Effective immediately, Google is discontinuing the development of DoubleClick Sales Manager. If you rely on the system to manage digital channel sales, you now have 24 months to find a replacement, and we’d suggest planning your transition as soon as possible. Even if you’re more heavily reliant on DoubleClick for Publishers, you should still consider how it may affect you. DFP changes are rare, and there hasn’t been a major deprecation like this in years.

Starting to look at your replacement options? Check out part 2 in our continuing DSM blog series.

Here’s what we know so far:

1. Shutdown day is 7/31/2019

This is the absolute last day you’ll be able to use DSM or any of its features, with one exception. Proposal negotiation for programmatic has been added as a DFP feature and will work the same as ever.

2. Your DoubleClick data is safe & exportable

Extracted data will be available (details still forthcoming) and we expect it will be a fairly simple process. Google has a great track record for data availability when it discontinues a product. You most likely won’t need to do much data entry to maintain complete, relevant records.

3. There’s no clear, best alternative

There are a few tools that do almost the same thing, and the best one for you will depend on a number of factors. Cost is a major concern as well- the most fully-featured solutions often have the highest licensing fees- so try to determine which features your team relies on. Another tradeoff to consider is your time use, as many alternative solutions are designed for specific use cases and will be less intuitive for more basic workflows.

4. Plan now, transition ASAP

Don’t wait until 2019, or even 2018, to plan your transition. It’s one of the biggest shakeups in the digital ad sales ecosystem this decade and a rushed switch to a new tool could be very costly (not to mention stressful).

5. It’s an opportunity

Since you’re already preparing to revamp your ad sales process, it may be time to revamp your entire process. Implementing a comprehensive, future-proof solution now is much simpler and cost-effective than waiting until you’re forced to upgrade.

Unless you’re using Google DFP on a very small scale, sales teams are usually much better served by a CRM-backed solution that can streamline inventory management, campaign creation, and rate card management, especially if you’ve got a complex workflow.

Silverline is happy to advise you on the best changes you can make to boost ROI and automate ad sales, and we’re ready to help you chart a path forward as we prepare for the end of DSM. We’ll be updating this blog as Google releases more information.