Posts for 'Advertising'

On the last podcast we did a deep dive interview with The Trade Desk’s SVP of Ventura TV OS Matthew Henick. Because we both believe this initiative has real potential to impact the CTV/streaming industry, this week we’re circling back to share our key takeaways from the interview.

At a high level, we agree with Matthew’s situation analysis of the TV OS market and the pain points for all constituents (TV OEMs and retailers, advertisers, streaming service providers and viewers). We also agree with The Trade Desk’s initial focus on TV OEMs and retailers.

However, we observe these are challenging deals to get done given entrenched TV operating systems and inertia, company politics and all-too-often hesitation to adopt new technology, irrespective of its potential superiority to incumbents. 

Nonetheless Ventura offers key competitive advantages, and the pain points appear to be getting more acute, thereby enhancing Ventura’s opportunity. We also discuss the advertiser, streaming service provider and viewer benefits. Add to all this The Trade Desk’s successful track record of creating software at scale and its extensive industry relationships and Colin and I agree it’s going to be a lot of fun to watch Ventura develop. 

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First up this week, YouTube continued its strong ad revenue growth in Q2 2025, with revenue rising 13% to $9.8 billion, ahead of its forecast. There’s plenty of growth still ahead as Shorts gain traction, advertisers tap conversion opportunities and AI permeates both content and monetization. 

Meanwhile Samsung signed a number of creators to put original content on its Samsung TV Plus FAST service. But as we discuss, there seems to be a looming decision for creators whether they should simply focus on their YouTube channels as YouTube becomes increasingly dominant on TV screens. 

Last but not least, we dig into the challenges that both HGTV and Peacock are experiencing. 

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This week we’re pleased to share our interview with Roku’s Senior Director, Global Ad Platform Partnerships and Business Development Miles Fisher. We do a deep dive into Roku’s recently announced partnership with Amazon Ads, which appears to be a potentially significant milestone in CTV realizing its ultimate potential as a full funnel medium.

As Miles explains, key to the partnership’s opportunity is the scale that both companies bring; Roku has 125 million logged in viewers per day on its devices, while Amazon has massive Prime program as well as other user data. Advertisers will be able to tap this impressive scale to target specific viewers with tangible performance outcomes. Roku and Amazon first-party data will be integrated through a custom identity resolution service.   

Roku has been focused on driving CTV to become a performance medium for a while, including programmatic (see panel with Roku and Walmart executives at VideoNuze’s June ’23 CTV Ad Summit). Miles said the companies have conducted early tests of the integration with positive tests. This is a partnership is definitely one to keep an eye on.

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We’re pleased to interview Vevo’s EVP, Global Sales Rob Christensen this week on Inside the Stream. Rob dives into the details of Vevo Evolve, the company’s new data-driven ad platform. Rob describes its advanced targeting, optimization and measurement capabilities. He also shares how Vevo’s music videos are succeeding across mobile, desktop and connected TV platforms. Looking ahead, Rob also explains how AI will play a big role in Vevo’s future.

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Last Tuesday was VideoNuze’s CTV x AI virtual conference, bringing together 18 speakers across 5 sessions. On today’s podcast we highlight the top takeaways from the conference from the consumer, advertiser and content provider perspectives. All of the session videos are available for on-demand viewing.

It is still early days for understanding the eventual impact of AI on CTV, but the speakers provided an array of insights of what’s happening already, and what’s likely in the future.

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Last Tuesday was VideoNuze’s CTV x AI PREVIEW: 2025 virtual which featured 18 senior executives on 5 sessions in 1 high-impact afternoon.

 Below are links to each of the sessions along with descriptions of each session and its speakers.


[VIDEO] Understanding Consumers’ Experience with AI and Entertainment

[VIDEO] Exploring How AI is Influencing CTV’s Effectiveness

[VIDEO] AI’s Capabilities Bring Benefits to CTV

[VIDEO] Interview with Paramount Global’s EVP, CTO and Head of Multiplatform Operations Phil Wiser

[VIDEO] How CTV and AI are Creating Breakthrough Experiences

Many thanks to our 3 generous partners FreeWheel, Mediaocean and Wurl!

Enjoy!

The following video was streamed at VideoNuze’s CTV x AI PREVIEW: 2025 virtual on February 25, 2025.

[VIDEO] Understanding Consumers’ Experience with AI and Entertainment
 
New research on consumers’ awareness and experience with AI and entertainment. Plus insights about CTV, advertising and viewership trends.

Jon Giegengack – Founder and Principal, Hub Entertainment Research

The following video was streamed at VideoNuze’s CTV x AI PREVIEW: 2025 virtual on February 25, 2025.

[VIDEO] Exploring How AI is Influencing CTV’s Effectiveness
Learn how AI is influencing CTV advertising’s effectiveness, including audience targeting, planning, optimization and measurement. What are the current opportunities and the long-term potential for AI to drive incremental value in CTV for both advertisers and streaming services?

• Bob Bress – VP, Head of Data Science, FreeWheel
• Brad Epperson – AWS WW Business Development Lead for Monetization (Media, Entertainment, Games and Sports)
• Jordan Greene – Co-founder and Chief Media Officer, Alpha Precision Media
• David Nyurenberg – Director, Digital Video Product Development & Innovation, Rain the Growth agency
• Jason Wiese – EVP, Strategic Insights and Measurement, VAB (moderator)

The following video was streamed at VideoNuze’s CTV x AI PREVIEW: 2025 virtual on February 25, 2025.

