Tim Peterson (2:33)

Yeah, I don't think Netflix is going to win the upfront. I don't think they have enough inventory to do that because they're going up against. Well, they're going up Against Disney, who has abc, espn, Disney plus, which also like wraps in Hulu, the ESPN streaming app. Disney has the super bowl next year and then you have NBCUniversal, who has NBC, Peacock, Bravo, like has a lot of properties. I mean even Fox has like fox and Tubi. YouTube is just a Goliath. So I don't think, I don't think Netflix is going to win the upfront, but I think it will be one of the companies that's going to be up in the upfront. What helps that is Netflix is also newer to the market so it has more growth opportunity but it's also doing a lot more to justify more spend going in that direction. It rolled out its in house ad platform Netflix ad suite little over a year ago Now I've talked to agencies who have said that that's led some clients to double ad spend in the past year and its pricing has gone down into like the low 20s on a CPM basis for non targeted ads. So that's also helping make the service more affordable to advertisers. And it's doing, it's been doing, but it seems like it's expanding a almost like a shadow upfront or an upfront plus style deal which also makes it really interesting and creates a bit of urgency for some advertisers to be spending even more money with Netflix. All of which we get into in this conversation with Sam Bradley from our marketing team.

Kamika McCoy (4:23)

Yeah, absolutely. I haven't used Juicy Scoops in a while, but it'll be a juicy conversation and all questions will be answered. So with no further ado,

Tim Peterson (4:39)

Sam, thanks for joining me and Kameka, thanks very

Sam Bradley (4:43)

much for having me Again, delighted to be back.

Tim Peterson (4:45)

Glad to have you back because I have been wanting to talk with someone, anyone about Netflix's advertising business. I've talked to my cats about it. They're less than interested in this. And as much as I could just talk at Kimiko about this and I'm sure she would be very gracious and listen, I don't think that would be fair. So we brought you in as another one to manage the load with Kimiko.

Sam Bradley (5:13)

Okay. Like a full studio audience.

Tim Peterson (5:16)

Netflix obviously like had a tough start with its ad business, you know, four or five years ago. Feels like a long time ago, but it feels like in the past year plus Netflix has had a real glow up on the ad side of things. It feels like the Christmas day games in 2024 were an inflection point because then I went to CES January 2025 talking to a Lot of agency execs about Netflix and they just said their perspective on Netflix clients perspective on Netflix had flipped because of how successful the Christmas Day NFL games were. And it just feels like ever since then Netflix has just been on like an upward trajectory and now we're in upfront season. And as much as I'm not about to say I think Netflix is going to win the upfront because I think traditional TV still largely owns the upfront. I do think Netflix is remaking or at least is part of a wave of companies kind of remaking the nature of upfront deals. Kimiko, you've reported on these joint business plans that retail media networks have done with advertisers or with the merchants as part part of advertising. Netflix has also been doing JBP style deals. Agency execs that I talked to have kind of come to describe them as like upfront plus deals because one of the most interesting things about them is the advertisers who sign these deals with Netflix get to preempt upfront advertisers. So these advertisers get opportunities to secure inventory, product placement like brand integrations before those opportunities are made available to advertisers in the upfront. I wrote about this in the Future of TV Briefing back in March so people can go read that. To read more about these deals Netflix is putting together. It's been doing these for like 2, 3 years at this point, but it started expanding them to more advertisers and like as part of it it's asking advertisers to double their annual spending on the platform. So there's definitely a price tag attached to this that makes them pretty pricey, but it's almost like a shadow upfront or again upfront plus in a way that makes me wonder are we going to see more of this kind of thing where like the upfront still is part of the market, but it's not the top of the market like it's been historically.

Kamika McCoy (7:53)

I think it's interesting anytime that like when I'm reporting on jbps and things like that, to me that is a signal of and Netflix opening this up to more advertisers, right. And pushing for it. There's a signal of like a real, not just like maturity but like a premium price tag kind of placed on what it is that you're offering here and also that you've got more just than beyond the ads like your standard ad package. They're also, they're like building out really just like their capabilities didn't just like was it late last year, earlier this year that they rolled out some more? They included Amazon for their dsp, Yahoo for their DSP and a handful of others. So they're really going robust here.

