Author: Franz Malten Buemann

As a marketer, you might be focused on creating organic content most of the time. But you should keep in mind that paid advertising is just as important.
When you manage the paid ads for your business, you can go through individual ad managers such as Google Ads or Facebook Ads. However, that’s not the only option. You can also use demand-side platforms (DSP), which are automated, as a way to purchase and manage your online ads.

In fact, did you know that in 2020 $46.86 billion, or 88.7% of all US mobile display ad dollars, were transacted via automated means?
This means that a majority of marketers paid ads used DSPs as a way of purchasing, managing, and tracking online advertising.
Below, let’s review all the basics about DSP advertising.

With a DSP, you can purchase mobile ads on apps, banner ads on search engines, and video ads on Facebook, Instagram, Google, and even more platforms. Instead of using both Google Ads and Facebook Ads, for instance, you can purchase those ads in one place on a DSP.
The purpose of this is to make ad buying faster, cheaper, and more efficient. Now, let’s dive into how DSP platforms work and why you should use one.
DSP Advertising
So, you might be thinking, “How do DSPs work?”
DSP’s work by using programmatic advertising, which is the buying and selling of ads in real-time through an automated system. With real-time bidding, ad placements are auctioned off in milliseconds.
When you get started with DSP advertising, you’ll need to begin strategizing how much you want to spend. Think about what an effective cost per click and cost per action might be. This will help you set up your online ads so the platform knows how much to spend in any given auction.
The best DSP platforms will allow you to include multiple rich media ads, including video, images, and animation.
Now you might be wondering, “Why would I use a DSP?”
The main reason is that it makes your digital ad experience easier and more cost-effective. You can control, track, and maximize all your digital ads in one place. This means you can manage an entire ad campaign across sites on one dashboard. For example, you can show someone an ad on Google, then show them ads on Facebook, and then across other sites they visit all in one campaign. Before DSPs, those would be separate campaigns on Google and Facebook Ads.
This means you can advertise on many networks, including all the major publishers, in addition to more. With the amount of networks, you’ll have a more global reach.
Additionally, DSPs often partner with third-party data providers, giving you better tracking and reporting capabilities than a single network usually provides. And in the planning process, the targeting options are more personalized, meaning you can get better conversion rates.
When you’re choosing a platform to work with, you’ll want to look at how many ad exchanges the DSP has access to because that affects how many people you can reach. Plus, you’ll want to consider cost, training (full service or self service), support, and ease of use.
Now that you know more about DSP advertising and how it works, let’s discuss the platforms that can help you do it.
Top Demand-Side Platforms
1. Centro

Centro is an omni-channel DSP built to generate better outcomes for your ad campaigns. One of the best features is that it uses AI machine learning to automatically analyze data from numerous campaign parameters to optimize your ads.
With this DSP, you’ll be able to target hyper-local audiences across devices and multiple touchpoints. You’ll also get access to the industry’s leading exchanges, along with 25,000+ audience segments across over 30 different data providers.
2. Google Marketing Platform

Google Marketing Platform is Google’s unified advertising and analytics platform for smarter marketing and better results. This DSP has several products for both small businesses and enterprise companies, including Campaign Manager 360.
With this product, you can save time with cross-channel ad management to maximize insights and optimize media and creative performance across all your digital campaigns. The flexibility is the standout feature on this DSP. You can use third-party features and integrations so you can choose the capabilities that best help you manage and measure your campaigns.
3. Knorex

Knorex is a universal advertising platform that automates personalized marketing across channels, devices, and ad formats. You can market on Google Search, Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn all in one place.
This DSP also uses AI to learn from past data to predict and adjust ad budget dynamically in real-time to drive higher efficiency.
4. Jampp

Jampp is a DSP that leverages unique contextual and behavioral signals to deliver customers and in-app purchases through programmatic advertising.
The key features of this platform are user acquisition, app retargeting, geolocated ads, dynamic ads, and predictive bidding. This is mainly a mobile user acquisition and app retargeting DSP where you can focus on mobile first ads.
5. Smadex

Smadex is a mobile DSP engineered for growth. The platform uses a combination of its own programmatic advertising technology, machine learning, and first-party data.
With this platform, you can reach global audiences at scale and re-engage audiences with its retargeting capabilities.
When you choose a DSP, make sure you understand how many inventory sources it accesses, which third-party data integrations it offers, and what targeting criteria is available. To successfully run programmatic ads on a DSP, you’ll need to reach global audiences with personalized ads.

