Not every new platform works for local-direct clients! Philip Jay LeNoble, Ph.D.

Advertisers Value Addressable TV... But Lack Consensus On Defining It

• by Karlene Lukovitz  @KLmarketdaily, Yesterday

Although nearly a third of advertisers consider addressable TV to be a “must-buy,” there’s no real consensus about how to define it. 

So finds a survey of 200 U.S. video advertisers conducted in June for WarnerMedia Ad Sales and DirecTV by Advertiser Perceptions. The survey built on research on addressable and connected TV (CTV) conducted last year. 

Clear majorities agreed that addressable is a reliable way to reach their audiences, and that they are satisfied with the results of their addressable campaigns (85% and 79%, respectively). 

This year, 32% described addressable as a must-buy — up 7 points from 25% in last year’s survey — and 44% as a complementary buy (up from 41%). 

The number considering it a discretionary buy declined to 18%, from 24%, and just 6% consider it an experimental buy (down from 10%). 

Further, 47% said they expect their company or main client to increase spending on addressable TV over the next 12 months (compared with 55% saying the same about CTV). And one in four said they would increase investments in addressable TV if they were provided with addressable/digital cross-screen solutions.

 
While the researchers had their own clear definition of addressable TV (shown above), advertisers tended to define addressable TV holistically, with “targeting” and “targeted ads” being the terms most commonly used, according to the study report.

Asked in a separate question to choose which of several definitions best describes addressable, just over third (37%) picked “Targeted ads dynamically inserted into a content stream, allowing for different ads to be served to relevant households within the same ad break.”

But much smaller percentages chose a variety of other definitions (top of page).

One marketing manager admitted: “Confusion. I can’t quite seem to remember the precise difference between OTT, CTV, addressable, and data-driven, to be honest.” 

Perhaps that’s not so odd: In general, the participating advertisers tended to perceive CTV and addressable TV similarly, suggesting that they view them as complementary rather than as an either/or investment. 

Both are perceived as offering increased ad relevance, incremental reach, and reliable audience targeting. 

However, those who said CTV is most important to achieving their goals tended to agree that addressable TV’s ability to test and learn is its top benefit, implying a desire to experiment with both CTV and addressable, while those who said linear is most important to achieving their goals tended to view addressable’s ability to deliver more relevant ads as its top benefit.Lack of scale is the most-cited obstacle to buying both addressable and CTV (38% and 30%, respectively). 

Inadequate audience and campaign measurement was cited by 32% and 37%, respectively.

 Something to share with a potential or current local-direct Travel Agency: Philip Jay LeNoble, Ph.D.

COMMENTARY

Report: Big Changes Looming For Travel, Tourism Category

• by Richard Whitman , Columnist, Yesterday

TBWA’s cultural intelligence unit Backslash is out with a new report that details looming changes in the travel and tourism category and how brands may need to pivot to exploit new opportunities that the shifts are fostering.

As you would imagine, COVID has been one factor driving change. Also, more people are becoming woke to the harmful effects that previously unlimited travel has had on the environment and on many popular destinations.

“Incessant travel has taken a catastrophic toll on our planet, and a tendency to prioritize tourism dollars over residents’ well-being has destroyed the cultural fabric of our most cherished destinations,” the report states.

The report touches on “anchorless living” and the mainstreaming of the digital nomad lifestyle thanks to work-from-home models set during the pandemic. That, in turn, has triggered more travel from remote work locales. A study earlier this year found that more than half of Americans had already taken a trip, or were planning to, as a result of working remotely.

The hotel business is being transformed as many have begun to focus on subscriptions versus nightly rates.

The insurance business also stands to gain from the shifts. A recent survey found 70% of Europeans and 64% of Americans indicated they would be more likely to purchase travel insurance as a result of the pandemic.

According to the report, wellness-related travel “has officially taken over” the category. The global wellness tourism market reached $735.8 billion in 2020 and is expected to grow at an annual clip of 6.6% to reach $1.2 trillion by 2027. And nearly half (47%) of those polled in a survey indicate wellness and mental health as a top motivator for traveling in 2021.

