A Multidimensional Look at TV Advertising: Chess Anyone?

Where to start How amp8216bout level oneTelevision and VideoAs the saying goes all television is video but not all video is televisionamp160 Television is still synonymous with long form linear storytelling shot with one or more cameras and possessing certain levels of technical quality or production values as we like to sayamp160Meanwhile video has moved beyond the old tape or binary medium for capturing audio and video information to now becoming synonymous with nontraditional shortform social entertainment a la YouTube with production values only as shiny as they need to be for a given audienceamp160amp160 In fact some of todayamp8217s most popular YouTube Video series like amp8220Smoshamp8221 amp8220Super Carlin Brothersamp8221 amp8220Markiplieramp8221 and amp8220PewDiePieamp8221 sorry had to say it generate tens of millions of views letamp8217s call them impressions every monthSure there are some challenges when trying make applestoapples comparisons between YouTube and television but these are still regular bankable numbers that The CW or any young skewing cable network would love to haveamp160 Since advertising chases attention the business of television and video are merging to become the business of TV a brilliant moniker that when spoken out loud conjures up the historic gravitas of amp8220TVamp8221 complete with images of amp8220The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carsonamp8221 amp8220Knots Landingamp8221 amp8220Sesame Streetamp8221 and amp8220The Walking Deadamp8221 When expressed in print TV optically communicates the parity that video now enjoys alongside television as an advertising mediumamp160All TV is either amp8220linearamp8221 or amp8220ondemandamp8221amp160 Linear traditional broadcast cable and satellite television is funded through advertising andor subscription dollars while ondemand is either subscription supported SVOD or ad supported AVODWhich brings us to level twoMetrics and AnalyticsHaving moved beyond just diaries and people meters the Nielsen Company the industryamp8217s baseline for measuring all things ad supported is now rolling out more sophisticated means of championing total audience measurement across multiple platforms and devicesamp160 This is important and long overdue but has little to do with Nielsenamp8217s true value which actually lies within its role as common currency allowing all the players in the TV ecosystem namely incumbent networks and advertisers to agree on a metric for economic exchangeamp160 This is why Nielsen will never be amp8220toppled by a competitoramp8221amp160 In a 70 billion television economy there can only be one currencyThat said Nielsen only represents the horizontal amp8220Xamp8221 axis in a larger XY audience measurement universeamp160amp160 Blue chip advertisers like those in the consumer packaged goods automotive and big pharma categories must still amp160plan buy and post their multimillion dollar television campaigns against Nielsenamp8217s catchall Uber metric as thereamp8217s really no other way to control that much money over such a long spending cycle often 24 months from planning to postingamp160amp160 amp160These big spenders and de facto underwriters of traditional linear television are more or less stuck with the blunt metrics of household ratings and demographic categories like amp8220women 1849amp8221However alwayson digital devices are simultaneously providing oceans of audience measurement data feeding into the vertical amp8220Yamp8221 axis of this rapidly developing world amp160This hybrid matrix approach also allows television advertisers to finally stop measuring just the amp8220inputsamp8221 from their campaigns like gross ratings points and CPMs and start measuring business driven amp8220outputsamp8221 like sales retention and loyaltyamp160 Whatamp8217s more improved insights gleaned from the Y axis are also allowing chief marketing officers the ability to start embracing the burgeoning practice of amp8220programmaticamp8221 ad buyingLong a standard practice on the web aka automated behavioral marketing this idea of finding customers and prospects based on where they are instead of where broadcast and cable networks think they should be is now coming to television courtesy of the big data gleaned from digital setup box information productized by companies like comScoreRentrak TiVoTRA and Simulmediaamp160amp160 In short what worked for advertisers on the web is now coming to televisionThat takes us to level threeComplexity Fraud amp8230 and Blocking The digitization of the media industry television now included has created fabulous advances in the accuracy and efficiency of advertising and audience measurementamp160 Unfortunately it has also spawned a ratamp8217s nest of complexity and fraud amp160amp160To understand complexity one need look no further than Lumascapes for different