For decades, marketing strategies were based on sampled data limited to basic demos like age and gender. But consumer behavior is changing as media fragmentation becomes more prevalent. As a result, the way advertisers reach their audiences needs to change as well. Panels and models aren’t enough.
Marketers want truth—truth in audience segments, truth in planning and truth in who they’re actually reaching. Attaining the right impression is more important than ever. Top media players are already creating audience-based buying platforms, and their integration into buying processes is coming a lot sooner than you might think.
Audience-based buying is about to take charge
The traditional linear TV ad-buying process is becoming more outdated with each passing second. It’s almost hard to believe that many marketers simply buy spots on specific networks and programs to reach pre-defined—if not, generic—audience segments. And further, that they measure TV viewership with sample-based ratings.
TV has historically led the way in harnessing technology to strengthen the relationship between brands and consumers, and today is no different, as a new type of buying takes shape.
The introduction of audience-based buying was a long time coming. Brands have to take into account what people are watching, what platforms they’re watching it on, what format they’re watching it in, and which publisher(s) will optimize their media buy. Audience-based buying on TV and connected video is doing what digital has been doing all these years—without the ad fraud or brand safety concerns that remain challenges for the online ad space.
Of course, targeting the right audiences can only be executed if the data that powers it is accurate and comprehensive.
The industry needs to move away from modeled ratings, especially as improvements in technology make higher-quality metrics available. Now, TV can utilize data that reflects authenticated audiences, just as digital has exchanged cookie-based planning for ID-based planning.
Set-top box data, for example, gives advertisers an accurate view of what viewers are watching, when they’re tuning in, and where they’re watching it. This allows media providers to target audiences on the content they’re consuming, regardless of screen. The addition of third-party data can further drive accurate delivery by refining customer segments. This is what brands are after: the most optimized multiscreen campaigns in one end-to-end solution.
Change is coming
Advertisers have been demanding more, and media companies are responding.
The New York Interconnect (NYI)—an ad partnership between Altice USA and Comcast—recently grew into the largest interconnect in the country when it welcomed Charter, and with it, major affiliates like Verizon, Dish and DirecTV as partners. Together, they’re executing their shared vision of providing a unified, data-driven, advanced advertising product and making it a reality.
Launched in April 2018, the (new) NYI integrates the technologies of each of the cable providers into one unique offering called Audience One. The platform will allow advertisers to capture impressions among targeted audiences in the NY market across linear TV, addressable TV, digital and connected video in one integrated ad buy.
Even Nielsen, known for its sample-based ratings, is making a play for audience-based relevancy. It just launched its Enterprise Audience API, which allows advertisers to utilize data sets like credit card spending habits, in-store consumer goods purchases, and extended psychographic profiles to power audience-targeting campaigns.
Networks are also getting in on the action. Viacom, Turner and Fox last year partnered on Open AP, a platform that will standardize more defined audience segments to make buying decisions easier and more streamlined. This year, NBCU and Univision also joined Open AP.
What’s next
Advertisers and media companies have been clamoring for audience-based buying, so what’s the hold-up?
First, talking the talk and walking the walk are two different things. As traditional ratings have been the TV currency for decades, marketers have been hesitant to exchange their long-held savings for crisp new bills. To shift this mentality, media players must continue pushing for a better way of optimizing campaigns. As audience-based buying proves its effectiveness in driving efficiencies, engagement, and ROI, the tide will slowly turn in favor of brands realizing there is no better way to plan their campaigns.
Second, media companies need to work to create well-defined platforms that establish transparency, accuracy and standardization in buying and selling inventory. Just as Altice USA, Charter, and Comcast have come together to integrate products and capabilities for NYI’s Audience One platform, it’s important for partnerships to create solutions that define the most optimal ways to not only deliver advertising but also measure and report on a campaign’s impact.
The industry is on the cusp of a revolution—one of undeniable truth in segmenting, delivering and reporting to reach actual audiences. As more and more brands get on board—and they will—we’ll be seeing a much better, more efficient way to advertise in the near future. And that’s better for everyone.
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Ed Renicker is the CEO of NY Interconnect, LLC, a partnership between Altice USA, Charter Communications and Comcast that unifies TV ad opportunities in the New York market. He previously was president of Altice Media Sales, Altice USA and COO of Cablevision Media Sales.
