Video supply-side platform Beachfront Media is expanding its partnership with White Ops, the digital verification vendor that specializes in bot detection, to include over-the-top (OTT) inventory. All inventory passing through Beachfront’s marketplace is now vetted and verified by White Ops, according to Frank Sinton, Beachfront’s founder and chief product officer. But is OTT fraud a […]
Sinclair Broadcasting, the largest owner of television stations across the nation, is letting local advertisers buy connected TV in a much more targeted way alongside linear and digital. The broadcaster is teaming up with the connected TV DMP and measurement system Tru Optik to power advanced audience targeting across Sinclair’s owned-and-operated inventory, as well as […]
OTT audiences are prevalent and engaged. But while advertisers are buying, they’re not exactly beating down the doors. Watch any premium long-form show on an internet connection and you’ll see the same irrelevant message played so frequently it’ll haunt your dreams. What gives? The main issue is buyer confusion about how to transact on OTT […]
Advertisers for the first time can tap Roku’s first-party data via a managed service measurement system called Ad Insights, released on Wednesday. The Ad Insights platform builds on Roku’s support of third-party measurement partners like existing partner Nielsen, Kantar Millward Brown, Oracle, Placed and Experian. “This launch was really the result of us stepping back […]
Although connected TV buyers have become pretty sophisticated at targeting and delivering an ad to individual users, managing frequency across video providers is a work in progress. But despite the industry’s recognition that consumers demand better ad experiences, many viewers find themselves bombarded with the same ad. Worse, those ads sometimes run within the same […]
MGM Networks is expanding to OTT platforms and expects data-driven TV advertising to revitalize the studio’s library of films and TV shows. Last year, MGM Networks launched an OTT app for the Comet sci-fi channel and saw 120,000 downloads despite minimal promotional spend, said senior VP Todd Parkin. The company plans to launch OTT apps […]
In the words of Jon Stimmel, the chief investment officer for UM Worldwide, planning an over-the-top (OOT) ad campaign is “a Frankenstein of different methodologies mixed together.” He added, while speaking last week at the Videonuze Shift summit in New York, that buyers need more automation in the OTT planning process: “We are recreating the […]
“On TV And Video” is a column exploring opportunities and challenges in advanced TV and video. Today’s column is written by Evelina Grines, vice president of media and entertainment at MPP Global. Video audiences in the US are soaring, growing 46.8% from August 2016 to 2017, per the MPA. And while that’s good news, viewership […]
Thanks to its smart TVs, LG Electronics controls a channel that can bring the granularity of digital advertising into the world of connected TV. But LG is a consumer electronics manufacturer, not an advertising company, and in recent years it has learned how to accommodate a new business practice. Its first foray into ad monetization […]
Demand-side platform The Trade Desk wants a bigger slice of TV ad budgets. The company on Thursday rolled out a connected TV targeting and attribution tool designed to extend digital buying capabilities like retargeting and audience matching into the over-the-top environment. According to CEO Jeff Green, connected TV inventory available through The Trade Desk increased […]
Although Roku’s device sales make up 59% of its revenue, the growth of the segment is declining as Google, Amazon, Apple and other competitors push for more market share. However, its platform business, which consists of ads and subscription revenue, has expanded rapidly and now represents 41% of Roku’s total revenue. Advertising accounted for 67% […]
Ad buyers decry the absence of addressability in OTT inventory, which they claim lacks the targeting and measurement capabilities to which digital buyers are accustomed. But an integration between Videology’s cross-screen video platform and Tru Optik’s CTV device graph, revealed Wednesday, aims to bring more addressability to OTT advertisers – at scale. Previously, Videology would target […]
OTT is a catch-22 for advertisers. While it reaches the cord cutters traditional TV advertisers want to target, that audience is still difficult to track in an OTT environment. Although the channel is capturing more attention (and dollars) from the traditional TV camp, digital buyers say connected TV needs to address the issue of identity […]
Although early video investments (and acquisitions) were focused on the desktop, a new influx of funding is pivoting to channels like over-the-top TV. In the span of three months, more than $150 million in VC funding has been injected into startups capitalizing on the demand for new video content – and addressing the challenges of […]
The drumbeat of blockchain industry news continues this week with the launch of AdLedger Consortium, a blockchain-enabled online advertising group backed by MadHive, a blockchain ad tech startup, IBM, Integral Ad Science and Tegna’s OTT ad subsidiary Premion. As with other initiatives, like Comcast’s fledgling Blockchain Insights Platform, the AdLedger Consortium is still in the […]
