Advertisers are looking for more flexibility in reaching audiences among a wider variety of video platforms, including traditional linear TV and the growing number of digital channels. Dish Media is giving marketers more choices, most recently in its partnership with Verizon Media announced this month.
The deal gives advertisers using Verizon Media’s demand-side platform (DSP) automated access to Dish’s household addressable ad inventory. Those media placements can reach households that either watch linear TV or have connected their TVs directly to the internet to see programming on over-the-top services like Dish’s Sling TV.
“Sling does over 60% of its revenue programmatically, and has relied on the DSP ecosystem for several years now,” Kevin Arrix, senior vice president of Dish Media, said in this interview with Beet.TV. “It’s proven to be a great investment and bet for us.”
The partnership not only adds 7 million Dish house households to Verizon’s addressable TV ad footprint, it also lets advertisers buy addressable ads programmatically among 11 million households. Dish’s inventory will be available by early next quarter.
“Omni-video is critical going forward,” Arrix said. “The buy side doesn’t care if someone is watching linear television versus digital television versus video on demand (VOD). They care about reaching someone wherever they’re watching television.”
Consumers in the past year have increased the amount of time they watch TV by 9.3% to an average of 229 minutes a day, according to researcher eMarketer. Many people have been working from home during the coronavirus pandemic, freeing up time to watch TV instead of commuting to the office.
The crisis has led advertisers reset their media spending priorities, and demand greater accountability than ever before, Arrix said.
“The need for advertisers to know exactly the impact of any given dollar spent … tends to push you toward a data-driven advertising scenario,” he said. “They’re going to prioritize data-driven more so than ever before.”
