Upfront 2026-27: 'What's A Network?'

• by Joe Mandese , Yesterday

Over the years, the annual upfront media-buying season has sometimes been likened to lemming-like “herd mentality” behavior, but Carat Chief Investment Officer Carrie Braverman Drinkwater used that metaphor in a completely different context during MediaPost’s “Upfront 2026-27” Outfront Forum panel to illustrate why the major TV networks may be less in command of driving the market than ever before.

She closed the panel by sharing a personal anecdote about what happened when she and other multi-generational members of her family played a popular board game called “Herd Mentality” in which players pick cards with questions on them and predict how the rest of the herd will guess.

“One of the questions was, 'What’s your favorite network?'," and it was like ‘What, what do you mean “a network?”’, Drinkwater recalled, adding: “Even the grandparents were, 'Well, can you explain?' It was wild."

Drinkwater used to the anecdote to remind Outfront attendees that it’s not just industry media buyers who are changing how they view the television marketplace, but most consumers too.

Aside from “network” pronoun recall, the panel unlocked other insights about how the upfront marketplace is changing – and in some ways, how it is not.

One of the most important ones for me was how the panel answered a question I’ve asked Outfront panelists for years: Do they plan to register their budgets with the networks the same way they have since I began covering the marketplace in the early 1980s.

After decades of saying yes, this year’s panel indicated a change in the status quo. While two of the panelists didn’t answer my question at all, two of them indicated they would likely share some budget information with the networks in advance of their negotiations, but not in the way they have in the past.

“Let’s just say we’ll have conversations,” said Canvas Worldwide Chief Investment Officer Ed Gentner, adding: “It’s not like always in the past, 'On May 15th, here’s the spreadsheet with our budgets.’”

"It’s not, 'Here’s how much by client'," added Carat’s Drinkwater, noting: “It’s not a traditional registration. It’s 'an intent-to-spend'."

One way the upfront marketplace hast not changed -- at least not completely -- is the integral role Nielsen’s audience ratings estimates will play.

“The large majority of the business is still transacting with a lot of the bigger media companies based on Nielsen,” Canvas’ Gentner said, adding, “That’s why it’s such a big deal right now.”

By “big deal,” Gentner was referring to some obligatory Nielsen data snafus that have created confusion, uncertainty and a delay in releasing accurate audience-planning data so advertisers and agencies can estimate their upfront advertising deals heading into upfront negotiations.

“They’ve been disappointing this year,” Gentner said, adding that one of the reasons Nielsen continued to serve as the primary advertising currency heading into this upfront was the long-term stability of its audience data.

“The stability isn’t there,” Gentner noted, adding: “the goalposts keep moving.”

That said, all of the panelists concurred that as important as Nielsen’s "currency" data is for negotiating deals, agencies -- and especially their clients -- have moved away from audience impressions data and much more toward outcomes-based measures, ROI and ROAS (return on ad spending) analyses and rely much more heavily on their own proprietary modeling in terms of the actual reach and frequency their upfront buys will deliver.

 

Commentary

More Sports on Linear, Streamers? There's A Price to Pay

• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, Yesterday

Although sports continues to make ever larger inroads into TV and streaming platforms, the majority of content spend of seven major media companies will still be centered on non-sports entertainment programs, according to one market analysis.

By 2028, around 20% to 40% of spending among three legacy media companies -- Paramount Skydance (including Warner Bros. Discovery), NBCUniversal and Walt Disney -- will be on sports programming, according to MoffettNathanson Research.

Paramount Skydance is projected to be at 20% of a total $34.1 billion in overall content spend, while NBCUniversal is estimated at 27% of $22.6 billion and Walt Disney is projected to be at 40% of $27.0 billion.

The only outlier here is Fox Corp., estimated at 63% of $9.3 billion.

At the lower end of their respective sports TV content share of their content spend are digital-first companies: Netflix (6% of $20.9 billion) and Amazon Prime Video (19% of $14.5 billion).

These estimates also include an expected sharp 50% in the upcoming renegotiation that the NFL will have with five media companies, which would lift overall annual TV rights fees to around $15 billion from $11 billion.

Complicating this process is the FCC, headed by chairman Brendan Carr. It is pushing to possibly stop the NFL's highly valued 65-year-old antitrust exemption -- which allows them to collectively bargain for all its 32 teams.

Carr believes that the NFL on free, over-the-air TV is still permissible, while deals involving streaming platforms are not.

Other big new sports negotiations are starting up in the next two years. These include national TV right deals for Major League Baseball with Fox, ESPN, Warner Bros. Discovery and NBC in 2028. There will also be a new deal with the NHL for ESPN and Warner Bros. Discovery that year.