Newsy started life as a desktop play. But now the digital video network, purchased by the E.W. Scripps Company in 2013, derives most of its traffic from over-the-top (OTT) devices as buyers begin to warm up to the channel. Marketers are increasingly willing to invest in OTT not just as a testing ground but as […]
Roku will offer audience guarantees this upfront season, joining big networks like NBC with similar programs. Several agencies, including Horizon Media and Hill Holliday’s media spinoff, Trilia, are beta testing Roku’s audience guarantees. Roku’s offering is based on the set-top box maker’s existing integration to Nielsen Digital Ad Ratings, which helped buyers determine their waste […]
Dish’s streaming TV service, Sling TV, which reportedly topped 1 million subscribers last fall, is now focused on monetizing its audience cross-platform. Connecting the pipes for programmatic monetization across Sling TV, Dish and Dish Anywhere didn’t happen overnight, but Adam Lowy, GM of advanced TV, said years of work are paying off. Dish has been “quietly […]
IPG Mediabrands’ investment arm, Magna, revealed on Wednesday it is doubling its investment in over-the-top (OTT) TV provider Roku. It declined to name specifics but noted the deal has multiple implications for inventory rates and pricing, third-party research and data. Magna is forming a private deal with Roku to allow more precise targeting between the agency’s […]
Tubi TV knows that not everyone wants to pay for premium content. “We see a strong desire among viewers who want free content, whether they’re viewers in search of value or subscription viewers who can’t find the content they want on their SVOD [subscription video on demand] service,” said Thomas Ahn Hicks, co-founder and head […]
Despite the perception that over-the-top TV (OTT) supports digital ad-buying tactics – like dynamic insertion and targeting at scale – buying connected TV is still a largely manual process. “Everything we do right now is I/O-direct with publishers,” said Seth Walters, senior partner for interactive and connected TV (CTV) for WPP’s advanced TV agency, Modi […]
Over-the-top (OTT) television is at an inflection point. While it’s a promising way for media owners to capitalize on changing consumer consumption habits – the number of connected TV users totaled 181.8 million viewers in 2016, a 20% year-over-year increase, according to eMarketer – with reward comes risk. OTT’s lucrative CPMs could also attract bad […]
Agencies are developing skills and business models around advanced TV buying, just as they once did for programmatic buying. GroupM has a dedicated department in Modi Media. IPG Mediabrands’ Cadreon, Dentsu Aegis’ Amplifi, Omnicom and Publicis Groupe also have added expertise. Even independent agencies like Horizon Media are building out advanced TV centers. “Advanced TV” […]
At 10 million active accounts strong, Roku is turning to media companies to improve the quality of its streams and ramp up ad monetization. Wednesday’s rollout of Roku Direct Publisher allows content owners like Rolling Stone, UPROXX and the Scripps-owned satirical publisher Cracked to develop and distribute video via Roku apps. The tool is also […]
Dynamic ad insertion is technically easier on over-the-top (OTT) apps, but it’s less prevalent, at least at scale, in live TV and video on demand (VOD). To help answer that call, Adobe has enhanced its Primetime solution to enable dynamic ad insertion for live, linear TV streams. The solution already supports VOD and OTT devices. […]
These are the TV brands you know – Sony, Samsung, LG. But the browser inside their hardware comes courtesy of a third party. And Opera TV, the purveyor of said software, is starting to dip its toe into more consumer-facing fare. “We shipped 42 million devices with our software last year and we’re nearly at the […]
Although the Rio Olympics broke its own record for reserved ad dollars set during the London Games in 2012, broadcast is losing its iron grip on live sports media. Ratings for NBC across a portfolio of Comcast-owned properties (like MSNBC, CNBC, USA Network, Golf Channel, Telemundo and the NBC smart-TV app channel) were down compared […]
Zype, a startup which seeks to power publishers’ video delivery pipes, has raised $2 million in seed funding following an initial raise of $1.6 million last October. Think of it as a “lightweight” competitor to more legacy cloud video distribution platforms like Ooyala and Brightcove. Zype provides app publishing, monetization and analytics tools and a content […]
A year ago, E.W. Scripps–owned video network Newsy was predominantly a desktop-focused site. A lot has changed for the publisher, whose 55-person editorial team endeavors to put its own spin on the stories of the day across verticals, from global news and policy to culture and entertainment. Newsy is now on pace to hit one […]
The Association of National Advertisers (ANA) filed comments with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on Monday that formalized its opposition to the FCC’s proposed set-top box rules. Under the proposed rules, companies such as Google and TiVo who manufacture their own set-top boxes could access content from multichannel video programming distributors (MVPDs) without having to […]