The report predicts an increase in “responsible restrictions” that will help preserve more popular destinations. “Trips personally planned by locals will distribute visitors more evenly. And a nomadic new business class will stay longer, marking the end of disposable turnaround trips.”

Also, off-grid destinations are gaining in popularity, especially among those who have already done grand tours of Europe and Asia multiple times. The report points to Antarctica’s tourism boom. Over 56,000 tourists visited Antarctica during the 2018-2019 season, and the figure for the 2020-2021 season is expected to surpass 78,500 — more than double the total from a decade ago.

“So if even Antarctic travel is edging toward the mainstream, what’s next?” the report asks. It partially answers the question, noting the fledgling space ventures being developed by Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, and others.

 

Nielsen Repackages Streaming, Digital Ad Ratings Under New Group

• by Wayne Friedman , 9 hours ago

Nielsen is putting all its streaming measurement products -- programming content, advertising and platforms -- together into a new group, called Streaming Measurement Suite.

The company says the new suite gives clients a better view of the streaming/digital world and will encompass all ad-supported and subscription platforms.

As part of this restructuring, two of the three measurement products in the group will be rebranded.

Nielsen Streaming Video Ratings will now be Streaming Platform Ratings, offering a broad view of data to understand subscription and ad-supported streaming services. Platform Ratings now will survey the top 17 streaming platforms, representing about 85% of the entire streaming market.

Although Nielsen says it has more than tripled the sample size of Streaming Meter Homes, it did not disclose specifics. But media research sources say Nielsen is now up to 18,000 streaming meter homes, up from 6,000 earlier this year.

In addition, Nielsen SVOD Content Ratings will be known now as Nielsen Streaming Content Ratings -- which offers episode-level measurement of individual programming on four of the top five streaming platforms.

Nielsen regularly releases top 10 lists of streaming acquired and original TV series and movies in terms of viewing minutes. The Content Ratings service is used by seven of the top 10 TV network groups and 14 of the top agencies, according to the company.

Nielsen's longtime Nielsen’s Digital Ad Ratings (DAR) will now be a part of the streaming measurement suite. But it will not get a brand refresh. DAR tallies audience measurement for streaming ads on CTV devices.

The company recently added connected TV ad inventory from two of the big smart TV ad providers -- Samsung and Vizio -- to its list of streaming ad inventory, which includes Roku, Amazon, and Hulu.

Nielsen says it captures 100% of streaming minutes on the TV glass; 75% of CTV media spend; and 87% of total video digital ad spend across computer, mobile, and connected TV

 

Local Advertising To See 6.4% 2022 Growth Following Robust 9.9% 2021 Rebound

• by Karlene Lukovitz  @KLmarketdaily, Yesterday

Local U.S. advertising will enjoy 6.4% growth in 2022, to reach $138 billion, following 9.9% growth this year — the strongest recovery seen since the Great Recession, according to Borrell Associates’ just-released 2022 Local Advertising Forecast.

The 2022 forecast is nearly two points higher than the CAGR that local advertising experienced between 2010 and 2020.

Streaming video/OTT is forecast to see the biggest gain — up 18.5%, to $21.3 billion — more than twice as large as broadcast TV advertising.

Other media expected to see large gains include audio/podcasting (17.8%), targeted banner advertising (12.6%) and broadcast TV (12.3%).

Media forecast for declines include radio (-4.6%), print directories (- 11.4%), newspapers (-6%), magazines and other print (-7.5%), and untargeted banner advertising (-4.6%).

Despite strong increases in 2021, nine of 17 different types of media advertising will not attain the levels they saw in 2019: cable TV, outdoor and cinema, all forms of print media, radio, and untargeted banner advertising.

Local TV is the only traditional medium projected to see 2022 spending levels exceeding those of 2019.

However, newspapers’ year-over-year local advertising decline in 2022 is forecast to slow to 6%. The newspaper industry has suffered double-digit declines for the past seven years.

The 2021 and 2022 forecasts reflect the pandemic’s effect of fueling local businesses’ investments in marketing through paid search, social media and streaming video, notes Corey Elliott, Borrell’s executive vice president of market intelligence and lead forecaster.

