When planning an omnichannel TV and video campaign, how can advertisers optimise their spend to deliver maximum efficiency and effectiveness? What level of transparency into programmatic buys are advertisers looking for in 2024? What levels of transparency are actually available?
These were among the issues discussed in the second half of a recent roundtable discussion hosted by New Digital Age (NDA) in partnership with Nexxen. NDA’s editor Justin Pearse hosted the conversation, where he was joined by media industry experts including: Steve Broadhead, MD, EMEA at Nexxen; Joe Cinko, Head of AV, Bountiful Cow; Emma Glenn, Programmatic Expert, ex EssenceMediacom; Ben Kugler, Business Director, The7Stars; Laurie O’Riordan, Head of Programmatic, Digitas UK; and Dan Shepherd, Head of Digital Investment, Goodstuff.
Cinko told how, in his experience, there tends to be some confusion (and conflation) in the minds of advertisers between efficiency and effectiveness. He said: “ For too many people, efficiency means getting more for less spend, which, in turn, means that you tend to optimise towards avenues with a lower CPM. However, in terms of effectiveness, does a 30-second linear TV slot have the same impact as a 6-second clip on YouTube? Are they really comparable?”
On advertiser attitudes to CTV, Cinko added: “To the audience CTV is TV. For advertisers one of the biggest problems with CTV is that we call it ‘CTV’! In this growth period for CTV it would be more beneficial to call it ‘Big Screen Video’. Clients hear ‘TV’ and associate it with premium inventory and Saturday night shows with millions of viewers. Inadvertently, mentally, they directly compare the cream of the crop of linear TV to CTV, when in reality the two things have a very different purpose within an omnichannel campaign. Repositioning levels the playing field, provides a build on digital’s offering, indirectly challenges linear, and bridges the gap between the two.”
Glenn agreed that managing client expectations is a huge element of omnichannel marketing for agencies. “We work very closely with comms planning and the client upfront to make clear exactly what we can and can’t do in terms of delivery and measurement. We explain, for example, that Digital Out of Home is different to traditional Out of Home. Likewise linear TV is very different to CTV.
“It’s a question of managing those expectations, then agreeing on the KPIs and outcomes you’re shooting for and making sure the various channels you’re using are aligned to deliver.”
Glenn also called on the ad industry to up its game creatively in terms of making video content appropriate to the place it’s being viewed: “We’ve all seen examples of a TV ad being squashed down for use online but, in 2024, that approach shouldn’t be good enough anymore.”
Unintended consequences
Shepherd pointed out that there is often a difference in reality between omnichannel planning and omnichannel buying.
“When the client’s goal is ‘reach’ or ‘attention’, it tends to make all media look the same,” he said. “As marketers, we’d be doing ourselves a disservice if we are basically chasing ‘one plus reach’ with everything we do. We know that different channels do different things and, at the moment, the buying side of things can sometimes fly in the face of traditional comms planning, which is what our industry has been built on. You can’t just eliminate linear TV from a plan because the CPM doesn’t match up with YouTube.”
On the subject of standardisation of measurement, Shepherd said one often-overlooked metric in relation to video inventory is ‘sound on’: “A lot of video inventory is naturally ‘sound off’ which is obviously important if your content simply doesn’t work without the audio.”
The lack of standardisation across different AV channels remains a complicated issue and a tough problem to crack, commented O’Riordan: “Ideally, the measurement framework would be the first thing that you tackle and agree to before any omnichannel planning takes place, but that’s usually wishful thinking. The timeline never works out.”
O’Riordan argued that the relatively rapid development of CTV as an advertising channel has resulted in some unintended consequences from a measurement point of view.
“We associate TV with scale, so, in the clamour to provide the scale that advertisers were looking for, CTV providers created a massive boom of inventory, but without any of the standardisation or classification that advertisers have come to expect from their media investments in linear TV. As it stands, linear TV advertisers have more transparency over where their media budgets are going than CTV advertisers.”
Data and collaboration
While the objectives of every omnichannel campaign are different, said Kugler, there are commonalities that tie them all together. “Based on the conversation today, it seems like we’re all using omnichannel marketing to unify reach or to deliver different messaging via different channels. There also seems to be lots of common experience around using IDs to allow that to happen. We all have many of the same headaches.
“On the planning side of things, lots of the TV-leaning people that we work with are worried that the revolution in CTV is going to cost them their jobs. The truth is that there’s lots of tech and lots of support available to them, so they should worry more about getting a good brief from the client. The key to planning a successful campaign, as ever, is understanding what the client is trying to do.”
Nexxen’s Steve Broadhead commented that while the industry was still a long way from solving the varied challenges associated with omnichannel campaigns, there are encouraging signs of improvement.
“The AV marketplace remains fragmented and complicated for advertisers, but more data is being made available that’s helping marketers. ACR (Automated Content Recognition) data, for example, provides advertisers with info about the individual show and its audience to help them plan and buy. Traditionally there have been issues around data collaboration in the industry but the silos are starting to break down and we’re starting to see more of what’s actually possible.
“There are also new players entering the market who, keen to win ad budgets, are opening up their data in ways that challenge the legacy providers to follow their lead. In terms of transparency, it’ll take time, but things are definitely moving in the right direction.”
