New true[X] President Midha Looking To Leverage The ‘Connected Living Room’

Having crafted more than 10,000 of its interactive, consumer-engagement ads, true[X] is going all in on the “connected living room” to offer advertisers the best options to leverage things like co-viewing, 4K screens and surround sound. “We’re standing up an entire CT innovation lab around that concept,” says Pooja Midha, who recently became President of true[X].

“Today we are on most of the connected TV platforms and in the next month or two we will be pretty much virtually everywhere,” Midha adds in this interview with Beet.TV, dubbing the connected living room “a super rich environment.”

Prior to taking over daily operations and long-term strategy at true[X], Midha spent five years at Disney ABC Television Group, where she rose to SVP, Digital Ad Sales & Operations, as ADWEEK reports. She also spent a decade at various Viacom properties.

Midha will be a keynote speaker at Beet Retreat in the City, scheduled for June 6 in Manhattan.

The company’s core product, its engagement ad format, is now used “across pretty much every broadcast and major cable network.” In addition, “We also work with some of the MVPD’s on their digital inventory and we work with some select gaming partners,” says Midha.

Since its founding in 2007, light years before anyone thought of living rooms as being “connected,” true[X] had a simple proposition: give consumers some say in which television ads they’d prefer to endure and, potentially, interact with. In its most basic form, the true[X] offering in full-episode video content gives viewers a “choice card” with the options of interacting with a 30-second ad or just viewing a “regular” ad experience

“And what we see time and time again is that most people would choose to interact than have the regular ad experience,” says Pooja. “What’s interesting is that the first time they take it, they adopt it, the rate is nearly sixty percent. The second time they see it, it goes up and it keeps going up.”

Full-screen interactivity provides for a broad pallet of advertiser and publisher storytelling and e-commerce. “There’s a lot of potential to really drive very different advertiser KPI’s.”

Advertisers are not charged if viewers leave the interactive format before its full 30-second run and default to the regular ad experience. “The idea is that at any time, we are guaranteeing that you will have someone’s full attention for thirty seconds, that they will interact at least once, and that you will be in a high-quality, full-screen environment,” says Pooja.

While the true[X] studio team last year eclipsed the 10,000 interactive ad mark, the company typically works with advertisers’ existing creative assets. Pooja says there’s lots of potential beyond simple engagement—particularly in the living room.

“We’re actually trying to see what else we can do in that environment and we’re standing up an entire CT innovation lab around that concept,” she says.

This video is part of The Road to Cannes, a preview of topics to be addressed at Cannes Lions. The series is presented by the FreeWheel Council for Premium Video. For more videos from the series, please visit this page. FreeWheel is a Comcast company.