“SMBs were spending an average of 57% of their budgets on digital advertising prior to the pandemic,” he said. “They hunkered down in 2020 and 2021 and put a lot more into bottom-of-the-funnel marketing to drive business. As a result, we’re now seeing 65% of their budgets going to digital media, and forecasting that it will reach 67% next year.”

Mixed Bag by Markets

The advertising forecasts for many individual markets vary significantly from the national forecast due to factors including local impacts of COVID, business closings, state and local regulations and natural disasters.

Some markets have been devastated by business closings, while others have seen little damage or even enjoyed significant growth in new businesses.

A market’s rate of bounce-back in 2021 will dictate its advertising performance in 2022. Areas that built back faster in 2021 will see modest growth in 2022, while those still recovering this year “will see more explosive growth in 2022,” said Elliott.

For instance, Las Vegas is forecast to see local TV advertising expenditures rise at nearly three times the nationwide average of 12.6% next year, while Lake Placid, New York is forecast to see a 3.5% decline.

Biloxi, Mississippi is forecast to see a 38% gain in streaming video/OTT advertising next year, while other markets may see low single-digit increases.

Other examples:

National spot TV is projected to leap 26.3% in Springfield, Missouri, but dip by 2.9% in Oakland, California.

Cinema advertising is projected to increase 20.3% in Victoria, Texas, but decline by 9.3% in Blacksburg, Virginia.

Cable advertising is forecast to rise 29.3% in Corpus Christi, Texas, but drop 9.7% in Lincoln, Nebraska.

Newspaper advertising is forecast to rise 12.8% in Shreveport, Louisiana, but decline by 14.8% in San Francisco

 

MadHive Expands Google Cloud Operations For Local TV Station CTV Platforms

• by Wayne Friedman , 6 hours ago

Looking to boost its growing connected TV "infrastructure-as-service" for TV station groups, MadHive has struck a deal with SADA, a Google Cloud technology partner, paying it $100 million over six years to expand MadHive’s cloud operations.

This builds on MadHive’s original five-year, $50-million deal with SADA, which was struck last year.

MadHive’s clients include TV stations’ locally based OTT advertising platforms, including Fox Television Station’s FLX; Tegna’s Premion; Hearst Anyscreen and Scripps’ Octane OTT. These locally based OTT operations -- once packaged with local, linear TV media schedules -- add reach to local TV advertising media buys.

For MadHive, the deal adds to the company's efforts around fraud detection, attribution, OTT audience forecasting, and audience based-buying.

In 2019, MadHive struck a deal with Vizio’s Inscape, the smart TV data company, to integrate Inscape data from 11 million smart TVs to help its effort in delivering a national OTT measurement/forecasting tool for advertisers.

 

First Week Of New TV Broadcast Season: Down 20% In L7 Ratings Versus 2019

• by Wayne Friedman , Yesterday

The first week of the current 2021-2022 TV season showed Nielsen-measured viewing improvements over last season. Much of this was due to pandemic-related production delays.

This year is still well behind the 2019-2020 TV season.

The top five English-language broadcast networks’ prime-time shows are down 20% on average to 5.1 million viewers when looking at Nielsen-measured live program-plus-seven days of time-shifted viewing (L7) versus the same week in 2019.

Taking out all sports programming -- just analyzing scripted/unscripted entertainment TV series -- brought that down to 4.8 million, a 19% drop from two years ago.

In 2019, the first week yielded an average 6.4 million viewers through seven days of prime-time programming and 5.9 million for non-sports entertainment programming.

Some 17 entertainment shows topped 10 million or more viewers in 2019. The leading show was CBS' “NCIS” at 16.9 million viewers.

This year, there were just six shows topping the 10 million mark. CBS’ “NCIS” is once again the best -- but at 12.5 million viewers. Second best this season is also a CBS show -- “FBI” -- at 10.5 million.

NBC’s best came from two Chicago-themed dramas -- “Chicago PD” and “Chicago Med” -- at 10.5 million and 10.2 million, respectively.

Fox’s top honors go to “911” (8.8 million) and “The Masked Singer” (6.9 million). ABC scored with “Dancing with the Stars (6.8 million) and “The Rookie” (6.5 million). The CW had “Coroner” (1.05 million) and “Supergirl” (910,000).

