Loading summary
Transcript5 lines
- [00:01]
Adelaide
A word from our sponsors Media verification and measurement are undergoing major disruption. Legacy players are pivoting to performance, advertising AI is reshaping brand safety and attention is replacing viewability. Adelaide is leading this shift with au, a new way to assess media quality that scores placements based on their potential to drive attention and outcomes. Before your ads run, think of it like a credit score for media. Finally, a clear view of quality. Before you buy, take the guesswork out of your investment strategy and try Adelaide AU on your next campaign.
- [00:42]
Audio Hook
This podcast is brought to you by audiohook, the leading independent audio dsp. Audio Hook has direct publisher integrations into all major podcast and streaming radio platforms, providing 40% more inventory than what could be accessed in omnichannel DSPs. What's more, audiobook has full transcripts on more than 90% of all podcast inventory, enabling advanced contextual targeting and brand suitability. Audio Hook is so confident that in addition to CPM buys, they offer the industry's only pay for performance option where brands can scale audio and podcasting with peace of mind knowing they are only paying for outcomes. Visit audiohook.com to learn more. That's audiohook.com.
- [01:27]
Kate
Are the upfronts beginning to fray at the seams? It's a question worth exploring as the industry wrapped up a three day blitz of high profile TV showmanship last week in the name of securing Mega up front. Wonder where they got the name from? Linear and streaming TV investments I'm Kate with marketecture and this is the Refresh, your weekly download on what went down in advertising. This week we're covering off on key themes from the upfronts, the trade desk rollout of OpenSensera and Microsoft's announcement that they'll be shutting down Xander so let's get into it. Back to our original question. Are the upfronts beginning to fray at the seams? Maybe. But fraying seams also offer opportunities for upcycling. Aligning to massive cultural moments will always be in vogue for brands, but the way that they do so and the priorities that drive those decisions are shifting. TV networks and streaming platforms are beginning to bend to the pressure of an ad industry that's increasingly prioritizing the tech side of the equation. And at this year's upfronts, that was more clear than ever. While Upfronts presenters built hype around celebrity names, Internet personalities and memorable entertainment bits, I think these underlying tech advancements are what will actually persuade brands and media buyers to make larger investment commitments. Commitments. So from a tech perspective, what did we see at this year's upfronts. First of all, the F word flexibility. In the face of never ending economic uncertainty, advertisers have learned to deal by seeking out opportunities that give them the agility they need. Programmatic buying offers the turnkey setup that brands and media buyers need and are beginning to demand more of, and TV networks and streaming platforms alike are beginning to accommodate this. Netflix officially rolled out their ad tech platform Netflix Ad Suite earlier this year in the US and Canada and will launch it in EMEA sometime this week. And earlier this year, Disney rolled out the ability to activate media programmatically on live event inventory, specifically on espn. This more accessible activation circumvents upfront spend commitments and allows more advertisers to get in on the action. We also saw a lot of announcements related to AI powered campaign execution, including audience segmentation, media decisioning and creative production. Disney, Netflix, YouTube, Fox, Amazon all announced capabilities that use advanced AI to understand when to insert an ad or how to align an ad to the emotional context of a scene. One thing that did surprise me a bit here was seeing creative production get a boost from generative AI. Not because this isn't one of the most logical use cases for the tech, but because it was rolled out during events dedicated to showcasing big TV moments that often go hand in hand with massive creative efforts that are not going to be using generative AI. If this can be done really well, it will be a huge value add for brands. This remains to be seen, but networks and platforms have a lot riding on products like this, so I'd anticipate they've made sure that they're going to get it right. Our final tech theme Measurement and this isn't necessarily a new trend. The industry talks a lot about interoperability, especially with data providers, but TV buying partners are actually creating it with the renewed emphasis on integration with data clean rooms like Snowflake and Liveramp taking the spotlight at this year's upfronts. Plugging into a platform's data clean room allows advertisers better line of sight into performance on each respective platform. But this does come with an asterisk unless brands are able to port data into their own data clean room instance, and this inherently assumes the brand has their own data clean room relationship. The challenge for advertising advertisers who are buying across multiple platforms is still going to be understanding what's happening across the entirety of their buy. Brands may still need a more sophisticated measurement partner to understand variables like reach, frequency, audience or platform overlap, and even business outcomes within the investment as a whole. All in all, the upfronts are still about building cultural and consumer clout through being present in some of society's biggest TV moments. But I think many buyers have added another requirement into the equation. What ad tech capabilities will also provide differentiated, smart and legitimately measurable ways to reach their audiences. Moving over to the Trade Desk who rolled out Open Sincera last Tuesday, May 13?
- [05:07]
Audio Hook
This podcast is brought to you by Freewheel. Freewheel gives advertisers direct connections to streaming video inventory from the world's leading publishers. It's simple, really. They're removing middlemen, which means more working media dollars, better outcomes and enhanced control. Discover how it pays to go direct visit freewheel.com architecture that's freewheel.com architecture.
- [05:31]
Kate
OpenSensera will be a free API integration that builds on Sincera's core product offering, which shows ad impression data from publishers and tech vendors, including environmental signals like ad formats on a page, refresh rates on those ads, and then media signals like which alternative IDs are present. So how has the industry historically used Sincera? Most use cases ladder back up to media quality, which ultimately supports media performance. Their site lists outputs like MFA identification, attention based buying, inventory quality, privacy compliance, competitive analysis and audience targeting verification. The rollout creates more stickiness for the trade desk, as OpenSensera has a potential to offer a viable alternative to verification giants like DoubleVerify and IAS. From a broader perspective, the industry desperately needs more transparency into what is actually happening before, during and after an ad impression is delivered. This is a legitimate step toward transparency and accountability within the Open web while also being very on brand for the trade desk. The company that has positioned itself as a champion of the premium Open Web Open Sincere will begin beta testing in early August, according to a LinkedIn post from CEO and co founder Mike O' Sullivan. Wrapping things up with Microsoft's announcement that they'll be shutting down Microsoft Invest, which most in the industry fondly know as Xander or App Nexus. Microsoft also confirmed the SSP and publisher Ad Tech, AKA Microsoft Monetize, will remain as is. With this move, Microsoft isn't getting out of the demand side game. Instead, they're working toward what they and many others are increasingly viewing as a future of Media Activation, a chatbot style ad buying product which for Microsoft will be powered by their own copilot. And if there were any doubts on the direction Microsoft is steering toward the title of their blog post announcing Xander's closure, empowering Businesses for Future that is conversational, personal and agentic made their intentions very clear in an ad tech landscape that's becoming cluttered with DSPs that all tend to offer the same thing while also saying no, no, I'm not like those other guys. This is a pivot toward true differentiation that Microsoft should be making, and James Hercher over at Ad Exchanger made a solid point in his article covering the news. Microsoft has never done an outstanding job of monetizing their own properties the way Meta or Google has. This shift gives them much more latitude to do just that for the ad tech industry. The final line from Microsoft's blog post announcing the change offers a slightly ominous but also motivating call to action. Our commitment to more private and personalized advertising experiences for a more agentic and conversational world is not achievable with the industry's current DSP model, which therefore no longer aligns with our investment in this future. Each of our stories this week is a bellwether for an ad industry that's seeing disruption gaining steam. Companies are not just exploring advanced AI solutions, but implementing them in more intelligent, intentional ways, and those that can't advance their tech quickly enough will be gradually left behind. That's all we have time for today. Thanks for joining us for the refresh, and we'll catch you next time.