How Mike Law Is Navigating the CTV Targeting Puzzle at Carat

Summary

Next in Media – Podcast Summary

Episode: How Mike Law Is Navigating the CTV Targeting Puzzle at Carat

Host: Mike Shields
Guest: Mike Law, CEO of Carat North America
Date: March 31, 2026

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Mike Shields speaks with Mike Law, CEO of Carat North America, about the rapidly evolving landscape of Connected TV (CTV) advertising. As media, marketing, and advertising are reshaped by technology and data, they tackle critical questions on CTV’s targeting capabilities, fragmentation challenges, the blending of traditional and new video platforms, and the role of AI and human strategy in media planning. This wide-ranging conversation offers insights into balancing data-driven targeting with reach, the shifting definition of TV, the rise of creator media, and the future of media planning in an AI-centric industry.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The New Definition of TV and CTV

• TV is Anything on a Big Screen:
  • Mike Law emphasizes the blurred lines between “traditional TV” and streaming/CTV, with “TV” now defined as “anything that pops up on the big screen” (00:00, 02:08).
• Evolution of Targeting:
  • CTV’s promise was precise targeting, but overly relying on addressability can stifle brand growth and lead to audience siloing (00:06, 03:08).
  • Quote:

    "Brands have gotten too addressable at times and then they've become so siloed in who they're targeting that they forgot about growing the brand and growing the business."
    – Mike Law (00:06, reiterated at 03:08)

2. Balance Between Targeting and Reach

• Challenge of Fragmentation:
  • There’s immense data and provider fragmentation, plus technical limitations, making it tough to define and reach the right audiences (00:27, 07:00).
  • Real-World Example:
    • Ads are often mis-targeted, such as a child watching Disney receiving a B2B ad due to household-level targeting (07:46–08:10).
• No One-Size-Fits-All Approach:
  • Brands often toggle between hyper-targeting (especially in tough business times) and broader audience acquisition for sustained growth (05:19).
  • Quote:

    “We need to go find new audiences . . . the audience that got you there may not be the one that…”
    – Mike Law (05:26–06:02)

3. Limitations and Pitfalls of CTV Targeting

• Technology is Not Yet Perfect:
  • IP-based or household-level targeting is imperfect and may lead to inefficiencies or wasted impressions (09:07–09:18).
  • Quote:

    “We try to over-technical TV and video when we should be thinking about the reach extension."
    – Mike Law (09:18)

• TV as a Unique Medium:
  • TV (including CTV) remains unmatched for reach, community-building, and live events, which performance channels can't replicate (09:18–10:25).

4. YouTube, Social Video & the Changing Video Landscape

• YouTube’s Role:
  • YouTube is rapidly becoming more like TV, especially from a viewer’s perspective, but some brands still hesitate to see YouTube as a “TV” property due to legacy mindsets (11:10–12:29).
  • Quote:

    “I am in the camp that YouTube is becoming more and more like TV every day and I wasn’t paid to say that.”
    – Mike Law (12:44)

• Budgeting and KPIs Drive Platform Choices:
  • Channel selection is influenced by campaign KPIs, whether focused on reach or on targeting, and by whether budget is from brand or performance teams (12:29).
• Complexity of Modern Media Planning:
  • Today’s user journey is chaotic and multi-platform; planning must consider a constantly shifting and fragmented landscape (13:26–14:48).

5. Creators as a Force in Modern Video

• Creator Content as Scalable TV:
  • Creator-driven episodic content now rivals traditional TV in duration and reach, and should be considered in upfront and reach calculations (14:48–16:16).
  • Quote:

    “We have to be much broader in our definitions of what TV and video are today.”
    – Mike Law (16:42)

• Micro-drama and New Formats:
  • New content formats (e.g., 90-minute movies released as 3-4 minute vertical videos) add layers of complexity for measurement and planning (17:35–18:33).

