Posts for 'Advertising'

Video ad tech provider SpotX has announced server-side ad insertion interoperability with Amazon Web Services’ Elemental MediaTailor service. This means that content providers which are joint customers of SpotX and AWS Elemental MediaTailor are able to use SpotX’s ad decisioning capabilities to dynamically serve targeted ads, using server-side ad insertion.

With server-side ad insertion (“SSAI”), which is also known as ad stitching, relevant ads are integrated with the content at the server level, providing a better viewer experience as compared with when ads are inserted by the player on the user's device. The latter model often results in buffering as the player transitions between content and ads and vice versa. Buffering is major challenge for content providers because it is the leading cause of abandonment, which in turn diminishes monetization.

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New research from video ad tech provider VideoAmp reveals that advertisers and agencies are bullish on planning and buying ads across linear TV, VOD and online video, but that challenges remain. Fully 85% of buyers believe that TV and online video ads are either somewhat or extremely complementary, something I’ve long-believed.  

66% of buyers said they are already leveraging digital data in their linear TV buys, while 57% said that they are targeting TV viewers across digital screens and devices. Meanwhile 74% cited accuracy in planning and execution across TV and video as benefiting from holistic buying.

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In 2017 Amazon continued launching into new businesses as it leveraged its massive scale and resources to disrupt the status quo. As we look ahead to 2018, online video adverting appears to be yet another juicy opportunity for Amazon to pursue, as all the pieces seem to be falling into place.

As background, Amazon is already investing heavily in ad tech and ad sales staff. Of course, ads and recommendations have long been a part of the Amazon shopping experience, with text and banner ads popping up following searches and on product pages. But video ads give the company a whole new opportunity.

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I'm pleased to present the 400th edition of the VideoNuze podcast with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia.

In this week’s podcast Colin and I discuss our top 10 online video stories of 2017. It’s been another incredibly busy year with tons of industry innovation and progress. As always, it has been a lot of fun to analyze all of this and report on it. Let us know what you think of our choices, whether you agree or disagree!

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Unless there’s some big news, this will be my last post for 2017.

Happy Holidays to all!

Coincidentally, while I was in Israel a couple of weeks ago for the Video Trends conference, the country’s Antitrust Authority opened an investigation into Google and its dominance of the Internet advertising market as a restraint of trade.

The investigation was prompted by a complaint from Artimedia, a global company that entered the Israeli online video advertising market 3 years ago. Artimedia is backed by Singaporean investors, mainly by Mr. Ching Chiat Kwong, chairman and CEO of Oxley Holdings, which is publicly traded in Singapore Exchange market (SGX:5UX). I interviewed Artimedia’s CEO Gal Turjeman to learn more about the investigation. Following is an edited transcript.

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Below are the final two session videos from our recent SHIFT // Programmatic Video & TV Ad Summit.

First up is “Bringing the Precision of the Digital Age to Television” which was kicked off with a short presentation by Scott Ferber (Chairman and CEO, Videology) showcasing research on key challenges to accelerating programmatic TV. Following his presentation, Scott joined a panel I moderated, with Larry Allen (VP of Ad Innovation and Programmatic Solutions, Turner Ad Sales) and Andrew Feigenson (CEO, Simmons Research) also participating.

The second session is “Trending Now: What’s Ahead for Programmatic Video and TV?” which included Paul Alfieri (Chief Marketing Officer, Cross MediaWorks), Rob Byrnes (VP, Digital Planning, National Geographic), Rob Cukierman (VP, Sales Strategy & Partnerships, Vevo), Stephen Strong (Head of Revenue, Newsy), Tore Tellefsen (VP of TV Solutions, DataXu), with Chris Karl (CEO, VertaMedia) moderating.

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At our SHIFT // Programmatic Video & TV Ad Summit a couple weeks ago we had two sessions that were connected: one that focused on executing the roadmap for success in audience buying and one that focused on maximizing data’s ROI.

Panelists for the audience buying panel included Gabe Bevilacqua (SVP of Product Management, Advanced Advertising, Viacom), Jason DeMarco (VP, Audience and Data Solutions, A+E Networks), Anupam Gupta (Chief Product Officer, 4C Insights) and Adam Hecht (VP, Monetization, SintecMedia), with Mary Ann Halford (Senior Advisor, FTI Consulting), moderating.

Panelists for the maximizing data’s ROI panel included Scott Ashby (Sr. Director, Advanced Ad Products, Fox Networks Group), Judith Hammerman (SVP, Data Solutions & Programmatic Solutions, Time Inc.), Mark Risis (Head of Global Data Partnerships, IBM Watson Advertising), Damian Garbaccio (Global Chief Revenue Officer, Nielsen Marketing Cloud), with Brian Leder (Partner and Chief Strategy Officer, Promatica), moderating.