views of todayamp8217s digital video landscapeamp160 Hundreds of companies of varying ages shapes and sizes some competing some cooperating but all fighting for their share of attention dollarsAs for fraud a recent ANAWhite Ops report in 2015 found that anywhere from 3 to 37 percent of advertisersamp8217 display ad spending had fallen prey to amp8220botsamp8221 while roughly 25 of all video ads suffered the same fateamp160 In 2015 fake traffic cost the advertising industry 63 billionamp160 Maybe a small sum today but as CPMs for display and search ads continue to fall also aggravated by dueling demand and supply side servers systematically commoditizing inventory premium ad dollars will continue to move to video Unfortunately so too will the ever more sophisticated versions amp160of fraud amp160And sure ad spending on digital video is only about a 10 billion space at the moment but itamp8217s on a double digit growth curve and when we fold in broadcast cable satellite mobile and OTT the amp8220blendingamp8221 of all TV ad measurement will be harder and harder to follow and thatamp8217s assuming the ads running over these rails are even being seenMeanwhile the target of all this ad noise the consumers have voted with their feet or eyes in this case effectively saying amp8220we donamp8217t want ads anywayamp8221amp160 Indeed one of the baseline paradigms of the digital age is that ultimately the consumer is in charge and will use technology to fine tune his or her own preferences and experiencesamp160 Too many ads amp160Fine weamp8217ll turn amp8216em offAccording to AdobePageFair ad blocking grew by 48 last year or roughly 45 million active users As far as many webmobile users are concerned the old amp8220intrusionamp8221 model of advertising is over itamp8217s just going to take a while before the big agency holding companies are willing to admit itAlternatively SVOD platforms like Netflix Hulu and Amazon are immune to the problemamp160 They have highquality longform film andor television programming that users are willing to pay foramp160 Theyamp8217re closer to the TV end of the TV spectrum and quite comfortable mining their own amp8220big dataamp8221 in support of their own inhouse audience measurement forecasting and program acquisitiondevelopment budgetsBut not everyone is going to pay for all the video they want all the time Any MCNs or videobased siteschannels with paid subscription tiers already know this amp160So the key question becomes how can todayamp8217s publishers and advertisers make AVOD work when its key supporting elements namely viewable ads seems doomed to failWays to WinAt the industry level standards bodies like the IAB are helping tidyup the desktop and mobile video advertising space with viewability and verification supports built into modern video players VAST VMAP VPAID etc while slow but steady progress from the broadcasting community ATSC 30 ASPEN AIMS EIDR and AdID is also helping put edges on how linear television will find its way into the TV cloudHowever some kind of universal respect for consumer attention will also somehow need to be baked into this same development path a path that will need to include the dismantling or circumventing of the current ad tech ecosystem and replacing it with a dramatically more streamlined transparent viewable and measureable solution amp160amp160amp160amp160amp160amp160amp160amp160amp160amp160amp160amp160But itamp8217s hard to tell if thereamp8217s enough pain to make any or all of this happen anytime soonamp160 How many billions of dollars in fake advertising will have to be lost to dubious supply and demand side server farms before the inflection point hitsamp160 And even if the traffic is sourced and authenticated are all the commissions doled out to agencies and ad exchanges amp160 the middle men and gate keepers wedged between advertisers and their customers worth the fees when software and algorithms are doing all the heavy liftingamp160 amp160amp160And why fork over the commissions when all these third parties are doing is just coming up with more ways to drive away more eyeballsMaintaining the integrity of an ad supported TV experience in an increasing ondemand world is the game at handamp160 As we can see it has many layers players and challengesamp160 From a distance it seems confusing and hard to playamp160 But within its multidimensional matrix of choice and noise a clear amp8220signalamp8221 is waiting to emerge and when it does weamp8217ll all find new ways to play and new ways to winImage at top courtesy of Corbis The opinions and points of view expressed in this commentary are exclusively the views of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillageMyersBizNet management or associated bloggers

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A Multidimensional Look at TV Advertising: Chess Anyone?

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