Tim Peterson (8:33)

Yeah, they got Amazon, Google's DV360 trade desk, Yahoo, DSP and actually so we're recording this Wednesday, April 22nd. Last week Netflix had earnings for the first quarter of 2026. And one interesting stat that it threw out is that programmatic buying through third party DSPs is becoming close to half of Netflix's ad revenue when you like exclude live events. So this isn't including like revenue from WWE Raw or you know, NFL games, things like that. But still that means Programmatic is half becoming half of that remaining business. So it's a lot of money that's being spent on Netflix inventory through these other deals piece.

Kamika McCoy (9:22)

Gracious. Okay, let me jump back here. When you mentioned that they're building a different playbook. Some of these other streamers you started kind of with like their JBPS and Upfront. How does that differ from like, I don't know, like Peacock, Tubi and a handful of others.

Tim Peterson (9:41)

Yeah, I mean so those companies usually do traditional upfront like Tubi's part of Fox, Peacock's part of NBC Universal. And so that's, those are additional inventory sources alongside for Fox, the broadcast network, Fox News Channel for nbcu. Obviously there's NBC, there's Bravo. Technically NBC is still selling Versant inventory. So you get some of those former NBCU cable networks that are part of it as well. But it's still like single year deals. Hey, commit to spend this much money with us, some of that is fixed each quarter we'll give you inventory and like you get access to brand integration opportunities as part of that, like new products, new ad products, different inventory sources. And so that's not all that different from what Netflix has been doing. It's just the fact that these are longer term deals. So these can be two to three year long deals and you're preempting the upfront. There's also been talk Netflix has had with some advertisers about doing these JBP style deals where there would be like tech and innovation benefits to it. But no one that I've talked to knows what the hell that actually means. So TBD on that.

Kamika McCoy (11:07)

It look it to me what that says is like what I was kind of mentioning earlier is like there's real ambitions and I like in looking at their earnings in some of the, the comments from their executive Team leadership. Netflix doesn't feel like they've done all that they can do. They've significantly grown their ad business. And then on the earnings, it was like, hey, the addressable market that's out there, we've only started to kind of tap into that. And I think, like, maybe some of the tech innovations and things like that that they're gearing up for, although TBD on what exactly that means sets a really good Runway for where they're looking to head next, especially with the JBPs. Kind of like, to me, like I said, ind our ads business and the traditional AdSense is just the start of what we have to offer. They've also been doing some really interesting ad integrations with, I think it was Bridgerton and Facebook or Meta. And then there was another one with Discover Card and Stranger Things.

Tim Peterson (12:04)

Yeah, I mean, brand integrations has been like, a big change with Netflix in the past few years. I think in the past, like, two years has really been the biggest change because historically, brands had been able to get into shows like House of Cards. I did a story 2015, 2016, about how Stella Artois, a part of AB&BEV, had gotten into an episode of House of Cards. And I talked to AB InBev on that. I was just like, how much did you pay for this? How did this come about? And they're just like, we didn't pay for this. All we did is we have a contact on the crew. They needed beer for a scene, and we just sent them a case of beer. And that ended up in the show. And that was like, how these kind of integrations went historically. But obviously everyone was going to realize there's money to be made here. And so over time, like, you have production companies who do charge for these brand integrations, but, you know, the TV networks, the streaming services had historically kind of left that money alone. Sometimes they do get involved in these things, but a lot of times, like Netflix, for one, was kind of just like, look, do what you need to do. If that helps you to, like, maintain the budget for this show, don't be egregious about it. But, like, we get it. You gotta, like, we're only giving you so much money to produce this show. So if you have to make up the difference by, like, weaving in a certain beer brand into a scene, we get it. Within the past two years, Netflix has been like, actually, we're going to be involved here. And so these brand integrations have become part of its deals with advertisers, where they extend to the Custom commercials, like what you're talking about, where they'll take a brand and characters or kind of the look of Bridgerton and have it be a very Bridgerton themed commercial ad that runs on Netflix and feels very bespoke and you know, stands out honestly from an ad supported viewer perspective. And then it does things like the collabs with brands inside retail stores and things like that where it's, you know, Stranger Things X all the different brands that Stranger Things had done deals with.