Have you ever shopped for something online, compared prices, and read reviews until you knew you were making the right decision?
That’s similar to what businesses do when they need to purchase something as well, except it’s a slightly more formal process.
In the business world, the process includes having vendors or companies submit RFPs (request for proposal) or RFQs (request for quote) so you can compare their products and services.

These documents help businesses decide which vendor they want to buy from. It’s similar to when we, as consumers, shop online and look at prices and reviews to compare, say, new phones.
Below, we’ll discuss everything you need to know about RFQs — from what they are, to how to write one, to how it’s different from an RFP.

In an RFQ, you’ll find a vendor’s costs, payment terms, and product specs or details. Most businesses use an RFQ when they know exactly what they’re looking for, the budget they want to spend, and are ready to make a purchase.
If you know what type of features you want to see, you plan to choose a vendor based on price, and you don’t need a service plan or supported contract, an RFQ might be right for you. When you have a bunch of RFQs, you can properly evaluate all the solutions based on price, quickly.
Now, what’s the difference between an RFQ and an RFP?
While an RFP gives more detailed information on the service itself, an RFQ mainly answers how much it costs. An RFQ implies this is a simple, on-demand purchase as opposed to a longer term project that will have a longer buying process.
So, now you might be wondering what this looks like in action. Let’s review below.

1. Preparation
As a company, if you want to use an RFQ, you first need to decide if you want to open the bidding to any vendor, or choose a select group of vendors.
If you’re going to send RFQs to several vendors, you need to decide which vendors you want to send the RFQ template to. You might make this decision based on reputation or people you’ve worked with before.
If you want the bid to be open to all vendors, you can use a procurement software to simplify this process — this will post the RFQ document on your website, allow vendors to upload, ask questions, etc. Plus, this will keep all the RFQs in one place, easy to review, and contact all the vendors that you say no to (more on this later).
Then, you need to create the RFQ document (see template below). This should detail a list of requirements, including a list of products (features required), quantity or duration, date of delivery, and payment terms. If you don’t use a standard template, then companies might give you different information and you can’t compare apples to apples.
Also, ideally you’ve included an introduction to your company, what you need, the deadline to submit, and how to submit. Introducing the problem you’re trying to solve will make it easier for sellers to recognize if this is a good fit.
As a vendor, when it comes time to fill out an RFQ, you need to look at the template that was sent to you, and start gathering all the information. How much will those products cost? Is it in the right currency? Did you include your contact information? As a vendor, your work is now done, unless you’re chosen of course.
2. Review
Now that you’ve sent your RFQ documents to your list of vendors, it’s time to wait until the deadline. When you start receiving the RFQs back, you can review them. Which company gave you the best price? Which company can provide all the products/services you need?
This process will be easier if you used a standard template and asked everyone for the same information. If this was thought out, and you included all the details you need in the template, then this process should be quick.
3. Choose and Close
Once you decide, you can either email everyone the decision, or use the software mentioned above to send out notifications and alert vendors who submitted an RFQ.
It’s best practice to wait to alert the vendors that didn’t get chosen until the one you did choose signs the contract and the deal is closed.
When you let vendors know they weren’t chosen, thank them for their time. It’s important that when you choose a vendor, you aren’t burning bridges with the other vendors because you might need to use them in the future.
RFQ Template
Below is a list of information that you might ask for in an RFQ. You can separate the document into buyer information, seller information, and review and evaluation.
Buyer Information

Company Name
Company Description
Product Details and Goals
Contact Information – name, title, phone, email of the point person

Seller Information

Product Details — name and specs
Product Quantity
Delivery Requirements
Product Price

Review and Evaluation

Evaluation Method
Timeline
Terms and Conditions
Submission Requirements and Instructions

If your company is deciding between multiple vendors, you know what you want, and it basically comes down to price, an RFQ might be the way to go.

Boosting your online sales can be simple with the right tools, and GetResponse provides the full toolbox. See how to use GetResponse ecommerce solutions to grow your online store.

