For a long time, media planning has been built on the assumption of precision. We can reach audiences, and we can understand them clearly enough to justify where and how we do it. That assumption has been carried by the language of targeting,optimisation and performance. For a time it worked, it felt like the systems behind it could support that.
That’s less true today.
Planning these days is happening in a more complex environment. One shaped by privacy changes and a more fragmented media landscape. But it’s not that the volume of data has disappeared, if anything, you could argue the opposite. It’s that how we use it now requires more consideration.
LOCATION WAS THE START POINT. NOW IT’S NOT ENOUGH
Location has often been used as a proxy for audience in OOH, the idea that if you choose the right environments for your plan, the audience will follow, and that is still partially true.
However, the reality of that today is a bit more nuanced.
Movement is less predictable, hybrid working is the norm, people are splitting their time across home, office and flexible workspaces, and routines aren’t as fixed as they once were. As a result, two sites that look equally strong on a plan can deliver very different value depending on who your desired target audience is.
FROM MOVEMENT TO SOMETHING YOU CAN PLAN WITH
That’s the problem we focused on when building Atlas Insights.
At its core, Atlas Insights rings together robust anonymised SDK-based location data, alongside points of interest and real-world journey patterns. Because behaviour isn’t static, the data is refreshed monthly facilitating accuracy across audience groups and seasonal trends.
Rather than simply describing audiences, Atlas Insights identifies where they over-index across all OOH inventory, making it clear not just where panels are, but where particular audiences are more strongly represented. It gives planners a clearer basis for decisions:
- Where to prioritise
- Where to place weight
- Where relevance genuinely sits
Take Rugby Enthusiasts. Over the last month, that audience spiked, driven by local and regional clubs coming to the end of their seasons. That shift showed up clearly in the data. Which meant we could see where that audience was most concentrated at a moment in time and adjust investment accordingly.
THIS ISN’T JUST PROGRAMMATIC OOH THINKING
It’s also worth being clear about where this sits.
There’s a tendency for audience-led thinking to be tied solely to programmatic. In reality, that’s too narrow. Atlas Insights is designed to inform planning itself, across classic OOH, digital OOH, and programmatic OOH, not just inform how OOH is bought, but how decisions are made around formats, weighting and where OOH plays a role in audience optimisation. Audience understanding shouldn’t sit within one buying route but should shape the plan as a whole.
SUMMARY
When we launched ATLAS in Ireland back in April, Atlas Insights was a core part of the roadmap, something we would roll out in the weeks that followed. That’s where we are now.
The way we plan has to evolve.
Location still matters; it always will. But what if your audience isn’t there? Understanding who is actually moving through those locations and planning around that, is what makes the difference.
For more information on Atlas, visit https://talonooh.com/products/atlas/