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Our afternoon keynote interview at the recent SHIFT // Programmatic Video & TV Ad Summit was with Mike Rosen, EVP, Portfolio Sales and Strategy, NBCUniversal. Mike was interviewed by Matt Prohaska, CEO and Principal, Prohaska Consulting and shared a fantastic insider’s look at how the TV industry is evolving.

Mike discussed a range of topics including how NBCUniversal has organized itself around audiences instead of verticals with content a key focus, how he defines the term “programmatic,” why data comes up in every single meeting and how it feeds NBCU’s optimization platform, what the “new” currency is and the challenge of giving up legacy approaches, which industries are adopting custom segmentation approaches first, how to overcome attribution challenges and much more.

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At our recent SHIFT // Programmatic Video & TV Ad Summit, we had a great session focused on how devices and distribution are contributing to advertising paying off in new ways. Topics included how to improve audience targeting, creating value in a multi-touch world, how to unify analytics across all distribution points, why more premium content is flowing through connected TV devices, the role of ad ops and yield management, plus lots more.

Panelists included Youssef Ben-Youssef (Head of Ad Platform, Roku), Stephen Bach (SVP, Partnerships and Business Development, Vemba), Keith Grossman, Global Chief Revenue Officer, Bloomberg Media Group), Anthony Laurenzo (SVP, Non-Linear Video Strategy & Investment, Amplifi), with Tim Hanlon (Founder and CEO, The Vertere Group) moderating.

(Apologies, there was a problem with the primary audio source, so there's a little background noise)

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I’m pleased to present the 399th edition of the VideoNuze podcast with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia.

This week we’re joined by Ross McCray, co-founder and CEO of VideoAmp, a leading video ad tech platform. VideoAmp positions itself as the “TV operating system for advertising,” working primarily with the buy side to unify linear TV and online video advertising.

Ross shares his thoughts on a range of key industry issues including how the TV networks are increasing their competitiveness relative to Google and Facebook, how friction in the buy side is being reduced as agencies revamp their organizational structures, the role of 6-second ads in driving new value, how data from tens of millions of TV viewers is now helping create targeted segments, big trends for 2018 and much more.

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Connected TVs and set-top box delivered VOD together accounted for 49% of premium video ad views in Q3 ’17, according to FreeWheel’s newest Video Monetization Report. The combined share is roughly stable over past year. However, STB VOD grew 54% year-over-year (with its share now up to 20%), while connected TV gained 47% YOY (with its share now 29%).

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SpotX has revealed that ad spending on its platform for OTT inventory increased by 18x for the 12 months ending October 2017. SpotX defines OTT inventory as including broadcast-quality inventory from TV networks, pay-TV operators and other live, linear and VOD streaming services delivered via connected TVs, desktop and mobile. SpotX said the portion of ad budgets spent on OTT inventory increased from 8% in Oct. ’16 to 26% in Oct. ’17, with 30% expected by end of the year.

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Our morning keynote interview at the SHIFT // Programmatic Video & TV Ad Summit was with Jon Stimmel, Chief Investment Officer, Universal McCann. Jon was interviewed by Matt Spiegel, Managing Director, Marketing and Technology Solutions, MediaLink about a range of topics including unified measurement, data fragmentation, changes to UM’s planning and investment process, integrated buying, CMOs’ outcome targets and much more.

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At our recent SHIFT // Programmatic Video & TV Ad Summit, one of our sessions focused on innovation in programmatic video and TV, with many topics discussed including header bidding, AI, brand safety, mobile, role of data, syndication and much more.

Panelists included Paul Bannister (EVP, CaféMedia), Dvir Doron (CMO/BDO, Cedato), Joe Lospalluto (Head of Sales, Americas, Smart), Chip Schenck (VP of Audience and Programmatic Solutions, Meredith), Frank Sinton (President and Founder, Beachfront Media) with Brian Ring (Principal Analyst, Ring Digital LLC) who moderated.

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I’m pleased to present the 398th edition of the VideoNuze podcast with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia. Many thanks to Brightcove, our podcast sponsor, which, with SpotX and the IAB Tech Lab, shared a great presentation at last week’s SHIFT event about how server side ad insertion complements programmatic (session video is here).

First up on this week’s podcast, Colin shares his thoughts about why programming costs are likely to continue rising for pay-TV operators, counter to Charter’s CEO Tom Rutledge belief that they’ll moderate. Colin details his reasoning, which could portend higher subscriber bills and therefore more cord-cutting.