In 2020, the first week of the season -- September 21-27 -- had English-language broadcast networks averaging 3.9 million L7 viewers per all prime-time series.

Returning and new TV series were delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Many networks shifted some summer programming into the period.

 

What Happens When Facebook Goes Down? Traffic To The Open Web Soars

• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, Yesterday

What happens when Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp go down for a day? According to some data, traffic to other destinations on the open web jumped by 21%. Thats what an analysis conducted by Taboola of 9,000 digital publishers representing 500 million daily unique users shows.

The graph depicted here shows average daily traffic on the open web (brownish yellow) versus what happened on October 4 (grayish-green).

While it wasn't exactly clear from the data what specific destinations people turned to -- theories have ranged from Twitter to porn -- a Taboola spokesperson noted: "This huge increase highlights the direct traffic – usually trapped within a walled garden – which publishers benefit from when readers don’t access Facebook."

“The adult entertainment space is ripping right now,” said Peter Williams, vice president of Dreamcam, a VR live camming platform for the adult entertainment industry, adding: "We're seeing traffic and time on site numbers like never before, which can only be attributable to the social networks' outages. People are either bored without Facebook and Instagram content to peruse and are looking for something to do. Or, for some who pleasure themselves to sexy Instagram posts, they are looking for other content to do 'use.' It's quite fascinating to watch this unfold.”

Through 4pm (ET) Monday, Dreamcam's site traffic was up 240% vs. the same period a day earlier. Average time on the site was up 49%, and new users increased by 26%.

 

How Facebook's 'Technical Mistake' Affected Some Advertisers

• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, Yesterday

A technical mistake caused Facebook’s global outage on Monday, leaving nearly 3 billion internet users unable to access Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, Santosh Janardhan, Facebook vice president of infrastructure, wrote in a blog post on Tuesday.

People and businesses worldwide rely on Facebook daily to stay connected. “We understand the impact that outages like these have on people’s lives, as well as our responsibility to keep people informed about disruptions to our services,” he wrote. “We apologize to all those affected, and we’re working to understand more about what happened today so we can continue to make our infrastructure more resilient.”

Apologies may not be sufficient for advertisers. Forrester Vice President, Research Director Mike Proulx pointed to “real-time marketing” moments on Twitter, where brands talked about how the outage had widespread implications to the advertising ecosystem because ads weren’t being served for more than six hours across Facebook and Instagram.

Lisa Hamilton, CEO of marketing company Help2u in Australia, told The Wall Street Journal that the disruption made her “blind to 100% of her customers” activities. She said Facebook analytics is crucial to demonstrating the strength of her product delivery and she was unsure what damage the outage would do to the data.

A few hours after the outage began, Twitter wrote “hello literally everyone” in a tweet on its official account, to which Olay replied: “Twitter what’s your skincare routine clearly it’s working.”

Some like Jeff Kupietzky, CEO at messaging company Jeeng, believe that publishers should move away from social media platforms like Facebook, and readers should look to other platforms for their news.

Ryan Brelje, senior product marketing manager at Iterable, pointed to the need for cross-channel marketing. “What happened to all of those social campaigns and retargeted ads they planned?” he said.

Some brands turned to Twitter and others relied on text messages. Postscript saw brands texting customers, nudging them to shop instead of scrolling on social media, where they shared deals and promotions. Some brands that did this include Outer Aisle, Bite, and Braxley Bands.

Postscript saw a 45% increase in number campaigns sent Monday compared to other recent Mondays, which can be attributed to the outage, according to a company spokesperson.

And as the news continues to unfold after the outage and whistleblower Frances Haugen’s revelations about Facebook’s negative impacts on society, and an episode of NewsHour emerged preserved in the American Archive of Public Broadcasting (AAPB), a collaboration between the Library of Congress and Boston public media producer GBH.

In the year 2006, 22-year-old Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg told reporter Judy Woodruff during an interview: “I’m really young, so I have to be thinking about the long term, you know, and how the stuff is going to play out. And I think that the way you achieve the best long-term value is by building real value in the world. So, we focus a lot on our product and what the people who use the service get out of it. Are we actually helping them achieve their goal of understanding the world? And if we can do that, then I don’t think we’re going to have a hard time making a lot of money.” 

