Future of TV Ads

LONDON — European satellite TV operator Sky is far more than a one-trick pony. As well as beaming satellite TV for the last couple of decades, Sky is also a telco, a TV channel operator and an ad sales house. That diversity gives it breadth that extends beyond its own platform, and beyond its own content. Case in point […]

LONDON – The need for census-level data in the media planning process “is paramount right now,” according to Mike Bologna, President of GroupM’s Modi Media advanced television unit. “It’s what advertisers are looking for,” Bologna says in an interview with Beet.tv. “They night not necessarily need the data all the way down to addressability, but […]

LONDON — When you are facing the challenge both to beef-up your technology capability and to roll out across channels at the same time, should you pick multiple tools that can help each deployment, or one that claims to do it all? Many tech vendors these days are fond of boasting their “end-to-end” status, claiming to be able […]

LONDON – Adam Gaynor has a way of making the most confusing subjects sound quite simple. For example, addressable television is a “product.” Programmatic is a “process.” In the United States, says DISH Network’s VP of Media Sales & Analytics, “When you ask 10 people what programmatic TV is, you get 11 answers.” But in […]

LONDON — The organization charged with measuring UK TV viewing for channels’ advertisers, Broadcasters’ Audience Research Board (BARB), used to be criticized for its traditionalist approach to the task – a 5,1oo-household panel method supposed to represent country-wide viewing in a multi-media age. But BARB is reinventing itself. The board already measures laptop, desktop and tablet TV viewing […]

LONDON – If anyone in the premium video business doubted the logic behind FreeWheel’s acquisition of StickyADs.tv, French media giant Canal+ dispelled it by choosing the combined entity to optimize and manage its advertising inventory across all screens. “So now we can safely say we have a presence as FreeWheel at very single broadcaster in […]

LONDON — About 42% of US homes are now able to receive so-called “addressable advertising” – TV ads custom-targeted at individual homes thanks to one of a variety of return-path TV systems. But how much of the multi-billion-dollar TV advertising industry could be funnelled through that channel in the years ahead. It’s early days, but […]

LONDON — In the emerging world of “addressable TV advertising” – in which operators can swap out a standard 30-second spot for one custom-targeted at a single viewer – cable and online platforms may appears to have the upper hand. But satellite is far from out of the game. UK satellite pay-TV operator Sky had its AdSmart […]

LONDON – If where you spend your time and money says a lot about your priorities, AT&T has anted up in a big way on cross-screen addressable advertising with its participation in the acquisition of INVIDI Technologies. “We’ve been spending a lot of our time and a lot of our money on addressable television,” Mike […]

LONDON — In what is beginning to look like a season of exits for video ad-tech startups, addressable TV specialist INVIDI was last month acquired by AT&T, DISH and WPP. The 16-year-old company has come in to its own of late, by helping advertisers serve household-targeted ads in to TV streams in the two minutes per hour […]

LONDON — It just launched its new V6 set-top box and a weird Android tablet this week and, though the kit reportedly does not upgrade the advertiser offering, according to The Drum, UK cable operator Virgin Media is already helping serve targeted ads inside catch-up programming. Virgin Media, formed out of a merger of regional cable operators […]

LONDON — What if Netflix started running ads? It is a topic that has previously been debated here on Beet.TV, with one exec betting: “They’re going to have to start to deploy some type of advertising model to recoup some of the revenue that they’re spending on this programming.” A new thorough analysis has shed some hard […]

LONDON — In the digital media ecosystem, disintermediation lurks around every corner. With so much of the advertising industry in flux, it is easy for an incumbent player to be dislodged by market forces. European satellite operator, channel owner and telco Sky is fighting against that tide when it comes to next-generation advertising, launching an analytics suite for its […]

LONDON — European satellite operator, channel owner and telco Sky has been pioneering the cross-over of digital media and TV ad sales these last couple of years, notably launching Sky AdSmart, its addressable TV offering, allowing advertisers to target individual households. Then, in October, the company bowed AdVance, a suite knitting together data from across its many screens […]

LONDON — While analyst data continues to point to a downturn in TV activity and an up-tick in cord-cutting in the US, over in the UK television is barely in a death spiral at all. There are many reasons for that – for one, quality content and attractive online services are proving so popular that the BBC is […]

LONDON — This new year is expected to bring bigger developments in the enablement of buying TV ads with rapid decisioning, using programmatic technology. At least, that’s what ad agency SMG’s UK co-CEO Pippa Glucklich hopes. SMG’s use of addressable TV is taking off in the States. But that’s not the same in every market. “The UK […]

LONDON — So far, “programmatic” systems of online ad trading have been applied to static display advertising and video advertising. Now, everyone’s talking about its value to TV advertising. But what about radio, music and podcasts? Havas is working with an audio exchange and other partners to deliver programmatic audio advertising in France and the Netherlands. […]

LONDON — The software which powers decisions that fuel video and TV ad spending and targeting is getting more and more sophisticated. But what if it could actually predict the future? That’s what Edinburgh-based TVSquared is pushing toward. One of the company’s two main software pieces is ADvantage, a platform providing offering insight in to how […]

LONDON – Broadcasters are in a “strong position” to capitalize on the fragmentation of video distribution and delivery and have largely “woken up” to the emerging news opportunities, say Jon Block, a seven year veteran of Britain’s ITV network, who joined Videology earlier this year. We interviewed him about the transformation of the video landscape for […]

LONDON-   Cablevision, a large U.S. regional cable and Internet provider, long a pioneer in offering addressable TV advertising, has made its first “upfront” deal with Modi Media, the advanced TV unit of WPP.  It is a longterm partnership around addressable advertising. At the Future of TV Advertising Forum in London earlier this month, we interviewed Ben […]