Hulu On Viewability; Programmatic Video's Huge Growth Rate

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Hulu Chief On Viewability, Programmatic

Speaking to Ad Age, Hulu CEO Mike Hopkins said the company has seen “nothing but good news coming out of the viewability debate,” as Hulu only charges its advertisers for ads that are 100% completed and in-view, though he declined to comment on whether CPMs were rising or falling. On programmatic, Hopkins confirmed that Hulu will continue to experiment with automation in 2015. “This year we’re going to really take a look at programmatic from the standpoint of a mechanized way to distribute our advertising to be more user-friendly with our agency partners,” he said, adding that Hulu is aiming to leverage better data metrics and third-party metrics to target on its platform. More.

Programmatic Video Sprint

With a projected growth rate of 204% this year, programmatic digital video is the fastest-growing category under the programmatic umbrella, says eMarketer. According to the researcher, bigger networks and publishers could throw more connected TV inventory into the stew by year’s end. “Though many lump set-top boxes such as Roku, Apple TV or other IPTV-enabling devices such as Google’s Chromecast and Amazon’s Fire TV Stick into the programmatic TV category, they are technically considered sources of digital video given that their content is powered via the internet, though it is ultimately viewed on the larger screen,” eMarketer explains. “With significant demand driving programmatic TV forward this year, such a distinction is noteworthy.”

Mondelēz’s Media

While CPG giant Mondelēz International’s Q4 sales slid 7% to $8.8 billion (and 3% for the year to $34.2 billion), it puffed up its margins by reducing costs and driving efficiencies in areas like its media spend. “We expanded margins by driving efficiencies in the non-working elements of our media spend, including significantly consolidating suppliers,” said company CFO Brian Gladden. “We also reduced production costs as we shifted more advertising to digital outlets.” Read the release. Mondelēz’s close working relationship with video DSP TubeMogul is part of that strategy.

Torrent Ads

BitTorrent tapped Rapid Eye Studios to produce and distribute original video content for the BitTorrent Bundle platform, its core ad product. CEO Marco Weber called the deal a “an aggressive expansion into the media space for BitTorrent.” BitTorrent Chief Content Officer Matt Mason was quick to point out BitTorrent’s upper hand on the competition. “Others in the original content space such as Amazon Prime, Netflix and Hulu have made great progress, but we are starting out with a big advantage: We have a larger audience than all of those platforms combined,” he said. Read the release.

Apple CEO: No Data Is Good Data

In an interview at the Goldman Sachs Technology and Internet Conference, CEO Tim Cook reiterated Apple’s disavowal of data collection or transmission of any kind. “There’s no need for us to know what you’re buying, where you’re buying, I don’t want to know any of that. We think customers will rebel on that,” he said. “So we think over the arc of time, consumers will go with people they trust with their data. People are unknowingly sharing things with others, and info can be pieced together. Over time people will realize this more and demand privacy.” MacRumors has a transcript.

Opera Mediaworks’ Sterling Quarter

Opera Mediaworks’ Q4 revenues were $103.2 million, a hefty 139% YoY increase. Strong results in mobile video and performance advertising fueled growth, as did international expansion through the acquisition of South African mobile ad network AdVine. Standard caveat: These are gross revenue figures and therefore include media costs. Press release.

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