Kamika McCoy (14:28)

In your opinion, what is Netflix? Because Netflix is not the only game in town at this point. Right. You've got a lot of other streamers that have also kind of put their best foot forward and put the hat in the ring, turned a profit and yada, yada, yada. What is Netflix getting, right, that makes advertisers continue shelling out money for it, especially in comparison to some of its competitors?

Tim Peterson (14:49)

I mean, I think a lot of it is Netflix has just grown like its audience size. So told advertisers earlier this year it has 57 million monthly active viewers in the US for its ad supported tier. So that puts it not on the level of like a Disney just yet, but above like a peacock for example. And so it's got legit size. And then also like its pricing's come down. Like Sam, you've been reporting on how its pricing's come down. Like the latest that I heard is for non targeted ads you can get Netflix inventory in the low $20 cpm. Sometimes you can go under $20 cpms.

Sam Bradley (15:34)

Yeah, that's down from about $60 when they first launched the ad business as well, isn't it?

Tim Peterson (15:38)

Yeah, I think they came out at 65. If I'm not mistaken, it was either 60 or 65. I forget where. If HBO Max was the one who came out at 65 and Netflix came out at 60. But yeah, it's down meaningfully from where they debuted. And Sam, you've also reported. So you had a story in March about how Netflix's ad revenue has grown and been forecasted to grow.

Sam Bradley (16:04)

Yeah, I mean we've already touched on a few of the reasons why, but I mean that addition of the Amazon DSP and the overall number of DSPS to its kind of to its roster, if you will. I think that's really opened it up to smaller and mid sized advertisers. That's what one exec at PMG told me in March that their smaller advertisers and maybe more performance oriented advertisers were. I mean a lot of those folks are looking to see TV into TV for the first time anyway. But they're looking at Netflix quite favorably. And that's been opened up in part because the Amazon DSP and part because of the other ones. The prices coming down has obviously helped. And at the other end of the market, the fact that it's adding on more not just live sports events, but live events in general. I'm thinking of the live stream they showed of the guy climbing the big tower, which was pretty interesting viewing. I think it's better say I don't think they knew what would happen if he fell off, but

Tim Peterson (17:06)

they, I think

Sam Bradley (17:07)

they've more, more than changing just ad execs opinions about whether live streaming sports is a good idea or not. They've changed the perspective on the entire sector. Like they've sort of proven that it can go off without a hitch and you don't have to ask questions about whether the stream will work or cut out or whatever. I think it's proven it for the entire segment. Really?

Tim Peterson (17:28)

Yeah, yeah. I mean like we should also give credit to Fox did this with the Super Bowl a year ago when they had that on Tubi and NBCU with Peacock has done a lot like NBCU when they put the first NFL playoff game, the wild card game, on Peacock two or three years ago. That was a huge deal. They've, I mean they've done programmatic for Olympics inventory, live inventory on Peacock. So Netflix can get its flowers, but I think a lot of other folks need to get its flowers too. But one interesting thing. So I think maybe the biggest thing that Netflix did in the past year was it brought its ad tech platform in house. It had historically been relying on Microsoft's ad tech platform and last year it transitioned to the Netflix ad suite. And that to Sam's point, is really what facilitated being able to open up its inventory to longer tail advertisers to be able to carve up that inventory for like with rolling out the Netflix ad suite, the targeting options on Netflix also really grew. In addition to being able to buy through various DSPs, I mean all of the big DSPs like Trade Desk, DV360, Amazon, Yahoo, all have access to Netflix inventory.

