TORONTO — It’s a smaller media market with a highly concentrated ownership – so how does a media agency make the best from Canada these days?

In this video interview with Beet.TV, GroupM Canada chief investment officer Sebastian Rennie opens up on a two-pronged approach.

“I think it’s about finding the combination of two things, really,” says Rennie:

  1. “Maximizing the rate of return to advertisers, which has always been TV’s strength.”
  2. “Finding a way to complement the declines in, say, off-peak viewing with some more addressable opportunities and making that inventory work more smartly.”

For Rennie, that means exploring new ways to target households, taking advantage of new technology which brings enhanced targeting capabilities to TV, a medium that was – until now – considered for mass reach only.

These days, Rennie says he is more interested in striking a balance within TV, “finding a way to complement the power of reach with perhaps some more bottom-funnel opportunities that aren’t quite realized yet”.

In other words, the Canada boss of the world’s biggest media investment group sees TV as a place where consumers can transact.

All of which would seem to make Canadian media valuable. Rennie says supply of ad inventory is increasingly constrained.

“Making each piece of inventory work as hard as possible is key to the future of incremental growth in TV,” he says.

This video was recorded in Toronto at the Future of TV Advertising Forum. This Beet.TV series is sponsored by Finecast. For more segments from Toronto, please visit this page.