Iris.TV Grows Its Contextual Video Marketplace for a Post-Cookie World

With more ad dollars set to flow into connected TV (CTV) and third-party cookies on their way out, one ad-tech company is bolstering its contextual targeting abilities for digital video. Iris.TV announced Monday it’s integrating Comscore’s brand safety and contextual targeting segments into its video marketplace, which will be available for both direct and private marketplace deals made through supply-side platforms. Iris.TV had announced a similar partnership last December with Oracle Data Cloud. [article_summary section="1"]Iris.TV runs a video personalization platform that surfaces recommended video content for its publisher partners, which include Gannett and a handful of CBS properties. Building off its network of about 200 publishers, the company introduced a contextual video marketplace so advertisers could run cross-site campaigns based on relevant content, not audiences. In opening up context-based inventory across all forms of digital video, Iris.TV is positioning its marketplace as a post-cookie solution. “It’s bringing [together] online context and brand safety data, using the same taxonomies and standards that agencies and brands are used to buying,” Richie Hyden, Iris.TV co-founder and chief operations officer, said in an interview with Adweek. “We’re just migrating that onto video.” Comscore and Oracle Data Cloud taxonomize the videos uploaded by publishers to Iris.TV based on certain brand-safety or contextual criteria. Those definitions are then sent back to Iris.TV and run through partnering ad servers. The ad impressions for those videos are then targetable based on contextual or brand-safety data. Most CTV campaigns are audience-based, since show-level data isn’t made available when running programmatic buys. David Clutter, head of demand at supply-side platform Beachfront Media, said most contextual CTV buys can only be done against genre or channel. “For those brands that are worried about data targeting in any way, this allows for us to give them another targeting solution not only across their video buy but across CTV as well,” Clutter told Adweek. Publishers, data partners, ad servers and SSPs make up Iris.TV’s contextual video marketplace. Some partners include buying platform Mediamath and SSPs Telaria, Beachfront Media and Oracle. [article_summary section="2"]Iris.TV’s contextual marketplace spans CTV, desktop and mobile video. According to eMarketer, CTV ad spend is projected to reach $8.9 billion by the end of this year, and surpass $14 billion by 2023. While cookies aren’t supported in the bourgeoning medium of CTV, they are the backbone for much the digital advertising ecosystem. “CTV continues to play an increasingly prominent role in media, and the industry is constantly looking for the next trusted third-party brand-safe and contextual solution to apply criteria across all platforms," Hyden said in a statement. “With Comscore, we are excited to be leading the charge on bringing privacy-focused connected TV targeting to market, and are looking forward to continuing to expand this relationship over the next year.”