Kamika McCoy (18:55)

Now it seems like a lot of their success to you guys's point is making advertising easier here for advertisers to be able to come in, buy an ad, target an audience and whatnot. I'm curious though, because they also made a bet on podcast video podcast being a bigger part of their content and whatnot. I'VE heard kind of mixed reviews. Where does that kind of fit into their playbook as far as, like, business growth?

Sam Bradley (19:25)

I don't know.

Tim Peterson (19:26)

That's like a huge one. Sam, you think otherwise?

Sam Bradley (19:30)

I think it's an interesting addition to their sports coverage. Actually, it maybe went a little bit under the radar in the States, but they have a deal with Goal Hanger, which is a podcast company owned by Gary Lineker, very famous English footballer and media personality who left the BBC relatively recently but has a huge podcasting business on the side. They did a deal with Netflix to broadcast the video edition of that podcast on Netflix through the World Cup. It's kind of given Netflix an end to that tournament, which they wouldn't have otherwise had. So they're using podcasting kind of as a way of maybe flanking these traditional temple moments. I think we could argue.

Tim Peterson (20:13)

I'm a little skeptical of the podcast stuff generally. I'm skeptical of video podcasts in general. So that's not like, exclusive to Netflix. My skepticism. I still get annoyed when Spotify tries to default to video for the podcast that I listen to on the platform. But with Netflix. So, like Netflix's earnings call last week, I think it was co CEO Greg Peters who talked about podcasts as a way to serve the mobile audience on Netflix. And so that's a little different than from an advertiser perspective of, okay, if I'm just like reaching people on mobile, I don't know that they're looking at their screen then, or if their phone's just in their pocket or wherever they may be that they're using Netflix to listen to podcasts again. Still, let's set that aside for a second. But I don't know if that inventory is going to be as valuable as an ad on a big TV screen while someone's watching an NFL game and is pretty locked on to the screen.

Kamika McCoy (21:21)

I wonder if it becomes kind of like the same logic as Costco's hot dogs, where that's not really their, their money maker, but it gets people in the door

Tim Peterson (21:32)

maybe. I mean, you're not doing deals with like, well, they're doing deals with, you know, the Ringer Network, which is owned by Spotify. And so with Spotify, and they've also been trying to bring on like, stand up comedians to have, like podcast shows on Netflix, talk shows on Netflix. And it, it feels, sure, maybe there's an opportunity there, but it also feels like Netflix trying to head off YouTube in a way, because what it's doing as part of these deals is saying Air your stuff here, not on you. Like there's actually like terms in these contracts. I think Lucas Shaw from Bloomberg has been one of the ones. Maybe it was Ashley Carmen from Bloomberg too who's reported on like, as part of these contracts, Netflix is telling folks like, you gotta take your stuff off YouTube. You can't be putting this on YouTube. And so I think that's an interesting dynamic where heading into this year's upfront and thinking about the TV streaming market in general, you have the traditional TV owners who have obviously been moving into streaming and doing interesting stuff in streaming. We've talked about nbcu, Fox. Disney's done a ton with its audience graph. It's the Disney ad server, which it acquired through its acquisition of Hulu to really become more almost streaming first or doing like very streaming native things with their advertising businesses. But those are still companies who, the bulk of their ad businesses are on the traditional TV side of things. And then you have YouTube and Amazon, these tech behemoths who are in the upfront market and doing really interesting things, especially now that Amazon has NBA and has the prime video ad supported here. So it has more of that TV inventory to sell. But what makes them especially interesting in a lot of ways is their DSPs, because as part of Amazon's and YouTube's upfront deals, one thing that they do is a commit to spending x percent of your money through our DSPs to buy other streaming services inventory and we'll give you discounts or, you know, we'll give you credits back and that you can spend. And so that's more of a back end kind of thing. Whereas on the traditional TV side of things, it's more traditional. In some ways, Netflix is almost like this hybrid in the middle where it's bridging the two different models. And I don't know if Netflix is going to get pulled in one direction or the other, or if Netflix, if it continues to be successful and starts really taking share from the others, starts pulling the traditional TV companies on one side, the tech giants on the other, towards this new hybrid model in the middle.