6. Evolving Role of Media Planners & the Human Element

• Automation and AI Are Reshaping, Not Replacing:
  • Though media planning is increasingly data and AI-enabled, human strategy, creativity, and judgment are still critical (20:29–21:34).
  • Quote:

    “The power of humanity to be seeing and feeling what’s happening in real time, to put in the right inputs into these systems . . . I don’t agree that we don’t need people. . . . We’ve dubbed this year the human renaissance.”
    – Mike Law (20:29–21:34)

• Planners will Collaborate Closer with Strategy and Insight Teams:
  • As technology handles more optimization, planners will focus on differentiation, messaging, and innovating brand experiences that machines can’t replicate (23:32–24:18).

7. The Agentic Future of Media Buying

• Cautious Optimism on Agentic Technologies:
  • Autonomous “agents” will allow more efficient optimization, but industry needs guardrails, regulation, and human oversight to avoid inefficiency, excess fees, and generic sameness in advertising (24:18–26:39).
  • Quote:

    “Could agents go out and buy media and optimize on their own? I think that absolutely… Should they or will they is the question.”
    – Mike Law (26:10–26:15)

8. What’s Exciting and What’s Frustrating Right Now

• Excited About:
  • The reaffirmation of the value of creativity, content quality, and the human element in an AI-driven era (27:57–28:33).
• Cautious About:
  • The fragmentation of tools and data, urging the industry to collaborate and establish standards rather than rush headlong into automation (27:57–28:39).
  • Quote:

    “All this talk around AI, agentic, automation has highlighted… the importance of the humans in our industry and the value of creativity.”
    – Mike Law (27:57)

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• On Over-Targeting Risks:

  "Brands have gotten too addressable at times and then they've become so siloed in who they're targeting that they forgot about growing the brand and growing the business."
  – Mike Law (00:06, 03:08)

• On YouTube’s Shift to TV:

  "I am in the camp that YouTube is becoming more and more like TV every day and I wasn't paid to say that."
  – Mike Law (12:44)

• On the Complexity of Today’s Media Landscape:

  “I've heard it kind of talked about as this bowl of spaghetti… the user cycle is all over the place.”
  – Mike Law (13:26)

• On the Irreplaceable Human Role:

  “We’ve really dubbed this year the human renaissance, because everybody’s so quick to say that AI and automation is going to rule the world. . . . The power of humanity to be seeing and feeling what’s happening in real time, to put in the right inputs into these systems.”
  – Mike Law (20:29–21:34)

• On Agentic Buying:

  “Could agents go out and buy media and optimize on their own? I think that absolutely… Should they or will they is the question. . . . It could go rogue. . . . More likely, it's just going to create a sea of sameness.”
  – Mike Law (26:10–26:56)

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Important Timestamps

• 00:00–01:07: Redefinition of TV, CTV targeting challenges
• 03:08–04:43: Over-targeting and brand growth tension
• 07:00–08:15: Fragmentation and household targeting limitations
• 09:07–10:25: The reach versus precision challenge in streaming
• 11:10–13:01: YouTube’s evolution as a “real” TV platform
• 14:48–16:42: Creator content, integration into traditional media planning
• 20:29–24:18: Changing role of planners in an AI/agentic world
• 24:18–27:04: The promise, pitfalls, and future of agentic optimization
• 27:52–28:39: Industry optimism and the need for collaboration

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Conclusion

This episode delivers a nuanced look at the crossroads of addressability, technology, and creativity in the evolving world of video advertising. Mike Law makes a compelling case for blending data-driven approaches with brand storytelling, cautions against overreliance on automation, and stresses the ongoing need for human insight in media planning. As the definition of TV continues to broaden and creators shift the content landscape, the industry faces both complexity and unprecedented opportunities for impactful advertising.

Transcript

[Mike Law]

We certainly live in a world now where TV is anything that pops up.

[Mike Shields]

That's what people do on the big screen.

[Mike Law]

I think that we have seen the world where brands have gotten too addressable at times and then they've become so siloed in who they're targeting that they forgot about growing the brand and growing the business. The targeting's not always perfect. It picks up on one web search that you did on behalf of somebody

[Mike Shields]

else or it's perceived as being as good as it gets. But it's not perfect.

