Q4 is almost upon us, meaning both publishers and advertisers are gearing up for what is often the highest advertising quarter of the year. Marketers will want to ensure that their ad spend isn’t going to waste, while media sellers will be looking for ways to capture those advertising dollars.

One way to stay on top of Q4 is to get familiar with the upcoming RFPs. Last quarter we gave a preview of these upcoming RFPs and would like to do the same for Q4. You can also check out our RFP Predictor, which will give you a detailed breakdown for all of Q4’s top brands. 

Top RFPs for Q4 

Taken altogether, we expect over 600 RFPs in Q4. This almost — but not quite — reaches the previous quarter’s number with 700 brands issuing RFPs. We expect November to be the busiest month, accounting for over half of the RFPs for the whole next quarter. 

Two of the three top product categories issuing RFPs in Q4 will remain consistent when compared to the previous quarter. In Q3, the top categories were retail, home furnishings and travel. For this next quarter, only travel will be edged out by apparel.

Despite the top categories, two out of three of the top issuing companies will be food related. The three top companies issuing RFPs will be:

Kraft Heinz: Still going strong from the merger in 2015, Kraft Heinz places ads for its host of food and snack-related businesses. Expanding beyond boxed dinners and Capri Sun, the food giant recently acquired paleo-friendly Primal Kitchen and has invested in a vegan mozzarella startup.  

JAB Holdings: Known for its moves on coffee staples like Krispy Kreme and Keurig, the German conglomerate has the unique challenge of differentiating each of its holdings from a branding perspective. Peet’s Coffee, for example, is being positioned as a coffeehouse with history, while Keurig is using automated testing to explore which blends land best. 

Estee Lauder: With brands like MAC and Clinique, Estee Lauder is a mainstay for many print publications as well as luxury-focused digital properties. Our RFP predictor tool that allows you to look ahead in every quarter. You can see when RFPs are coming out and  how your publication is positioned for each brand specifically.

The busiest RFP season of the year is behind us, but Q3 will bring a high number of RFPs as well. MediaRadar has prepared some insight into the top RFPs coming our way.

Are you ready for it?

If not, check out Taylor Swift’s newest fun, compelling and camp music video. We’ll wait.

Then let’s jump into the biggest takeaways from our Q3 RFP analysis. Staying on top of the upcoming trends will help you prepare for proposals, maintaining a competitive edge. 

Top Industries With Upcoming RFPs

Altogether, we predict that around 700 companies will issue RFPs in Q3 of 2019. 

The top three industries issuing RFPs will be retailers and wholesalers, travel and leisure, and home furnishings. This is nearly identical to Q2, with retail edging out Apparel & Accessories as the most popular industry for the quarter.

The top 8 industries with at least 50 RFPs in Q3 are:

• Retailer/Wholesale: 94
• Travel & Leisure: 91
• Home Furnishings: 89
• Food: 85
• Apparel & Accessories: 83
• Medical/Pharmaceutical: 62
• Technology: 54
• Beer, Wine & Spirits: 51

For the last on the list (Beer, Wine & Spirits), Q3 is the most active quarter in 2019 for issuing RFPs. 

Top Advertisers With Upcoming RFPs

The advertisers that will issue the highest number of RFPs in the upcoming quarter include:

• L’Oreal: L’Oreal Paris spent over $100 million on advertising in digital, print, and national TV in the last year. They invest in premium ad units and advertised on over 250 different Media Properties in the last year across multiple Media formats. L’Oreal Paris launched and advertised 36 new products in the past twelve months.

• LVMH: LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton spent over $100 million on advertising in digital, print, and national TV in the last year. They are currently not investing in any premium ad units, but advertised on over 250 different Media Properties in the last year across multiple Media formats. LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton launched and advertised 64 new products in the past twelve months. 

• Nestle: Nestle spent over $100 million on advertising in digital, print, and national TV in the last year. They invest in premium ad units and advertised on over 250 different Media Properties in the last year across multiple Media formats. Nestle launched and advertised 98 new products in the past twelve months. 