Around that time, Facebook announced it would open its social network to anyone, and match the open-door policy of MySpace, which owned 80% of the social networking market. MySpace had become the most visited website, ahead of Google, eBay, and Yahoo.

Advertisers that year spent about $280 million on MySpace, Facebook and other networking competitors. That number for Facebook alone now exceeds $48.48 billion, up 26.6% compared with 2020, according to eMarketer.

 

COMMENTARY

Prospects For Virtual Pay TV Providers: Access Is Up, Viewers Are Another Issue

• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, September 30, 2021

Virtual pay TV providers haven’t replaced traditional pay TV providers yet -- not even close. What’s the long-term prognosis for the business? Meh, maybe.

This isn’t to say individual success stories aren’t being written. According to Rich Greenfield, media analyst of LightShed Ventures, Google’s YouTube TV now has a slight lead over Disney’s Hulu -- just over 4 million.

All good and well. The bottom line is that virtual pay TV providers -- virtual multichannel video program distributors (vMVPDs) -- still haven’t overtaken the industry. It’s been six and a half years since the first real vMVPD service, Dish’s Sling TV, started in February 2015.

The biggest pay TV providers are still Comcast, Cox, DirecTV and Dish Network -- anywhere from 9 million each for Dish TV and DirecTV, and up to 15 million for Charter and 19 million for Comcast.

The virtual pay TV business has been making slow business improvements. But its growth rate -- in terms of adding subscribers -- is slowing. The industry added just 227,000 subs in the second quarter 2021 to total 11.98 million according to MoffettNathanson Research.

At the same time, we see individual streamers distributors gaining speed, especially pure-play streamers like Roku and Amazon Fire TV. Is one business affecting another? Though this is not an apples-to-apples comparison, overlapping services can be an issue for modern TV consumers.

At the same time, we know vMVPDs, such as YouTube TV, can also carry individual VOD streamers, as well as traditional TV networks and local TV stations. Streaming distributors don’t typically handle the latter.

And then there are those still nagging “blackout” situations. Right now, YouTube TV is in a contract squabble with NBCUniversal.

The real question for future home entertainment: Where will consumers want to hang out -- platform-wise? And what’s needed to fill in any gaps?

Do consumers now have easy access to virtually everything they need -- legacy/virtual pay TV providers, streaming distributors and/or individual VOD service through other means?

Yes, on the “access” question. But when it comes to a single TV distribution point? Nope.

For many young TV consumers, this may not be an issue -- in large part because a large and growing percentage aren’t even regular watchers of “TV” in the first place.

So consider other access points in the future -- which only seems to get more complicated.

 

Why De-Duplication Is Becoming The New Reach & Frequency

• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, 7 hours ago

As a journalist who began covering the ad biz in the quaint age of traditional media, one of the first things I learned about media planning and buying was that it was all about reach -- and at least in those days, optimal frequency.

So when I began covering digital, I would ask advertisers and agencies how they planned and bought digital, sometimes direct or sometimes programmatically. And I was told they were buying “uniques.”

So I asked them, how do you know they’re unique? I was being flip, but I was also trying to make a point -- because unlike a traditional medium like TV, where there was an explicit Nielsen “universe estimate,” and the allocation of GRPs (gross rating points) could be used to calculate reach and frequency, there was nothing like that in digital.

Advertisers and agencies were simply buying the monthly uniques of individual publishers, ad networks, etc., but they didn’t actually know how unique -- or incremental -- that audience reach actually was.

That, of course, led to controlled frequency of digital ad exposure, wear-out and frustration from consumers and marketers alike. But is also made it difficult, if not impossible, for digital ad buyers to calculate the true ROI of audience reach.

Over time, digital media created proxies by creating relatively unique identifiers -- browser cookies, device IDs, etc. -- and a slew of models in an effort to fix the problem, which needless to say led to another problem: consumer privacy and data sovereignty that has come home to roost.

So it will be interesting to see how Nielsen’s “One” platform will address that -- at least for its version of an integrated cross-platform TV/video measurement service -- which I assume will have universe estimates, as well as reach and frequency curves.