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Coffee and donuts. Sonny and Cher. Sherlock and Watson. 
The most legendary teams are great individually, but truly magnificent together.
That holds true for some of the world’s most powerful, most popular business technologies, too. Campaign Monitor’s flexible, intuitive email marketing platform is a potent marketing tool on its own. But when we join forces with the legendary Salesforce CRM, together we become an unstoppable revenue-generating machine.
This is no ordinary martech pairing. The Campaign Monitor + Salesforce integration is the highest rated ESP on the AppExchange.
Campaign Monitor for Salesforce is easy, fast and seamless to integrate. It has enabled us to really reach out and get to know our clients. The customer service is brilliant; it’s responsive, helpful and personal, by people who really know their product and care about their customers.
– Paul Easto, CEO Wilderness Scotland & Wilderness Ireland
The Salesforce email integration dovetails the platforms seamlessly, helping you save time, send more relevant campaigns, track success more meticulously, and drive greater ROI. Watch this video to see just a few of the ways you can start taking advantage of it right away.
Watch the email integration in action

If you already use both these tools, here are some great ways to translate the Salesforce integration into tangible benefits for your email strategy. And if not, consider it a list of reasons to consider taking on two of the most trusted, effective customer engagement tools on the planet.
Design and build out email campaigns directly from Salesforce
As your technology stack broadens, it becomes tedious and even confusing to constantly jump between a growing list of marketing, sales, and operations platforms. The Campaign Monitor for Salesforce email integration streamlines your process, allowing you to orchestrate and execute your email strategy without having to leave your Salesforce instance.
You can even directly access our library of scientifically designed, mobile-ready templates, and modify them with our intuitive drag-and-drop builder. It’s all in one place, so you save time and keep your workflow simple.

Automate data management and synchronization
Integrating your customer and marketing data systems means you can spend more time being creative and analytical, and less time wrestling with technology and performing menial transfer tasks. 
The integration adds a level of seamlessness. The participant list for our bike ride is updated every hour, so I can just create a segment saying everyone who’s raised, say $100, show them this copy. It’s so easy. I’ve got more time to think in those strategic ways because I don’t have to be manually handling data.
– Amy Mulder, Communications Coordinator
Connecting your accounts lets you automatically synchronize your contact and campaign data so you never miss a new contact (or changes to an old one). And since you can dynamically map data from any Salesforce object to Campaign Monitor’s custom fields, personalizing your emails becomes easier and more powerful than ever.

Simplify permissions and opt-in management
The world of permissioned email marketing continues to become more important—and more complex. The Salesforce email integration keeps your customer and subscriber preferences aligned across systems and keeps your audience in control of how and when they hear from you. That not only means happier customers; it also makes staying compliant with opt-in laws and regulations easier for your team.
Stay in control with smarter data dashboards
Synchronized data gives you deeper insights into subscriber behavior and helps you track customers from first touchpoint all the way through the purchase funnel. Custom reports and dashboards that update in real time with data from both platforms can help you measure the success of email campaigns in driving engagement and revenue.

You can view who is engaging with your emails and who is not, and track your subscriber lists—all in one place.
It is great to be able to schedule the data import to automatically run a couple of times a week to send contacts to CM based on SF report criteria. Also the mapping fields fields functionality can keep fields updated between the two. Using both of those functions we are able to confidently have up-to-date recipient segments whenever we are ready to send an email.
– Rachael Arnott, System Analyst, on the AppExchange
Wrap up
Integrating high-powered business technology is a great way to improve results and save time. But not all integrations are created equal: some, like Campaign Monitor and Salesforce, fit together like paired puzzle pieces.
Integrating your Campaign Monitor and Salesforce accounts means you’ll save time and get better performance through superior data analysis and personalization capabilities. 
You can try this Salesforce integration free for 14 days. Check it out here, and don’t forget to browse our App Store for other ways to connect your email marketing with your favorite business tools.
 
The post How to Save Time and Drive Revenue with the Highest-Rated Salesforce Integration for Email appeared first on Campaign Monitor.

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Thinking about using email marketing for your hotel? Check out our 6-step process for doing successful email marketing for hotels.