For more info on each of these advertisers and their upcoming RFPs, check out our Advertiser Pages. 

We also have our RFP predictor tool that allows you to look ahead. You can see when RFPs are coming out, how your publication is positioned for each brand specifically. 

It’s important to stay on top of trends in TV advertising — who is advertising with whom? Why, and how? Understanding the current state of the television landscape is necessary to find out which upcoming opportunities shouldn’t be missed, how best to prepare, and how to maintain a competitive and desirable edge.

MediaRadar will release its annual TV Trend Report later this month. Ahead of the full report, we put together the most critical insight for publishers and media companies — including the biggest TV advertisers with RFPs coming up in the next few months.

Top TV Advertisers With Upcoming RFPs

The most important part of the upcoming report will be an overview of the top TV advertisers — and how they are spending their ad dollars. The top TV advertisers with the largest ad spend that have upcoming RFPs between now and July include:

• Procter & Gamble: 12 RFPs predicted in the next 3 months.
• Berkshire Hathaway: 4 RFPs predicted in next 3 months.
• Pfizer: 6 RFPs predicted in next 3 months.

All three of these companies spent over $1 billion each on TV advertising in 2018.

Insight From MediaRadar’s TV Trend Report

In the past year, there have been a few noteworthy changes in the product categories investing in TV advertising. Tobacco vaporizer and pet-related companies increased their TV ad spend the most, whereas travel and non-alcoholic beverage companies decreased their investments more than any other category.

Over 2,000 new advertisers entered the TV ad market this year — apparel companies highest among them. Apparel TV advertising hit an all-time high, making up 13% of all dollars spent on TV advertising throughout the past 12 months.

In the last 12 months, the top five product categories for TV advertisers included:

1. Retail: $8.7 billion
2. Finance & Real Estate: $7.9 billion
3. Tech: $7.4 billion
4. Pharma: $6.6 billion
5. Auto: $6 billion

Among each of those product categories are household names like Target, Geico, T-Mobile, Pfizer and Toyota.

The full report, set to be released later this month, readers can expect further insight into major events of Q1 2019, shifting TV ad length, how direct-to-consumer brands are entering the TV advertising market, and the impact of the latest round of mergers and acquisitions on the national TV landscape.

Q2 is the most active quarter for RFPs each year by a wide margin, and this year is no exception. MediaRadar expects that over a third (34 percent) of all RFPs in 2019 will be issued during Q2, with the majority concentrated in April as the most active month.

The conglomerates behind some of the most popular CPG, apparel and retail brands — including Sephora, Peet’s Coffee and Gillette — will be putting out the highest number of RFPs this month.

The Top Industries and Companies for RFPs in Q2

With April kicking off RFPs for Q2, brands of all shapes and sizes are eager to put their newly established budgets to good use in the latter half of 2019.

According to our research, the top four industries issuing RFPs this quarter will be:

• Apparel
• Travel
• Retail
• Home Furnishing

The second quarter is big for apparel companies in particular — the industry as a whole issues more than double the number of RFPs than any other quarter. If you’re interested in a deeper dive into the numbers for these categories, or zeroing in on your own optimal RFP opportunities, feel free to check out our brand new RFP predictor tool.

Within these industries, MediaRadar expects the top issuing companies in Q2 to be LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton SE, the JAB Holding Company and Procter & Gamble. The three conglomerates are certainly major players in the ad market — they have collectively spent over $3.3B in advertising over the past year.

Advertising for LVMH, JAB and P&G

With dozens of brands between them, some large retail coffee chains and US household staples, it’s unsurprising that LVMH, JAB and P&G spent so much on advertising in the past year.

The conglomerates are also great examples of what it means to take advantage of multiple advertising channels at once. All three companies advertise both on more traditional channels (like TV and print, as well as programmatic digital advertising) and newer, more direct-to-consumer style channels like Snapchat.