Next, we discuss Netflix’s surprised reaction to the popularity of downloading among its subscribers. I had a laugh out loud moment reading about it earlier this week, since Netflix was steadfastly against downloading until a year ago, when, having been leap-frogged by Amazon, it finally began offering the feature. Netflix’s bias against downloading has been really bizarre and showed a real disconnect in understanding its subscribers.  

Speaking of reversals, Facebook has had a change of heart about running pre-rolls and now plans to introduce them in Watch. Colin and I discuss why Facebook made the change and what it means for the industry.

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One of the highlights of last week’s SHIFT // Programmatic Video & TV Ad Summit was a joint presentation from Brightcove (Mike Green, VP, Marketing and Business Development, Media), SpotX (Kevin Schaum, Sr. Director, Mobile and Connected TV) and the IAB Tech Lab (Amit Shetty,  Sr. Director, Video & Audio Products) on how server side ad insertion (SSAI) adds value to programmatic for both linear and on-demand advertising.

For those not familiar with SSAI (also known as “ad stitching”), this is a process for inserting ads into a piece of content (frequently long-form). There are multiple benefits of SSAI including better user experiences, reduced buffering, extended device reach, elimination of ad blocking and lower cost of deployment. Mike, Kevin and Amit elaborated on how these benefits are even more valuable for programmatic, especially in live and in skinny bundles, while also noting some of the key outstanding challenges.

The presentation clearly communicated how the industry needs to work together to evolve video advertising given new viewer behaviors, device proliferation and publishers’ pressures to fully monetize.

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At last week’s SHIFT // Programmatic Video & TV Ad Summit, Lauren Fisher, eMarketer’s principal analyst, kicked off the day sharing her forecasts for both programmatic video and programmatic TV ad spending in the U.S. Following her presentation, I interviewed Lauren and the audience asked a number of questions.

Overall, Lauren sees strong growth ahead for programmatic video, which will account for 76.5%, or over $13.4 billion of online video advertising by 2019. She’s particularly bullish about the role of mobile, which she sees growing to 60% of programmatic video by 2019. Lauren is also optimistic about connected TV’s opportunity, though she still see it as early in its development.

Programmatic TV is not nearly as far along, with Lauren forecasting $3.8 billion in spending by 2019, representing 5% of overall TV ad spending. Lauren also reduced her 2018 forecast to $2 billion, which is roughly half of what she forecast for 2018 when she presented at SHIFT 2016. We discuss all the reasons behind her revisions.

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Independent programmatic mobile video ad platform Beachfront Media has sold a majority stake to two private equity firms, Growth Catalyst Partners and PSP Capital, a fund started by Penny Pritzker who was previously Secretary of Commerce in the Obama administration. Deal terms were not announced.

As part of the investment, Bill Jennings, previously president of Page Science, will become CEO of Beachfront, with prior colleague Rich O’Connor becoming CFO. Beachfront co-founder and CEO Frank Sinton will become president, while is co-founder and wife Lisa Connell, will leave the business (both will remain owners).

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No surprise, at last week’s SHIFT // Programmatic Video & TV Ad Summit, the “duopoly” of Google and Facebook came up repeatedly on stage, mainly in the context of how they’re pursuing TV ad dollars and what the TV industry is doing to defend itself. In fact, the whole concept of “programmatic TV” - TV networks data-enabling and automating /streamlining the ad transaction process - pretty much captures what the industry is doing to become more competitive. 

But as I listened to and participated in the SHIFT sessions, one consideration kept coming back to me as possibly being the biggest single influence over how TV advertising evolves in the coming years: the idea that Google and Facebook are single entities, while the TV industry is fragmented with many different powerful players, each with their own agendas, capabilities and resources.

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I’m pleased to present the 397th edition of the VideoNuze podcast with my weekly partner Colin Dixon of nScreenMedia. Many thanks to Brightcove, this week’s podcast sponsor.

This past Wednesday was our 3rd annual SHIFT // Programmatic Video & TV Ad Summit in NYC. There were so many great insights shared by speakers and in today’s podcast, I highlight (and we discuss) 4 main themes that recurred throughout the day.

Taken together, the themes reveal just how significant the challenges are that the ad-supported TV industry now faces. Changes in viewer behavior, ad buyer expectations, competitive forces and technology have created what a number of speakers characterized as an “existential threat” to ad-supported TV’s future.

As Colin and I discuss, there are no silver bullets that neatly address these challenges. The industry is trying a lot of different things, but it’s not clear yet what these efforts will add up to.

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