[Mike Law]

I do think the fragmentation, whether you want to call it walled gardens, whether you just want to say there's a million data sets, a million data providers, it gets really hard to define who your audience is. I am in the camp that YouTube is becoming more and more like TV every day and I wasn't paid to say that. Millions of people are cutting the cord and moving to CTV only and to streaming services only. We can't then go to those services, put on all the data layers and say I've lost all my reach. And I thought you said everybody watches ctv. And that is why I do think that data and technology and using AI and those tools to help us solve it will be important. With the touch of humanity in the center.

[Mike Shields]

This week on NEXT Immediate, as part of my new special series with the folks at Go Addressable, I talk with Mike Law, CEO of Carrot North America. Mike and I talked about the challenges in scaling targeted advertising on TV and whether the ad tech win place is up for the task. Mike also discussed how media investment teams are viewing creator media versus TV spending and what needs to happen on the measurement front to make things more compatible. Lots to get into. So let's get started. Hi everybody. Welcome to Next to Media. I'm Mike Shields. My guest this week is Mike Law. He is the CEO of Carrot North America.

[Mike Law]

Hey.

[Mike Shields]

Hey, Mike. Thanks for being here.

[Mike Law]

Good to see you, Mike. Good to see you.

[Mike Shields]

So many things I want to talk to you about. Let's start with ctv because I saw you at ces, it's kind of top of mind. You're an expert on this. I'll ask you an easy open ended one to start because there's so many pieces here. But where, where do you think we are in the TV world in terms of targeting? Is it. Yeah, I think we envisioned one thing with CTV and it's never. No one said it was going to happen overnight, but where do you think we are right now?

[Mike Law]

Yeah. Well, I love that you kind of said TV and then said ctv and interchange the two. Because I think that that's right. I think we have to. First off, we certainly live in a world now where TV is anything that pops up.

[Mike Shields]

That's what people do.

[Mike Law]

Big screen. Yeah. I always used to say, you might remember, like, let's buy tv. Like we watch tv. Right. Like, just simplify it. I think when it comes to targeting and that piece, like, kind of like we've been talking about AI to a degree, like that's not really the story. Right. Like, targeting is no longer the, the. It shouldn't be the headline. It should just be part of the baseline of how we think about buying TV and where the power of video is. Holistically, I think that if we're, you know, debating whether TV's data driven, I mean, it's always been data driven. It's just the data's gotten better and more.

[Mike Shields]

Right, right. We had demos, we had, we had some, you know, there's always something.

[Mike Law]

Exactly, exactly. So I think, you know, it's really about how do you spend that next best dollar? How do you grow brands? I think that we have seen the world where brands have gotten too addressable at times and then they've become so siloed in who they're targeting that they've forgot about growing the brand and growing the business. And I certainly think as we get into more data driven buying, as we get into more potential agentic buying, algorithms driving decisioning, if you don't kind of break out of that, everybody will end up in the, in the same place. It will push everybody to the middle, so every category will have the same insights and start chasing the same consumers. So then all of a sudden the branding does become important. The product becomes important, where you differentiate yourself becomes important. So yeah, addressable important, targeting important, but it's really about kind of how you balance the two to, to drive growth.

[Mike Shields]

Right. Because you don't want television to become where the. At one point the web was 100% retargeting, chased around the same customers and it wasn't. You weren't generating demand or, or taking advantage of the medium strengths where. So you said a lot of things that are interesting because we talked about. I want to ask you about being too addressable, but how do you. This is, this sounds like a crazy question because I hear more and more. There's so much more, so much more activity in addressable television. And that used to mean one thing very specifically. What do you mean when you say that and where is that going right now?

[Mike Law]

Yeah, I think I think you're right. I think in the eye of the beholder or the eye of the deck writer, you could make any claim you wanted about what percent of TV is addressable from zero to a hundred. And there's a, a case for both sides. I, I think that for the most part brands have found a good balance based on, on their business. I still think the, the tendency is when business is not going well that let's go to targeting, let's go get the repeat customer, let's find our audience, let's try to look alike, model performance,

[Mike Shields]

whatever it gets is closest we got

[Mike Law]

to, we gotta zero in because I need to drive short term business growth.

