“It’s not the wild, wild West but it’s close to it,” is how Magna NA’s chief David Cohen sees the present cross-device, addressable video advertising landscape. The challenge is coming up with a standardized way of targeting and measuring the results.
“It’s the front that I think will get the most amount of effort, interest and capital investment I would say over the next twelve to eighteen months,” says Cohen, who is President of the IPG media unit, in an interview with Beet.TV.
While addressable is more expensive to execute on a cost-per basis and requires the creation and insertion of messaging customized to individual users, “We have found that cost is far outweighed by the delivery of results,” Cohen says.
Results can include brand lift, awareness, intent, brand preference and sales. “We have some clients that have been able to close the loop” on sales conversion, Cohen adds.
In the automotive category, Magna Global has been able to confirm whether a targeted consumer took a test drive or actually purchased a vehicle following an addressable ad campaign. “We’re very encouraged by the early day learnings in that regard,” says Cohen.
The industry challenge is creating cross-platform standards “because there’s lots of folks who are claiming cross-device usage, insights, targeting. I don’t know if anyone’s measuring that to a standard that’s well defined,” Cohen says. “With any nascent business, you have a lot of upstarts in that space.”
Media agencies have little choice but to step up to new and emerging technologies, according to Cohen.
“You could think about it as job security really,” he says. “Technology has changed the game and will continue to change the game forever. It’s incumbent upon us to stay on top of all these developments and have partners that are blazing the trail in this new space.”
This video explores the state of cross-screen addressable video advertising. The series is sponsored by AT&T AdWorks. Please visit this page to view more videos from the series.