 

Commentary

The Ever-Changing Role of The Upfront In 2026

• by Cory Treffiletti , Featured Contributor, Yesterday

Do you remember when the upfront was simple? Networks flew buyers to New York, threw lavish parties, showed highlight reels of their fall lineups, and checks were written. Done. It was a scarcity game, with only so many prime-time slots available, and if you wanted them, you played by the rules of the calendar.  It was a carnival of television media buying, and everyone wanted to be part of it.

That world is gone.  It changed.  The 2026 upfront season is the clearest evidence yet of just how much it has changed.

The upfront used to be about one thing: television. Specifically, broadcast television. More specifically, prime-time broadcast television. The networks controlled the inventory, buyers needed reach, and the annual May ritual locked in the deals that fueled the fall season. It was a comfortable monopoly that everyone accepted, dressed up as a marketplace.

Now, with upfront presentations scheduled from companies like Amazon, Netflix, Tubi, and Roku sitting alongside the traditional broadcast networks, the definition of “the upfront” has expanded so dramatically that it barely resembles its origins. Amazon is holding its own upfront on May 11 at the Beacon Theater in New York, on the same night as NBCU at Radio City Music Hall. That’s not a footnote. That’s a statement about who the players are now.

The numbers tell the story. In last year’s market, streaming commitments grew to $13.2 billion, a 61% increase from just two years prior, while total linear TV upfront sales sat at $17.8 billion, down 3% from the year before. The gap is closing fast, and the dollars are following the eyeballs.

Streaming surpassed broadcast and cable’s combined time spent for the first time in May 2025, and again in June. That milestone matters because the upfront was always a bet on where audiences will be. The answer to that question continues to change.

What’s fascinating about this year specifically is that the upfront isn’t just expanding to include more players. It’s being asked to do something it was never designed to do. The old upfront locked in reach. The new upfront is being asked to lock in technology and outcomes.

Nielsen’s 2026 Upfront Planning Guide argued that linear, streaming, and FAST should be treated as an integrated ecosystem, with each attracting a distinct audience profile. That’s a very different conversation from “how many households will see our ad in prime time?” It’s a more complicated, more nuanced, and frankly more honest conversation about how people actually watch television today. 

If you couple this with the fact that more companies are touting technology, AI, algorithmic buying and new creative formats, you come to see this more as the kind of event typically heralding change from Apple, and less like traditional TV upfronts.

Another dynamic that makes this year’s upfront uniquely interesting is the role of sports. Live sports have essentially become the last true must-buy in the traditional sense, the one category where scarcity still drives urgency in the way the entire upfront market once did. NBCU reported its highest ad sales volume in company history, largely driven by live events including the Milan-Cortina Olympics, Super Bowl LX, and the FIFA World Cup, collectively breaking previous sales records.

Meanwhile, sports accounted for nearly 30% of all ad-supported TV viewing among adults 25-54 in Q4 2025. The sports rights arms race across streaming has made this even more acute, with the NBA now split across Peacock, Amazon Prime, and NBC, and the dollars following accordingly.  This opens up opportunities for media buyers even as it creates confusion in the eyes of the audience itself.

So, what is the upfront these days? It’s a portfolio negotiation. It’s a conversation about the full video ecosystem, covering linear, streaming, FAST, live sports, and creators, all at once, with multiple sellers, multiple currencies, and multiple definitions of success.

The theater of it all remains (the parties, the presentations, the swag), but the underlying business has transformed. The upfront used to be the moment when television advertising was decided for the year. Now it’s more like the opening bell of a much longer conversation that the old model never imagined -- one that continues through the scatter market, programmatic deals, and real-time optimization 

The ritual persists. The reality is something else entirely, and this year makes that clearer than ever.

 Business

BIA Hikes ’26 Local Ad Forecast To $184.5B

Apr 9, 2026| TVN Staff

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BIA’s forecast highlights a two-speed market and key growth verticals while introducing DOOH ad forecast estimates to the media mix.

BIA Advisory Services has revised its 2026 U.S. Local Advertising Forecast (released in Q4 2025), projecting total local ad revenue to reach $184.5 billion, reflecting approximately 8.1% year-over-year growth compared with 2025. The increase over the prior estimate of $181.7 billion is driven by stronger-than-expected performance in mobile (particularly social), video, and streaming, political ad spend, and advertising technology.

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Excluding political advertising, the 2026 forecast is now $176.1 billion, up from the previous $172.7 billion.

“Our updated forecast reflects continued momentum in social and connected and over the top television, which are capturing a growing share of local advertising budgets,” said Senan Mele, VP of forecasting and data analysis, BIA Advisory Services. “At the same time, traditional media such as broadcast television, cable and radio remain essential, providing the scale, credibility, and local connection that advertisers rely on to drive awareness and demand.”

