Geographic enrichment

Vistar’s geographic enrichment service enables users to easily target digital out-of-home (DOOH) inventory based on regional locations or in proximity to a location. While onboarding media owners to our Supply Side Platform (SSP), we collect the exact location (latitude and longitude) of each venue* for an accurate mapping of inventory. This enables Vistar to provide the highest quality of venue location data for users to target. However, the latitude and longitude of a venue is not always particularly useful, especially if a user does not have this information readily available.

To make targeting relevant for users, Vistar enriches the venue data with useful geographic information. When a media owner makes an ad request to Vistar, our system augments the ad request with additional metadata about the location of the venue (such as the state, postal code, DMA, and so on). With this additional metadata, our system is able to detect which line items qualify for the venue based on the geographic targeting options applied in the platform.

*Note: While most inventory remains in one place (such as billboards or screens at a gym), some inventory moves throughout different areas (such as screens in taxis or rideshare vehicles). We are able to map this type of inventory by dynamically passing the latitude and longitude through their GPS system to our system.

View the following sections to learn more about each geographic targeting option and how they are currently defined in our platform.

Regional: geographic targeting

The available regional targeting options differ depending on countries and currencies associated with your account. We use the geographic definition provided by each respective government.

Australia (AU)
Targeting Definition
State/Territory This represents a subdivision of Australia.
Metro This represents the Greater Capital City Statistical Areas, provided by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).
Cities This represents Significant Urban Areas, provided by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).
Postal Area The 4-digit postal codes used by Australia Post, provided by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). The maximum number of postal area codes you can target on a line item is 2500.
Canada (CA)
Targeting Definition
Province This represents a subdivision of Canada.
Metro Area

This is representative of densely populated regions in Canada and consists of multiple jurisdictions and principalities.

This data is provided by the Canadian census.

City

This is representative of a large, urbanized area.

This data is provided by the Canadian census.

Neighbourhood

This is representative of the smallest administrative division, municipality, or sub-city in an area.

This data is provided by the Canadian census.

Postal Code Vistar uses FSA shapes from the Canadian census data to pull accurate 6-digit postal codes to be used for targeting. These geographical boundaries were updated in the 2016 Canadian census. The maximum number of postal codes you can target on a line item is 2500.
United Kingdom (UK)
Targeting Definition
Conurbation This represents digital vector boundaries for built-up areas in England and Wales. See Built-up Areas (December 2011) Boundaries V2, provided by the Office of National Statistics, for details.
Town This represents large towns and boroughs in the UK.
Postcode Sector

This represents both the outward code, area, and district, along with the postcode sector and first digit of the inner code.

For example: LN10 6 or EX32 2. See Postcodes in the United Kingdom for more examples.

TV Area This represents a region where the population can receive the same (or similar) television and radio station offerings. This data is aligned with Broadcasters' Audience Research Board.
United States (US)
Targeting Definition
State This represents a subdivision of the United States.
DMA Vistar uses Nielsen as the third-party data source to inform the DMA shapes in our platform.
NYC Borough Specific to New York City, the five boroughs consist of Brooklyn, the Bronx, Manhattan, Queens and Staten Island.
Neighborhood Specific to New York City, this is composed of hundreds of neighborhoods within the five boroughs.
Zip The 5-digit zip code is the system of postal codes used by the United States Postal Service (USPS). You can look up a zip code for more information. The maximum number of zip codes you can target on a line item is 2500.

Proximity: geographic targeting

While regional targeting options are defined by each respective government, proximity targeting options (POI and Geofence) are defined by Vistar and relevant data partners. See each section to learn more.

Point of interest (POI)

Point of interest (POI) targeting enables you to see how many of your desired venues are within a given distance from a point of interest, such as a particular restaurant chain. This differs from geofence in that POI shapes are circle-radius based. There are two types of POI targeting available in the platform:

POI Type Pricing Description
Foursquare A flat fee,
regardless of the number of POI sets used.

Places by Foursquare provides users with one of the richest indexes of point of interest (POI) data for commercial venues around the world. By partnering with Foursquare, the following list highlights major improvements to POI targeting:

  • A large catalog of high quality POI sets from a trusted source.
  • Simplified purchasing of Foursquare POI sets directly through Vistar’s platform.
  • Improved POI planning capabilities.

Foursquare POIs are available to accounts in Australia (AU), Canada (CA), the United Kingdom (UK), and the United States (US).

Custom Free

You can upload your own set of POIs, which enables you to customize and target your own set of POIs based on your organization’s needs. After you upload your custom set, it is added and saved in the platform for your organization to use.

Geofence

Geofencing is a targeting tactic that is used to create custom boundaries, rather than a predefined area. A geofence carves out a zone that can form a variety of shapes, whereas other proximity options are not as flexible, such as POI shapes that are only circle-radius based.

The following are example use cases for Geofence targeting:

  • Unique, custom shapes that you defined.
  • A large amount of zip codes that exceeds our limit for Zip Code / Postal Code targeting.
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