[VIDEO] AI’s Capabilities Bring Benefits to CTV
How is AI being implemented to benefit the CTV marketplace and what might be expected going forward? What are the new capabilities AI is enabling that add meaningful value to CTV?
 

• Gerry D'Angelo - Senior Advisor, Marketing & Sales, McKinsey & Company
• Asaf Greiner – GM, Protected by Mediaocean 
• Natasha Potashnik – Head of Data, Research & Measurement, Vevo
• Kevin Weigand - VP, Partnerships, Video & Audio, dentsu Media US Investment Solutions
• Colin Dixon - Founder and Chief Analyst, nScreenMedia (moderator)

The following video was streamed at VideoNuze’s CTV x AI PREVIEW: 2025 virtual on February 25, 2025.

[VIDEO] Interview with Paramount Global’s EVP, CTO and Head of Multiplatform Operations Phil Wiser

Learn how media companies, including Paramount, are approaching AI and its ability to drive CTV and streaming opportunities.

• Phil Wiser – EVP, CTO and Head of Multiplatform Operations, Paramount Global
• Will Richmond – Editor and Publisher, VideoNuze (interviewer)

The following video was streamed at VideoNuze’s CTV x AI PREVIEW: 2025 virtual on February 25, 2025.

[VIDEO] How CTV and AI are Creating Breakthrough Experiences
This session will focus on AI’s transformative impact on content and contextual advertising experiences delivered to connected TVs. What are the key innovations driving breakthrough personalization, relevance and value?

• Peter Crofut – Vice President, Business Development – Agencies & Brands, Wurl
• Albert Lai – Global Strategic Industry Leader, M&E, Google Cloud
• Bharad Ramesh – CEO & Co-Founder, Aqxle AI
• Marilois Snowman – Founding Partner and CEO, Mediastruction
• Peter Csathy – Chairman, Creative Media (moderator)

Peacock subscribers held steady at 36 million from Q3 to Q4, though up from 31 million a year ago. Importantly Peacock’s quarterly loss declined from $825 million in the year ago quarter to $372 million this quarter. Elsewhere at Comcast, the company lost 139K broadband subscribers in Q4, worse than the 34K loss a year ago.

We also discuss Fox’s increase in Super Bowl ad rates to $8 million, and new data showing how FAST apps built into the TVOS are garnering more attention.

Thanks to our sponsor this week, Looper Insights. Click to access their new report, “Streaming Forward: Trends Shaping Digital Entertainment in 2025.” Colin has the QR code on his site to scan for the report as well.

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Walmart has closed its $2.3 billion acquisition of VIZIO. As Colin and I discuss on this week’s podcast, there are many opportunities that the deal creates. We focus on a few, including Walmart extending WatchFree+, driving new CTV ad revenue and also broadening the availability of one-click buying and attribution.

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Disney’s fiscal Q4 results confirmed a broader industry trend that ad-supported subscribers are driving growth for streaming services. Disney’s CEO Bob Iger said 60% of new DTC subscribers are on the ad tier, with 37% and 30% of US and international subscribers, respectively, now on the ad tier.

Related, Netflix said earlier this week that 70 million monthly users are reached via its ad-supported plan, up from 22 million in January. It also said over 50% of new subscribers in countries where an ad tier is available sign up for it. Colin and I discuss the reasons viewers are choosing ad-supported plans.

Related, we also explore new Gracenote data showing the disproportionate amount of SVOD titles on Amazon Prime Video.

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Four topics for this week’s podcast:

First, Disney+ and Hulu are no longer available for sign up in Apple’s App Store. As we discuss, this feels like a move by Disney to preserve margins, though at the expense of some of its subscribers losing the advantages of unified billing and integrated search/discovery. It also means less competition for Amazon, which is already the dominant distributor of third-party streaming services.

Next, IAB Tech Lab this week announced an initiative to help standardize emerging CTV ad formats. We’re confident it will help more advertisers move spending into the channel.

Third, Fubo is boldly offering premium services on a standalone basis, not requiring a base subscription plan. Fubo aims to be a “super aggregator” and is breaking from pay-TV operators’ traditional approach of enabling access to premium services only for subscribers. It’s a sign of the times, with viewers requiring flexibility and it seems like a savvy play by Fubo to keep viewers engaged with its app.

Last, a variety of streaming services are partnering with grocery chains and delivery apps, which both of us think makes a lot of sense to reduce churn and cost per acquisition. We expect to see more partnerships going forward.

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Four topics for this week’s podcast:

Last week IAB released its new 2024 advertising outlook report based on a survey of media professionals. CTV advertising was at the top of expected gains, revised upward from a 14.5% lift vs. 2023 in IAB’s prior report to 18.4% now. It’s another positive sign for CTV ads and we discuss how big a role political ad spending is playing.

Next up, Comcast’s president shared insights about NBCU’s position in movies and PVOD which were relatively upbeat. While NBCU has had a strong year, as we review, movies still face stiff headwinds.

Third, Charter and AMC signed a new distribution deal that gives many Charter TV subscribers access to the ad-supported version of AMC+. While the deal averts a blackout like the one happening with DIRECTV and Disney currently, Colin and I question whether the deal is sufficiently forward-looking for AMC.

Finally, Colin explains the significance of Amazon introducing TVs that support the NextGen TV standard.

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