[Mike Shields]

Right.

[Mike Law]

But then the cycle just begins of okay, we've squeezed as much out of those customers as we can. The lookalikes. We've gotten as much of that as we can. We need to go find new audiences. So we, we have a lot of clients now who are, you know, faced with different and new challenges around audiences that they've historically found to be their best customers. So whether it's, they're aging out of the population, whether, you know, there's, there's lots of reasons why the audience that got you there may not be the

[Mike Shields]

one that they're seeing macro consumer shifts that, that are not reflected in their

[Mike Law]

media planning necessarily and what we've really, really focused on. And I, you know, I don't think we're alone in this but you know, this is where the understand deep understanding of audience knowledge, the ability to use your data to say hey, these are the micro audiences that you can grow with helps brands find new customers. And I think that that's, that's really important in this, in this story. So yeah, it's, it's hard to pinpoint what percent is addressable. We could all make up our own data on that. And it's of such a broad definition today. I think it's, it's about balance for growth.

[Mike Shields]

I keep, I keep asking you about how to get more targeted. You're telling me to come to, to that brands maybe go too crazy. But when it comes to trying to get more targeted, like what's in your way? Is it, is it just the fragmentation? Is there a reliable identifier that will help let you do what you want? Like what's, what's kind of what's challenging?

[Mike Law]

I think there's a few things. Yeah. I mean certainly the fragmentation. You know, one of the things and I texted her right after she talked about it at the iab. Alison Levin talking about the need for the industry to be moving forward together. Right. And I do think the fragmentation, you know, whether you want to call it walled gardens, whether you just want to say there's a million data sets, a million data providers, the. It gets really hard to define who your audience is. So that's one end of the spectrum. The other is it's not a perfect science. I think I have a example of a coworker who talks about her daughter watching something on Disney Channel and getting an ad for. Oh, I'll probably get in trouble for this. For the trade desk. Right?

[Mike Shields]

Yeah, that's funny.

[Mike Law]

Yeah. They were targeting my coworker.

[Mike Shields]

Right. There's a really specific audience for that one.

[Mike Law]

She pays the bill. Right. So therefore, by default, it seems like, oh, that's who's in the house. And that's the targeting. And that's, you know, like a one off.

[Mike Shields]

Extremely. But. Yeah, but it's illustrative.

[Mike Law]

But it's. Yes, exactly, exactly. And we've all experienced that. And I've gotten trade desk ads, too. So it does work. Jeff. It's fine.

[Mike Shields]

I've gotten vibe ads. It's funny, I've gotten a lot of B2B CTV ads recently, which is funny.

[Mike Law]

Yeah, Yeah. I think that those are the kind of the ends of the spectrum that, you know, these are some of the challenges in that space. So you can't. It's. It's a really hard in whether it's cb, ctv, any channels. I mean, we even see it in the social channels. Right. The targeting's not always perfect. It picks up on one web search that you did on behalf of somebody else, or it's perceived as being as

[Mike Shields]

good as it gets. But it's not. It's not perfect.

[Mike Law]

Correct, Correct.

[Mike Shields]

What about. Okay, now to get a little bit wonky here, but like, this was a big research topic in CES in the last couple of years, this idea that if you're lying on a. Relying on IP addresses and TV or maybe kidding yourself, it's not that you can't be. That targeting. Targeting doesn't work as well as you think it does. Maybe we should think about households. And that's a broad topic, but what do you. What do you make of that thinking? Have you experienced that challenge?

[Mike Law]

Yeah. Again, I think that this gets into the. The bigger question of just how targeted do you want to be and is it. Is it about one to one targetability, especially?

[Mike Shields]

Is that what television's for?