Examples of big spending include everything from the traditionally multichannel “What Fills Your Cup” campaign from Peet’s Coffee (owned by JAB) to the delightfully meta “It’s a #TideAd” that P&G put out for the Super Bowl in 2018. By the same token, you’re likely to find ads for LVMH brands (including everything from Hennessy to Hublot) in high-end publications.

Maybe you’re feeling more than a little overwhelmed at the volume of RFPs being issued this month — and the amount of brands they represent. If so, the same team that put together this research on the most popular RFPs of Q2 can help you get ahead of the game in future months and quarters. Use MediaRadar’s RFP predictor tool to look ahead to when RFPs are coming, complete with a handy research dashboard to assess how to position your publication for specific brands.

MediaRadar anticipates over 1,000 RFPs to be issued per quarter in 2019 – and Q2 will be the most active quarter for RFPs by far. Our research team predicts 38 percent more RFP activity than any other quarter. The influx of RFPs in the second quarter spans across industries. The retail, apparel and travel industries will all issue over 400 requests in the next few months.

These numbers spell opportunity for ad sales – but they also have the potential for spelling out a headache. With budgets finalized in February and advertising plans to be finalized ASAP, the RFP quickly turns into a tight deadline for publishers.

“One of the most frustrating things for any publisher is learning that you only have a few days to complete a lengthy RFP,” says Todd Krizelman, CEO of MediaRadar. “Our RFP Predictor solves this problem, empowering sales teams to be one step ahead. This is critical for winning new business and growing revenue.”

With the introduction of MediaRadar’s RFP Predictor, we have a few tips to avoid getting overwhelmed by the long list of proposals and short turnaround time. All of them have one thing in common: successful RFP responses requires forward thinking.

#1 Anticipate RFP details ahead of time

You don’t have to be taken by surprise when an RFP with a short turnaround comes out.

For example, MediaRadar has identified LVMH (the luxury conglomerate), JAB Holding (the food conglomerate) and Nestle (the conglomerate of conglomerates) as some of the top RFP issuers. With hundreds of brands between them, these major companies give ad sales teams the opportunity to dig into what past RFPs consisted of and how they were successful.

That is, provided you have the data surrounding these major RFPs. Successfully predicting future RFP details requires looking carefully at past spending, historical behavioral trends, key personnel changes, current corporate structure and critical industry news. These data points will help you know when RFPs are coming out and what they are likely to contain.

You know that Hollywood wisdom about learning from the past? Now’s the chance to put it into practice.

#2 Build a relationship with the media buyer in advance

Whether you work with a mobile media or an ad tech company, broadcaster or dotcom, the basis of ad sales (and any kind of sales, really) is the relationship. If you don’t have a relationship with a brand, you are much less likely to know when their RFP is going out, let alone understand what they are looking for and who to speak to.

In the age of “fewer but deeper” buyer relationships and programmatic advertising, an existing connection with media buyers is more important than ever.

By looking at which brands will be putting out RFPs ahead of time, you can get a step ahead by reaching out to the buyer before a proposal is even on the table. If they recently shifted mediums, you can address questions or concerns. If they launched a new product, you can speak to your excitement for their growth.

Whatever form the connection takes, it will likely prove valuable when it comes time to actually review RFPs.

#3 Set yourself up for notifications in the future

Even if you go through the steps of getting to know the brands that will send out RFPs and assessing what your proposal will look like, one critical step is to ensure you are actually included in the RFP process. With this in mind, you should set up a notification for when the RFP goes live – whether the media buyer sends it to you or not.

This most likely isn’t something you can set up on your own — it’s not as if a Google Alert will suffice on this front. The RFP Predictor tool from MediaRadar gives you the ability to search for potential RFPs by date and set up email alerts for when RFPs go live.

Receiving and responding to an RFP from media buyers may be an exchange, but it doesn’t have to be transactional. Putting these tips into practice will allow ad sales reps to put an initial response together before RFPs actually go out – and build a relationship with media buyers ahead of time. With nearly 500 RFPs expected for April, every step counts. The more prepared you are, the more relational the whole exchange becomes.