Episode 10

For the past 50 years or so, the process of buying TV ads has remained fairly consistent—and pretty straightforward. In most cases, companies buy ads well ahead of when programs air, often during the upfronts, which is when the networks announce their new lineups and sell their ad inventories.

Advertisers make their buying decisions on a contextual basis using broad audience characteristics like age and gender. This strategy is based on the premise that advertisers have enough general information about who will watch the scheduled programs to properly place their ads where their ideal customers will see them.

Recently, however, interest in more targeted ad buying is bubbling up, largely because that’s how the process works online. In fact, when the internet is involved, including the connected TV realm, the technology, data and physical plumbing allow advertisers to serve two different people visiting the same web page a different ad.

So is this possible in the traditional TV space? Yes, to some degree. That said, however, advanced audience-based ad buying in the traditional TV world isn’t very widespread, and the bulk of ads are still bought and sold the way they always have been.

This episode of The Database delves into the world of advanced audience-based buying in the linear TV space and addressable TV in the online space. We discuss the differences between the two terms, talk about those base benchmarks of age and gender and get into the hurdles and opportunities as the industry increases its digital focus on how ads are bought and sold.

Our guests include George Tsivin, SVP of Product Leadership at Nielsen, Thomas Eaton, SVP at Nielsen Catalina Solutions, James McNamara, SVP of Client Strategy at Nielsen, and Jason Burke, VP of Strategy at clypd.