Three years after launching its own data clean room, Roku is trying to bring something new to the table.
On Monday, the company announced the launch of a new offering, the Roku Data Cloud, which allows marketers access to more granular streaming TV data via ad tech and agency API partners.
More specifically, the Data Cloud will be available via agency analytics services from Omnicom (Omni) and PMG (Alli), as well as measurement companies Innovid and iSpot. There will also be an integration with Yahoo DSP on an advertiser-specific basis, though that’s expected in the back half of this year.
Miles Fisher, senior director of strategic advertising partnerships at Roku, told AdExchanger that the company has no plans to charge a SaaS-like subscription fee for the data, as many vendors in the space do.
“We’re in the media business. We’re not in the data business,” said Fisher. “We don’t want to be selling data for CPMs.”
No more yelling at clouds
The data cloud info itself comes directly from Roku’s automatic content recognition (ACR) and opt-in first-party signals, including those from customer sign-ups and purchases across the OS. The ACR data feed, for instance, allows for audience segmentation based on viewing patterns, while the OS data can identify potential demographic information for targeting.
The Data Cloud feed and services are partly self-serve, depending on the advertiser’s need. Roku’s data science team works closely with partners like PMG, Omnicom and Yahoo, for example, but allows for measurement partners “to do the analytics themselves,” said Fisher.
For PMG in particular, the Data Cloud is built into the agency’s proprietary analytics and insights solution, Alli, so clients will be able to act on the Roku data directly.
PMG’s prior relationship with Roku goes back at least a decade, including PMG’s recent acquisition of independent agency Camelot, said Head of Partnerships (and former Camelot CEO) Sam Bloom.
Working with the new Data Cloud, Bloom said, has been particularly helpful for clients in financial services, QSR, retail and travel categories, who seem “to bet more” – buying more ad inventory, in other words.
“When we bring the Roku data in, we see clients leaning in more and feeling more confident about the results, because it’s more like the data they’re used to,” Bloom noted.
What peak performance looks like
Despite gaining traction over linear TV, CTV is famously difficult to measure compared to other digital ad channels. (“Attribution is a last-click world, and there aren’t really clicks on the television,” said Fisher.)
Ideally, the Roku Data Cloud will improve addressability for CTV audiences at a larger scale, especially considering that one out of every three new televisions sold in North America comes with Roku’s software built in, according to the company’s estimates.
Clients with mid-funnel and upper-funnel campaigns “want them to be performative,” said Bloom. Where CTV is concerned, “we now have the data to go do those things.”