[Mike Law]

Yeah, especially in, I think, the medium that we're mostly talking about, which is TV and ctv. I still think that this is the channel that has the greatest ability to drive reach and to create these really community driven moments as TV becomes more fragmented. You know, there certainly an argument that it's a performance channel, but what people talk about is how it brings people together. So I talk a lot about live sports, the community of live sports. So yeah, there's, there's plenty of technical challenges to dig into. But I do think that sometimes we try to over technical TV and video when we should be thinking about the reach extension that we're trying to drive. And if we really want to, if we believe that millions of people are cutting the cord and moving to CTV only or to streaming services only, we can't then go to those services, put on all the data layers and say well I've lost all my reach. And I thought you said everybody watches ctv.

[Mike Shields]

Right, right.

[Mike Law]

Cut our, our head off to, to tell. So yeah, I think that we have to, you know, again, what's the KPI that we're trying to drive and then what are the tools that we can use to, to get there?

[Mike Shields]

Shifting gears a little bit. You, you, you mentioned, you know we talked about at the start what's what people think about TV is what's what they're putting on TV. You watch what we're, you know, YouTube has come a long way I think in getting to be legit legitimate. I'm obviously the numbers they have on CT or just television general are impressive and they're, and they're, they're, everything is trending in the right direction but it still seems like they are struggling among some brands to get in that consideration set for television. What do you, where do you see them right now?

[Mike Law]

Yeah, I mean I, I, I, I'll equate it back and I'll age myself a little bit. But back in the day when cable was growing, New York market didn't have fx and I remember they would come in and try to sell the Shield and all those shows and TV buyers were hesitant because they didn't live and experience it. That's not what they were watching.

[Mike Shields]

It's not real to them. Yeah, right.

[Mike Law]

Then it showed up in New York and everyone's like, this is the greatest channel of all time. I can't wait to watch. So I think that YouTube faces some of that same inertia which is we didn't, a lot of people who are responsible for buying television didn't watch YouTube on their TV. But I will say as a parent watching my kids, they watch YouTube on TV hours and they don't watch five minute clips, they watch 30 minute episodes that are updated twice a week, three times a week. So the content cycle is endless and the quality is getting better. Now, is it an exact TV experience? Can we expect the same thing? And this is where I think it would reflect back on our conversation before of why are you going to use YouTube for their hyper targeting capability? Are you going to do it to build reach? And I think that is dependent on the audience that you're looking for.

[Mike Shields]

Right.

[Mike Law]

And where honestly a little bit of where the budget's coming from. Is this a performance budget? Is it a brand budget? You have to go back to the KPI so you could be buying YouTube for multiple different reasons. I am in the camp that YouTube is becoming more and more like TV every day and I wasn't paid to say that and I'm certain they're going to play that back to me in some meeting at some point.

[Mike Shields]

You'll be, you'll be on stage whether you like it or not.

[Mike Law]

I'm not, I'm getting there.

[Mike Shields]

Yeah, that's in the upfront club.

[Mike Law]

Oh, that'll be in a quote somewhere. I can feel it already.

[Mike Shields]

But so, but you make a good point though. And it's a challenge and an opportunity for YouTube because they are, they are, they can, they can tell that TV replacement story but they also can play in the social video performance world and they would like to compete with TikTok on shopping and all those things. It's, they have to kind of be a lot of things which is not that easy.

[Mike Law]

Yeah.

[Mike Shields]

For someone like you to put in a. I guess it depends on who's. Whose budget we're talking about.

[Mike Law]

Yeah. And this is where I'll make a bit of the argument for, you know, our investment and activation teams today. Our planners like it is a really complicated media ecosystem for consumers and for advertisers. I've heard it kind of talked about as this bowl of spaghetti. Like the, the, the user cycle is all over the place. You go from searching to watching a video to listening to a song in, in less than a minute's time.

[Mike Shields]

And Right.

[Mike Law]

You know, you're watching one show on one streaming platform and then you're searching for it in another platform and then you're asking an LLM to dive deep into the history of the world and sharing notes. So it is really that, that I think is where some of the challenge comes and then people go back to the basics and try to simplify it and maybe we don't pull and extract enough of the, the amazing opportunity that technology and data does provide. So it's just a, it's, it's a, it's, it's hard to figure out. We're in the middle of this kind of evolution of this business. And that is why do you think that data and technology and using AI and those tools to help us solve it will be important with the touch of humanity in the center.

