As connected television matures, contextual targeting is set to become more intelligent, more dynamic and far more creative, according to Jess Brown of WPP Media, speaking with Beet.TV contributor David Kaplan.
Looking ahead to CES, Brown said she’s focused on three key trends in contextual CTV: using AI to scale relevance, bringing context into live moments, and reshaping creative to match those environments.
“I’m looking forward to three things in the contextual CTV space,” she said. “Using AI to find more contextually relevant content, figuring out what we can do in real time for live environments, and then tying it all together through creative.”
AI as the engine of scaled context
Brown said WPP has already been working with individual partners to identify content that aligns closely with clients’ brands and campaigns. The next step is scaling that capability programmatically.
“Today, our partners can pick out contextually relevant content one-to-one,” she said. “The real opportunity is doing that at scale. That’s where AI can really help—going beyond keywords or basic topics to understand sentiment and nuance.”
Real-time context in live environments
The second major frontier, Brown said, is applying contextual relevance to live programming: sports, events and other real-time formats.
“What can we do in the moment to understand what’s happening and match a message that makes sense right then for the consumer?” she said. “Live creates a huge opportunity to be relevant in real time, not just in on-demand libraries.”
Creative as the connector
Brown said the third pillar, creative is what ultimately makes contextual CTV work.
“It’s about having the right message to the right audience in the right contextual environment,” she said. Whether the content is live or from a catalog, the ad should feel like a natural extension of what the viewer is watching.
“Contextual relevance is more than just a theme or a keyword,” she added. “It’s when the ad carries a similar sentiment to the content, so it feels like part of the experience rather than a disruption.”
Early tests, she said, show that contextually aligned campaigns can lift unaided brand awareness, search activity and targeting efficiency, while also making viewers enjoy the ads themselves more.
Brand Safety, suitability and granular signals
Beyond performance, Brown sees contextual signals as critical tools for brand safety and suitability.
Right now, she noted, the lack of transparency often forces brands to block entire networks or apps. With richer content-level signals, agencies could make decisions at the level of individual shows or even episodes.
“If we can see those signals, we can say ‘this specific show or this episode is brand-safe and suitable’ instead of cutting off a whole platform,” she said.
Show- and episode-level buying needs new creative thinking
Show and episode-level planning in CTV hasn’t yet reached the scale of audience-based buying, Brown acknowledged, but she sees it as a core part of “in-the-moment” targeting.
The shift, she argued, requires a different creative mindset.
“It’s no longer one mass creative for all women 25 to 54,” she said. “You have to think about sentiment, tone, look and feel. A lot more has to happen in the creative space when you’re targeting at this level of context.”
Three ways AI will shape CTV and contextual
Brown outlined three main areas where AI is already starting to change how agencies operate:
- Planning: AI helps identify more nuanced, contextually relevant content, going beyond keywords and meta tags to understand sentiment and deeper signals.
- Optimization: Tools like WPP’s Data Analyzer can ingest campaign data and surface, in real time or post-campaign, which combinations of context and creative are performing best.
- Creative versioning: As brands demand more tailored formats and versions, AI can help generate and orchestrate the volume of creative needed to align with specific contexts and audiences.
“We’re asking a lot in terms of creative formats and versions,” Brown said. “AI is going to have a huge impact helping us keep up.”
Building the CTV data partnerships of 2026 and beyond
Looking ahead, Brown said the ideal CTV ecosystem will blend audience data and content data more tightly.
“We have rich data about our clients’ consumers,” she said. “We need to layer that with data about the content — what’s the sentiment, who’s watching, what mindset they’re in — so we can align data, supply and creative.”
You’re watching “The Road to CES 2026: Planning and Buying CTV the Way Viewers Watch”, a Beet.TV Leadership Series, presented by Gracenote. For more videos from this series, please visit this page.
