Advanced TV doesn’t only concern the myriad streaming apps that are competing for customers’ attention. The industry’s shifts are changing the way traditional formats, like local television advertising, operate as well.
According to Brian Wallach, svp and CRO of advanced TV at FreeWheel, which is owned by Comcast, local TV used to be the black sheep of the industry. That’s changed, as a more fractured market has made marketers reconsider how they reach the audiences they’re targeting. FreeWheel is working with MVPDs to aggregate their local inventories, as the most advanced part of the business is household addressable, where premiums are up to 15x the rate, Wallach told Beet.TV in an interview with Jim Nail, principal analyst at Forrester, at the Beet Retreat hosted by Publicis Media in New York.
“People are jumping in to buy the same local inventory, proudly to declare they’re using household addressable, and that local inventory went from, ‘Ick, ew, I don’t want to be next to that,’ to ‘Wow, this is really powerful inventory when you can understand you’re reaching the consumer,” says Wallach.
While national television is regularly upheld for its reach, providing fast access to a mass audience, local TV is more aligned with personalized targeting that marketers are increasingly looking to supplement their video advertising strategies with.
“Most people make decisions locally,” says Wallach. “It’s really high quality, valuable inventory.”
FreeWheel’s core role is to help marketers find audiences at scale across the different platforms and programming where they’re consuming content. The company makes it more efficient to find the right places to advertise across different networks and streaming services by modeling desired audiences and offering next-day reporting.
It’s a work in progress, says Wallach, trying to make the process of buying ads and targeting more customers more efficient. According to Wallach, it will be an industry-wide effort to get it right.
“I’m really excited about partnering across the industry in terms of data. We work with Vizio, and Inscape, to try to expand what that offering is and find real scale for these audiences really easily, that’s critical,” he says. “When you have great data and insights, and great supply, you can connect the dots and make an impact.”
This video was produced at the Beet Retreat leadership event hosted by Publicis Media in New York. The event and video series is sponsored by FreeWheel and LiveRamp. For more videos from the event, please visit this page.
