I’m personally very, very excited about this. Watch the clip below…
Did you watch it? Okay I know, looks pretty standard. I promise the backend of this, is really, really exciting. I’ve been pretty vocal about how TV ad space has been slow to adapt to the new Ad Tech world.
See my overview on the Future of Television and dig into the slides around State of the Union, Monetization and Collaboration, The New Realm of Television
Don’t get me wrong, there is a place for big brand advertising. But, I believe that place is getting smaller and tighter by the second. By big brand advertising I mean, mostly television spots (:15/:30/:60) where people are okay with ROI metrics like increasing brand awareness, increasing brand likeability and increasing intent to purchase. I make this distinction because, in the past, advertisers have been satisfied with a less targeted approach to television. There can be waste – not the exact target audience you’re looking for – but because of strong ratings and the overall effects to the brand outweigh the price tag and the wasted eyeballs. (Keep in mind, advertisers would buy based on ratings which include an approximation of the type of audience that will watch likely see the ad).
Now, I think advertisers and their agencies want and demand more from television to meet the laser sharp targeting (or the appearance of laser sharp) from the ad tech world, i.e. Google, Microsoft and a host of start-up ad tech companies (Adap.tv, Tube Mogul, etc.). From theses issues, which I’m oversimplifying for brevity’s sake, comes the perfect mash-up Programmatic TV.
To industry pundits, who are the only people who could possibly understand this definition, Programmatic TV is the data-driven automation of audience-based advertising transactions. It really means advertisers can use actual audience data – not estimates – to place advertising in the most optimal places for their campaign targets. They can place ads automatically based on their key demos and not SportsCenter because I think they’ll be watching or at the 10p block because it’s likely they’ll be watching.
If programmatic buying was 2013 , Programmatic TV is 2014 & 2015. Week after week, Ad Tech companies are jumping into the space with announcement after announcement:
Like this one from March 2014, Adap.tv Launches Programmatic TV Buying Platform
Or this one from December 2014, WideOrbit, TubeMogul Forge Programmatic TV Ad
And, let’s not forget about this one from December 2014, SpotXchange Cooks Up Programmatic TV Initiative
I’m sure more networks will jump the bandwagon soon enough…
fantastic work Jessica