These are exciting times in the digital media industry. Digital ad spend is eclipsing traditional mediums and generating billions in sales. Technology trends such as the explosive growth of tablet and mobile media device usage open new opportunities — and present fresh challenges.

For example, digital media advertising offers a profusion of data and immediacy that was unthinkable in the past. But the range of display options, abundance of 3rd party data providers, DSPs, DMPs, analytic and measurement companies, data suppliers and so on offering a confusing array of services and indiscriminate ad placements present marketers with new dilemmas.

In the past, marketers selling apparel to women could reach their target consumer simply by placing ads in fashion magazines. With the rise of web advertising, digital publishers attempted to offer a similar service by selling site sponsorship and banner placement ads across multiple pages. This created an inventory glut as well as ad context issues.

Advertising technology companies offer new ways to target users, and the ability to layer in an abundance of data and measure customer and prospect interactions offers obvious benefits. But it can also drive digital media marketing practitioners to focus on metrics to the exclusion of the creative and emotional aspects of advertising.

Successful digital media marketing will fuse art and science together, combine great creative with a type of programmatic buying solution featuring recommendation engines connected to optimization rules to help advertisers buy more efficiently. To do this, the savvy digital media practitioner must stay a step ahead in a rapidly changing landscape and increase engagement and return on investment by delivering emotionally compelling creative via technology and human insight.