Political advertising will drive key spending this year. BIA projects approximately $8.4 billion in local political spending, creating substantial revenue opportunities across broadcast television, linear cable, CTV/OTT, radio, and direct mail.

BIA’s forecast also points to two growth factors driving the local advertising economy: near-term revenue from political spending and long-term growth fueled by key verticals, including real estate, restaurants, travel, retail, and financial services. Total local advertising is projected to exceed $222 billion by 2030, according to BIA’s forecast.

“The local advertising marketplace continues to reflect a K-shaped consumer economy,” said Rick Ducey, managing director, BIA Advisory Services. “Stronger spending from higher-income households is supporting discretionary categories like travel, leisure, and automotive, while value-oriented spending is shaping demand in retail, restaurants, and essential services.”

The forecast update also underscores the ongoing transformation of the media mix. Growth is being driven by digital channels — particularly mobile, social, and connected TV — while traditional media continues to play a critical role in delivering reach and brand impact.

As part of this forecast update, BIA has enhanced its methodology to better reflect changes in the marketplace, including adding Digital Out of Home (DOOH) as a distinct media category within the forecast, rather than grouping it with traditional Out of Home (OOH). This change highlights the increasing importance of digital, programmatic, and location-based media in local campaigns.

While some legacy formats, including print, continue to face long-term declines, others are evolving. Across the market, advertisers are increasingly adopting full-funnel strategies, combining high-reach media such as cable, broadcast, and OOH with data-driven digital channels to drive both awareness and measurable outcomes. Radio also remains a stable local medium, with additional opportunities emerging through digital audio, including streaming and podcasts.

“Overall, the local advertising market is not contracting; it is transforming. The most successful media companies will be those that can combine local audience scale with targeting, optimization, and measurement to capture both cyclical political spending and ongoing demand from growth-oriented verticals,” added Mele.

 Share this one with your local-direct clients to help them understand better what most brands get wrong: Philip Jay LeNoble, Ph.D.

What Most Brands Get Wrong Measuring Influencer Marketing ROI

• by Maria Bailey , Columnist, Yesterday

Influencer marketing ROI is measured by combining engagement, content output, consumer intent signals, and retail impact, not just impressions or reach. Many brands make the same mistake when they launch an influencer marketing campaign.  They treat influencer marketing like awareness media, when it’s a behavior-driven channel.

If you’re evaluating partners or building a campaign, understanding how measurement works is just as important as execution.

If you’re only measuring impressions, you’re missing most of the value that an influencer campaign creates for your brand. Some brands value the library of UGC content as much as they do the reach of the program.  One brand was recently able to save over $100,000 in product costs by using UGC content for CRM and ecommerce pages.

Engagement rate (not just likes). Engagement rate shows how much your audience cares, not just how many people saw your content.

A strong campaign typically delivers ~1%+ engagement or higher, depending on the influencer mix. The increase in engagement rate is obtained by carefully aligning the right influencers with the brand.

Total engagement volume. This is where scale meets impact. Instead of asking: “How many people saw this?,” brands should ask: “How many people interacted with this?”

Tens of thousands of engagements in a campaign signal real consumer interest. It's important not only to measures likes and shares, but to read and scrape all comments for insights and trends as it pertains to your brand.  There is a great amount of valuable information for the brand within the comments of social posts.

User-generated content output. UGC is one of the most undervalued ROI drivers. If distribution is king, content is queen. With so much social media consumption, brands must spend millions to produce enough content to keep consumers engaged.  Not only does it save brands a lot of money in production expense, but UGC content is known to perform better with consumers. With the right usage agreement with influencers, brands could have up to one year usage rights.

What this really means is you’re not just buying reach. You’re building a content engine. When you work with an influencer agency, make sure that all raw content is delivered to you at the end of the campaign. 

Consumer intent signals.  Intent signals are the clearest indicator that influencer marketing is working.

Brands can also survey all influencers for their comments on the product, since many will be gifted the product.

Retail and purchase behavior. If your product is sold in stores or online retail, this is where influencer marketing becomes a sales channel. It’s also important to support the ecommerce destinations of these major retailers. Many buyers want to see traffic to your product pages.

Brands can increase the ROI on their influencer campaign by executing a few key practices:

• Leverage long-term relationships with influencers to match content creators who are fully aligned with the brand’s values.
• Avoid oversaturating content creators.
• Communicate clear brand messaging and goals to influencers so they have direct instructions on helping your brand reach its goals.
• Follow all FTC rules.
• Leverage collaboration and whitelisting of UGC.
• Select influencers based on historical data like engagement rates, sales data and more.

Final Thoughts

The best way to measure influencer marketing ROI is to track how content drives action, not just how many people see it.

When done correctly, influencer marketing delivers high engagement, scalable content, strong consumer intent and measurable retail impact.