[Mike Shields]

Speaking of complicated and humanity, you hinted at how big some of the creators are and they are doing episodic longer form content on a regular basis. This may vary by client, but what do you do with them? Because are they, are they in your TV upfront bucket conversations and looking at them as like the same thing as buying a big show and see cbs? Are they so unique? Because it's all about brand integrations and the connection with the audience. Does it really depend, like how do you, what do you do with them?

[Mike Law]

Yeah, I would say I don't know why they wouldn't be. Now the question is creator versus content because I think the creators are, you don't necessarily have to sign up to a creator as a brand and say I want you to do an individual promo for my product.

[Mike Shields]

Right.

[Mike Law]

Still take advantage of the fact that that creator is making long form content that is being, you know, coming out with speed, with freshness and can help you drive reach to a particular audience. So, So I think it's a little bit of content plus creator content and creator content or creator, I think you can bucket those into different things because the creator universe, right, is about authenticity and you know, the ability to connect with audiences and to use their voice to do that.

[Mike Shields]

You don't want to under leverage that just to get impressions.

[Mike Law]

But that doesn't mean that just because you're not using a creator to directly promote your product that the content that they're creating isn't scalable, impactful and all those things to different, different audiences, right?

[Mike Shields]

Yeah, I guess it depends if you're trying to buy their audience or buy their, you know, their, their affiliation. It depends on the tactic.

[Mike Law]

Yeah, exactly. And then, then again, back to the com conversation we're having about the role of, you know, investment and activation and planning is so easily that becomes. Well, that's not my job, right? Oh, that's social. That's creator. That's that person over there. Well, no, if, if, if you have a creator who's making, you know, 20 minute episodic content launching three times a week to 10 million viewers, I Mean, that's, that's incredible. Let's take advantage of that. So we have to be, you know, much broader in our, our definitions of what TV and video are today.

[Mike Shields]

Does it make your life easier? You're starting to see these like, I've heard them referred to as like boutique studios or like creator studios that are becoming more than just like one or two guys making videos and they're rolling up bigger ones. Does that make your life easier? Are they like players in the upfront conversations?

[Mike Law]

I think that there's the potential for it. Again, I think the, the fragmentation makes it harder to then bring all those audiences together. So how do you accumulate the reach? One thing we have seen, I don't know if this is exactly where you're going with that question, but the formats of this content, like the micro drama is where you're seeing, you know, what's ultimately a 90 minute movie, but you're seeing it released in three to four minute content and vertical mats. You know that that's, that's a completely different format we've never, never dealt with before. So yeah, I think that they have the potential to. I think where you'll see brands get more involved in that is through the content integrations because it's a great opportunity for brands to get into storylines and kind of help develop the content. But are they true reach players potentially?

[Mike Shields]

It depends. Yeah, I could see all this being really hard to plug into your marketing mix models and things like that. Like, they don't seem like this kind of stuff translates very well.

[Mike Law]

And I think that we talk about marketing mix models, but even just in the front end, I mean, we've talked a lot this year. I've written about a couple times, you know, the role of the media planner and the reemergence of the media planner to help brands navigate this. Because you, you just, in the 20 minutes we've been chatting, you've asked some great questions about how do you think about this format and that format, but it just, it goes to the endless amount of formats that is out there. So then you have to go back to what are the basics of am I looking to reach more people? Am I looking to, to get more out of my current customer? So you have to go back to those KPIs and then it, then, you know, I, I don't envy media sellers who all come in with great products and great stories and can do great things, but there's a limit to the amount of dollars we can spend. We have to be as effective and efficient as we can, with that and our time and try to find where the most impactful places are. So, yeah, there's no lack of content or supply in the market, but how you aggregate it and make it consistently work towards what you're trying to do, I think that that's the challenge we all face.

