Starcom unveils ABACUS- the industry ‘first media booking bot’
Publicis owned Starcom UK, has announced it has developed and implemented an industry-first automated media booking bot, using intelligent automation called Robotic Process Automation (RPA).
This first iteration of the bot is able to book and edit digital and print media campaigns on a daily basis. Built in-house, ABACUS (Automated Bot for Amendments to Campaigns and Uploads) uses a bespoke technology platform that processes and verifies vital campaign details overnight, to ensure scheduled media plans are correct and efficient.
The bot’s process includes verifying media plan data, uploading to campaign booking platforms, trafficking to ad-servers and communicating campaign information to media owners.
Starcom describes it as a milestone and says it is testing it as part of a ‘pilot initiative’ implying that other Publicis Media agencies might also eventually utilize it.
In testing, the bot improved booking speed and accuracy by up to 50 per cent. The thousands of hours saved each year will allow Starcom’s buying teams more time to focus on higher value work such as developing breakthrough creative executions with media partners.
Nadine Young, Starcom’s Chief executive, said that execs across the media industry typically spend about half their time on booking systems, carrying out tasks such as the above, booking media plans line by line and resolving invoice queries.
“It’s expensive and not rewarding for the employee, Abacus allows us to liberate our teams from the more repetitive administrative tasks and unleash further opportunity to focus on more strategic and creative growth opportunities for our clients.”
For example, account execs can spend more time on improving how the agency works with media owners, how we can better the briefing process with them, and how we can spend more time working with clients?” she added.
Should it continue to prove successful, it is likely that the Abacus bot will be deployed at other agencies within Publicis Media. I really believe that in a few years’ time, this will be the norm, because who wants to be doing this manually?”
Eventually, once the technology has been implemented agency-wide, Young predicts Abacus will save about 12,000 hours per year.
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