Kamika McCoy (24:35)

That'll be interesting to see. Do you think it walking away. We gotten this whole discussion without talking about the Warner Brothers deal. Do you think them walking away and calling it with the Warner Brothers kind of indicates where their head is at in terms of like, where they see the direction of their business going?

Tim Peterson (24:54)

I mean, I think that was more just like, jesus, we're not gonna pay that much money for Warner Brothers. Like, come on, let's get serious here. So. And I think also like there may have just been some annoyance of like, well if David Ellison is just gonna like keep whining about this, keep coming back, keep bidding up the price like we got, I have other things to worry about. Yeah, like you can have it if it's that important to you because we're actually doing all right because that's the thing. Netflix is doing pretty well.

Kamika McCoy (25:32)

Yeah, pretty well is one way to put it there. And I suspect that momentum will continue. Sam, is there anything that you think in, in your reporting indicates to you kind of like Netflix's next steps here, how they continue said momentum?

Sam Bradley (25:47)

I think they're going to continue to add formats and probably leaned a bit deeper into the co branded thing we talked about earlier. A couple of weeks ago I reported on how much demand there is among brands for co branded or collaborative advertising. State Farm is another example to add to that list. They did something with Running Point, the basketball show recently. So I think you'll see them lean into that, especially because it differentiates them a little bit in the market. I think they've been willing to do that, as you said Tim, in a way that maybe other networks and streamers haven't been. So they can have that edge to an extent. I think we'll see that and I think it'd be interesting to see how they develop on the Amazon partnership and on the DSP partnerships and see how they maybe carve out some interesting formats or specialists for that long a tail of advertisers. Because as you know, there's a lot of them, even if individually they don't have huge budgets.

Tim Peterson (26:45)

It'll also be interesting. One thing I've been curious about is does Netflix stay with that model, which is more of the Disney nbcu Fox type model of we'll be the inventory source, you bring your ad tech on the buy side advertiser. So we'll play nice with trade desk, Yahoo, DV360, Amazon. Or does it go the Amazon YouTube route of actually we're going to have our own DSP. Actually we're going to lock down this inventory. Actually we want to own the tech end to end. Right now Netflix is doing the traditional TV thing, but there's that playbook that's kind of sitting there for them if it wanted to create its own demand side platform. Big question. One of the big questions there is if these third party DSPs are already representing close to half of Netflix's non live advertising business, has Netflix already reached a point where it actually can't afford to do that.

Kamika McCoy (27:56)

Yeah. Because they're putting a lot on the line there and you, and I'm talking as if I'm part of Netflix team there. That would be a lot on the line for them because you're, you'd have to make a big bet and it'd have to be a safe bet. Right. Because at that point, like, you're talking money being lost there and you don't want to jump from like, what do you call it, the frying pan to the hot water. There's a phrase in there somewhere.

Tim Peterson (28:22)

I mean, I wouldn't want to be in the frying pan or the boiling

Sam Bradley (28:24)

water from the frying pan into the fire.

Kamika McCoy (28:28)

Yes. You don't want to leave a safe bet. You don't leave a safe bet for something unknown unless it's got legs. And right now I don't know if, if it's got legs to kind of

Tim Peterson (28:39)

like the other thing is what makes Amazon's DSP and Google's DV360, which is the only DSP you can use to buy YouTube inventory, what makes them so successful isn't just that those are the gateways to Amazon's and YouTube's owned and operated inventory, respectively, but they also have access to all this other inventory. And that's one of the things that's not yet been a massive challenge for Netflix, but is definitely where it will have a vulnerability and why the Warner Brothers deal was One of the biggest arguments for the Warner Brothers deal is like Netflix needs to make sure it's going to keep having enough inventory. Where is it going to find new inventory? Is it going to be able to strike co sale deals with other media companies to sell their inventory, or is it going to find ways to create new inventory on the platform? Getting and not just create new inventory, but create new inventory that comes at a cost to its competition. You know, in the same way that NBCU and Amazon pounced on NBA rights because they saw, okay, if we can get NBA rights, that's going to give us something that only Disney also has. Netflix doesn't yet have that they have