[Mike Shields]

You kind of hit on one of the interesting discussion topics in the industry right now is the role of. We talk about how nuanced and complicated this job can be, yet there's a lot of talk that people won't be doing it anymore in a few years, that the machines will be so good at figuring out where to optimize media budgets that the media planner we know won't exist. That feels very contradictory or. I don't know. I mean, I don't want to be a doomsdayer about AI, but I also don't want to be naive. Where do you see that going? Are we going to have media planners in five years?

[Mike Law]

Yes. Well, all right, good. The role as we know it won't be the same, but there will be media planners who are enabled and empowered by better technology, better data, no different than my career journey, and it will allow them to think differently and hopefully optimize quicker. But, I mean, sorry to give a little kara story here, but, you know, we, we've really dubbed this, this year, the human renaissance, because everybody's so quick to say that AI and automation is going to rule the world. You drop a penny in, it will tell you where to spend it, it'll optimize it, and we don't need people go home. I, I don't agree with that. Right. I, I think that the power of humanity to be seeing and feeling what's happening in real time, to put in the right inputs into these systems. And as we talked about before, that the algorithms will drive everybody kind of towards the same human experience. And if you put in, I think, five QSR brands into the same system, it's eventually going to kind of push everybody to the same types of people or the same audiences.

[Mike Shields]

Right. And what is your brand?

[Mike Law]

How do you differentiate? You differentiate with your messaging, you differentiate with the content. And I think you have to differentiate by showing up in places that maybe that competition isn't. And that's what you need, the strategy.

[Mike Shields]

That's strategy. Yeah, that's correct. Right. You don't want to lose that. What about all that being said? I'm curious, like, if you were talking maybe to your junior team, like, how, what is their life like versus two years ago is it people imagine it being radically different. All they do is spend their time in chat, GDP or it's, you know, everyone's testing, they're not sure. Like what is it? What does day to day life look like in a meeting versus a couple years ago?

[Mike Law]

I think it's changing rapidly and I think, you know, the teams are being empowered with new tools and new technology to do their job. The idea of we can get a request from a client to see, you know, eight or ten versions of the same media plan. Well, we don't necessarily need to go into our tools and hand input eight to ten different variables.

[Mike Shields]

Right. Do the flowchart for everyone and all that.

[Mike Law]

Yeah, we've put in the variables of the audience, the KPIs and then say give us eight different versions of this and we've got agents that allow us to look at those very quickly and compare the trade offs and comparisons and then craft the story around that. So yeah, I think that their roles are changing. And you know, I, I also believe that, you know, the good news for our industry is that we have smarter people coming into the industry than ever before. They're more strategic, they're AI native, they're digital native. So they're going to rewrite what this industry looks like. And I, I think that this generation will kind of be writing what the next 20 or 25 years looks like. So kudos to them because don't discourage

[Mike Shields]

kids from going into this industry. Like it's not like, you know.

[Mike Law]

Correct, correct. And one other thing that I always love to say is like I felt like there was a moment in our industry where you would live your life and then as soon as you walked into the door, all of a sudden the systems and tools became your truth. And you didn't take a minute to say, well wait, that's not how I consumed that, that's not my brand experience. So I think that on your question of will a planner exist? Yes, because the tools would, that's what they would say is just everybody this, the data says this. You need the human to say, okay, but is that the lived experience? Is that how a brand shows up in the best way? So you'll see strategy and planning and audience and insight, those teams coming much closer together as the kind of architects of future media plans.

[Mike Shields]

Okay, you mentioned agentic. We got to go there. I guess this is another one where I feel like there is extreme opinions. Either it's all everyone is all of advertising is going to be all of what we knew as programmatic will be Agentic. Everyone will use agents all day long versus there's a hesitancy to go too fast, too far for brands. Where are you guys and where do you think things are going in terms of like execution?