But recently, I’ve been seeing a number of creative data approaches designed to “de-duplicate” audience reach in a way that seems reminiscent of the advertising and media marketplace I first began covering in the early 1980s.

One was unveiled last week by Interpublic’s Kinesso unit, the data and technology division that was spawned following Interpublic’s acquisition of Big Data giant Acxiom.

While any big consumer data platform worth its salt tries to de-duplicate ad exposure and reach, Kinesso has developed an “intelligent identity” method that seems like a pragmatic, as well as a media neutral solution.

Dubbed Kii (pronounced “key”), the solution licenses data from a cross-section of the best audience identity partners, utilizing a “cascade syndication” model that effectively de-duplicates there unique reach as it ingests the data into its system.

Even better, Kinesso’s Kii utilizes a “pre-match” method that ensures it only acquires -- and pays for -- unique new identities that are added into its database, ensuring that its also cost-effective and cuts out any fat and redundancy.

Although officially unveiled only last week, Kii has already been operational with big Interpublic clients, and Kinesso’s team estimates its already generating as much as 20% improvements in campaign reach delivery.

Another interesting pitch I got about reach and de-duplication wasn’t about media exposure, per se, but it also came from a company named Nielsen -- NielsenIQ the consumer marketing data giant that was spun off from the media measurement version of Nielsen this year.

The new NielsenIQ service, dubbed Omnisales, claims to be the first to enable consumer goods marketers and retailers to attribute -- and de-duplicate -- sales across online, in-store and curbside pick-up transactions.

While it’s not exactly the same as calculating the reach and frequency of media exposure by de-duplicating audiences to calculate incremental reach, NielsenIQ’s Omnisales effectively is doing the same thing for another media channel: physical and digital retail destinations.

And while the company hasn’t actually created reach and frequency modeling for brands and retailers utilizing the platform, it is something the company is looking at, according to Harvey Ma, senior vice president-consumer and retail performance at NielsenIQ.

“Understanding sales and share from this perspective is fundamental to doing business today,” he says, adding, “Consumers’ behavior has irreversibly changed and we will only see exponential growth in the number of those who shop online, in store, or via click-and-collect — and any combination of the three.”

 

COMMENTARY

Gen Z Wants More Diverse Representation In Research

• by Kathy Sheehan , Op-Ed Contributor, October 1, 2021

On a recent panel, we spoke to a Gen Z audience about ways to make research a truly diverse and safe space for all participants.

One example of a company stepping up and filling a void regarding diversity and inclusion is Vice. It launched a binary and trans stock photo library since one didn’t exist.

The diversity in younger generations fuels the need for more inclusive definitions. Gen Z accelerates the demand for better representation—and experiences—in research. The marketplace then adjusts to these demands, creating higher awareness.

Here are five ways companies can improve research to make it inclusive and welcoming for all.

Handling the preference not to answer. Researchers tend to put questions like annual salary at the end of questionnaires because they are deemed sensitive, leading to a drop-off in responses and completion.

But what’s the definition of a sensitive question? It’s different for everyone. For some, checking a box can be an action that’s fraught with anxiety. Checking a gender box can be more sensitive than income. We need to give people a safe space to answer questions.

Do we make questions optional vs. mandatory? Do we include an area for participants to write-in or type answers, so people can express what they are comfortable, with since it may not be an option in a provided drop-down box.

Fixed to fluidon sexuality. The way Gen Z identifies depends on the situation. The hierarchy will shift, so ethnicity will take precedence over sexual preference in one instance, but LGBTQ+ identity will be higher during Pride Month, for example. Companies must keep this in mind when building personas for customers.

Redefine brand sentiment. Brands must walk the walk. Customers will challenge companies on performative marketing efforts. Companies need to do more than place a Pride flag on company letterhead for one month a year. The commitment must run deeper. What is your company doing regarding same-sex couple benefits for employees?

Universal aspirations. Not everyone defines happiness and success in the same way. A gay man not married and child-free by choice, for example, may not need or want to see ads of a gay couple with children. Not everyone under the same ethnicity or sexual identity is painted with the same brush stroke.

Representation means authenticity. Tell stories that connect with consumer segments. They can tell the difference between a genuine connection and phoning it in because it’s the top news subject of the week.