Sam Bradley (30:10)

indicated in earnings calls when speaking to analysts that they probably won't pursue traditional TV rights in the same sense as NBA or NFL rights. But they want to go after these events, these very specific moments that they can create a package around, which is arguably that's the common thread between climbing a big skyscraper and Christmas Day NFL.

Tim Peterson (30:34)

Right.

Sam Bradley (30:35)

There was a recent, I don't think it was the most recent earnings call, but it was the one prior, they basically said that is the existing strategy. So we might see them move for more of those moments. Which of those come up? Right. But I don't think we'll see them go for a full NBA package.

Tim Peterson (30:53)

This is also the same company that in the past was just like, we're not interested in life sports, we're not interested in advertising and the tenor change. So I wonder with that how much of that is a negotiating tactic because. So the information had a piece within the past year about the dynamic between Netflix and the NFL and how neither side necessarily wants to like, cozy up too much to the other. But at the same time, both kind of need each other very much because the NFL needs to protect its cash cow, its rights to air its games. It's made a ton of money from the traditional TV side of things. He keeps getting them to pay more and more. It's. I think CNBC has reported that like they're renegotiating with Paramount right now and like the price that Paramount would be paying for rights will be going up significantly. But with Paramount, with Disney, with NBC, they're still dealing with these declining traditional TV businesses and the associated revenues. So at what point do they reach a ceiling where they like, they literally can't pay anymore for NFL rights? The alternative then is like, well, Apple's got a ton of money, Amazon's got a ton of money, Google's got a ton of money. But they have so much money and so much power that some of the NFL's leverage goes away a little bit when dealing with those companies. Netflix is kind of in this sweet spot in the middle where it's got money, it's got audience, it doesn't have the baggage of a legacy business of traditional tv. It doesn't have the all consuming power and budget of these big tech giants. And so I think very as much as Netflix may say certain things on earnings call, I think the door is very much open for Netflix one day to be one of the primary NFL rights holders. I don't think the NFL would ever make someone an exclusive rights holder. There's too much money on the table for that. But I could see Netflix coming in and having NFL rights on a level of how Fox and CBS and NBC and Disney have historically had it.

Kamika McCoy (33:30)

And then you can add a sports podcast to it as well.

Tim Peterson (33:33)

Sam, does that all check out in your mind or does that all sound like absolute?

Sam Bradley (33:40)

I think it all makes sense. I mean, there's only so much we can test. A hypothetical, right? We have to wait for it to play out. But no, it makes complete sense. And I think you can understand advertisers wanting to jump for that. Absolutely.

Kamika McCoy (33:53)

Well, they've got their next earnings call in mid July, so sounds like a fantastic time to circle back around right

Tim Peterson (34:01)

in the middle of the upfront.

Sam Bradley (34:03)

Yeah, it'd be interesting to see how well, Walk had a projection in the spring that suggested they'd have almost 10% of the overall CTV ad market, streaming ad market by the end of next year. So it may also be something worth keeping an eye on for the end of this year to see if are they halfway to that target? Is that, is that on track at all? Or is that like, you know, how, how accurate is that target or that projection? That'd be worth keeping an eye as well. How much of the growing streaming market are they capturing as they grow? Yeah.

Tim Peterson (34:38)

Awesome. Well, Sam, Kimiko, appreciate you taking the time to listen to me talk about Netflix's ad business. And to the listeners, thank you for taking this time to listen to me talk about Netflix's ad business. I will shut up now. Thanks for listening to this episode of the Digiday Podcast. If you enjoyed it, please leave us a rating and a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you're listening. Get more from Digiday with our daily newsletter sent out each weekday morning. Visit digiday.comnewsletters to sign up.