so many different um, events that people can go to. There are so many different forums where people can discuss, um, you know, and I think that we work in a really cool industry where if you see somebody that knows something about a specific topic, I would encourage people to reach out to them and just say, look, can we grab a coffee and kind of just pick your brains on how this works because um, you seem like you know what you're talking about. I would love to get 5 min m of your time and 99.9% of the times I imagine that person is going to say yes, absolutely. Um, so that kind of one to one peer led learning is also really important as well. Being the orchestrator of AI rather than a victim of it is probably quite important as well.
Speaker B: So staying ahead of it, you mean
Speaker A: staying ahead of it, embedding it into your own workflow, embedding it into your own process. Um, you know, the people that adopt AI and learn about it and you know, can really accelerate some of those lower value tasks in order to free up time to do the higher value tasks I think will accelerate really, really quickly.
Speaker B: Just use it to make you more efficient.
Speaker A: Yeah, use it to make you more efficient. Like if it can do certain things that uh, you know, take you a couple of hours a week but really aren't adding any value to uh, either your clients or to you yourself? Can that be automated in order to free you up to be able to do, to do other things? But on the flip side I would almost say don't become too reliant on it. Um, it's really easy to see when an email has been formulated by AI LinkedIn post or a LinkedIn post or whatever it is. Um, so continue to add value to the output that AI is giving you. Continue to interrogate it, have your own opinion on it, learn about it, but also then be in a position to go, right, that's the information that I've got and uh, I've got there in a few hours quicker than I would have got there previously. But what am I going to do with this information? How am I going to bring that to a senior leader within my business and show how I can drive business outcomes with this information? If you can do that, then that's where you become super, super valuable to. And I think those are the sorts of things that I would encourage people who are, um, kind of looking at AI, looking at technology and looking at how they embed it within their own work processes to really think about doing.
Speaker B: Yeah. Amazing. Should we wrap it up there?
Speaker A: Absolutely. It's been a pleasure. Thank you so much for having me on.
Speaker B: So much. Thank you.
Speaker A: Thank you for listening to today's episode of Life in Digital. If you want to know more about our guest or any of the topics that we cover today, you can find out more in our show notes and on our website.
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