[Mike Law]

Yeah, I think that we're at a place where the tools and technology will allow us to move very quickly into that space. I think that it will allow us to be more efficient as an agency and it will allow us to move strategy and planning up to the front. So I believe in it greatly and I think that when you look at the companies that are building it now, look, I've been lucky enough. You have too. Right. We live through kind of the birth of programmatic. I think that this is, you know, a moment that we need to make sure that we've got the right regulations in place, that we've got the right controls in place so that we don't get into another place where there's, you know, a laundry list of ad taxes attached to every dollar spent. And we've spent more money on placing the dollar than we did on the impact of the dollar.

[Mike Shields]

Yeah.

[Mike Law]

So I think that those things are what we really need to as an industry make sure that we're focused on creating those guardrails.

[Mike Shields]

Is anybody out? Like, are you. How do I phrase this question? Like, I think there's been a think the thinking that brands don't want to let agents go all the way. Like are agents going to go out and buy media and optimize on their own if they aren't already?

[Mike Law]

I think that they could. I think that absolutely.

[Mike Shields]

Should they or will they? I guess.

[Mike Law]

Is the question correct? I think they could. Should they or will they is the question. You know, again, we, we don't know the future. We don't know the tip of the iceberg on what this actually do. My belief as I sit here today that in the, in the relative short and midterm, that would not be the best way to do it without some human oversight.

[Mike Shields]

Right.

[Mike Law]

You know, Kedit allow us to look at optionality. Can it help us with optimizations? Yes. But I think that it could go rogue. And I also maybe less rogue. I think more it's just going to create a sea of sameness.

[Mike Shields]

Yeah. Which is, which is not what we are selling here.

[Mike Law]

Correct. Correct. With the human experience is not about sameness. So.

[Mike Shields]

Right.

[Mike Law]

You have to find the balance between the two. So yeah, I suspect you'll see some, some company probably already out there saying, yeah, we're fully agentic.

[Mike Shields]

Right.

[Mike Law]

Hey, going back to another topic we talked about like this. The industry's not set up for that because not all the tools talk to each other.

[Mike Shields]

Yeah, you couldn't do that if you wanted to. Right now it's all, you might be

[Mike Law]

able to do it in one platform, but then the platform talks in a different way. So that's what I was saying about Allison. Like we do need to kind of move this industry forward together and create some of those guardrails. And I think that'll be an important discussion in the next, you know, year or so as we move forward.

[Mike Shields]

Last one, Mike, is this is a two parter. I guess what's, what's got you really excited right now that we haven't talked about and maybe what's driving you nuts that we need to talk about more.

[Mike Law]

That's a good question. You didn't tell me you're going to ask that either.

[Mike Shields]

No, I didn't.

[Mike Law]

I think what has me excited is I actually think that all of this talk around AI agentic automation has highlighted two things. One, the importance of the humans in our industry and the value of creativity and the value of content and the value of brands because those are the things that are helping people to stick out. The second thing would be that it is, I think people are cautious because we've seen this before and the idea that we need to come together as an industry to solve this is, is really highlighted in this, in this moment.

[Mike Shields]

Yeah, we, we're smart, smarter this time. We're learning, we're learning, we've learned lessons and we're trying to get better this time.

[Mike Law]

Correct? Yep.

[Mike Shields]

All right, I like that. That's a very positive note to end on, Mike. Awesome conversation. Thanks so much. Let's do this again sometime.

[Mike Law]

Thanks for having me, Mike. Appreciate it.

[Mike Shields]

Thanks again to carriage, Mike Law and my partners at Go Addressable. If you like this week's episode, please take a moment to rate and leave a review. We have lots more to bring you, so please hit that subscribe button and we'll see you next time for more on what's next in media. Thanks for listening. Goaddressable unites the full TV advertising ecosystem. Agencies, advertisers, programmers, distributors, ad tech platforms and data partners to help unlock the full power of deterministic audience based advertising at scale. As a trade organization led by TV distributors and strengthened by cross industry collaborators, they're committed to accelerating the growth and impact of targeted advertising by advancing the use of high fidelity deterministic identity in a way that's trusted, scalable and turnkey to learn More, visit goaddressable.com G O A D D R E S S a B L e dot com.