“A lot of people use the data that the OEMs have in their measurement,” Cara Lewis, executive vice president and head of U.S. investment, Dentsu at Amplifi USA, said in this interview with Beet.TV. “Measurement is such a key talking point now in television in general. It’s important to have the data that the OEMs have, and to be partners with them.”

Source: eMarketer Insider Intelligence

Her agency has developed a CTV Playbook to provide a deeper look at ad inventories among different video channels. The goal is to avoid overexposing audiences to the same commercials, which is negative for consumer experience.

“Our approach is to be screen-agnostic, to make sure that we are building in and layering where frequency capping is happening,” Lewis said. “We’ve done an amazing analysis, our team, in terms of an overlay of who’s selling whose inventory.”

Combining the CTV Playbook with its Ampower optimization platform helps to see a more complete view of the television landscape and find the right balance between traditional linear TV and CTV for advertisers.

“We want to make sure that every impression that we’re landing is getting to that, meaning identity and getting to the root of who the consumer is and what they want to see,” Lewis said.

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Advertisers are “looking for where we can basically scale outside what’s happening in the overall video space. With the linear ratings eroding, how do we find our consumer and audiences on other platforms?” Cara Lewis, executive vice president and head of U.S. investment, Dentsu at Amplifi USA, said in this interview with Beet.TV. “With an AVOD, you can definitely do that across all of the different vendors that are out there.”

The VOD market is evolving quickly as some subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) services also have ad-supported tiers that are less expensive or free to consumers. Either way, consumers have more choices than before.

“It’s the consumers following the content,” Lewis said. “If the content’s there, we can be there.”

Source: eMarketer

Amplifi uses a people-based identity and data platform called M1 that provides consumer insights and addressable targeting opportunities for personalized media and creative strategies at scale. The tool plays a key role in media plans for targeting audiences that are difficult to reach through linear TV.

“We still want to buy incremental reach, which is definitely where our tool comes into play,” Lewis said. “We can plug in the different AVOD partners. As long as we input into it some sort of CPM that we can guarantee against.”

More personalized targeting helps to lessen the ad load on AVOD platforms, with a goal of improving the viewer experience by avoid repetitious commercial breaks.

“It’s definitely nice to see a lower ad load. We just did our ‘Cable Clutter Report’ and to see the amount of ads that are actually still in those reports is pretty astonishing,” Lewis said. “Consumers aren’t necessarily looking to avoid commercials. They don’t mind commercials, but they want them somewhat personalized to them.”

AVOD platforms also provide more opportunities to buy programmatically, though Lewis said she avoid open exchange bidding because of the worries about ad fraud. She prefers private marketplaces (PMPs) that have a select group of video outlets or direct deals.

Advertisers also are looking for improved media measurement to see a more complete view of consumers and their media consumption habits.

“We’re definitely looking to continue the conversations and continue investing against business outcomes where we can for the clients that are ready to do that,” Lewis said. “The big thing is getting that cross-screen measurement set, which I know is a little bit far away, but making sure that we can do that in the ecosystem of holistic video.”

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“We really need to solve for that holistic, cross-platform measurement in terms of measuring full video in the landscape,” Cara Lewis, executive vice president of video investment at Amplifi USA, a media buying agency owned by Dentsu.

She has seen a hesitancy among marketers to take a holistic view of video advertising because of challenges in cross-platform measurement. The marketplace has become more fragmented among linear and digital channels, making it more difficult to tell whether some viewers see the same ads too often, while others are missed.

Source: Deloitte

The industry needs to solve “frequency management in terms of connected TV and over-the-top, because there’s so many different vendors selling each other’s inventory,” Lewis said. “We really need to solve for that holistic, cross-platform measurement in terms of measuring full video in the landscape for our clients.”

TV ratings company Nielsen this month announced a plan to replace its measurement system by 2024 with a unified metric for traditional audiences and viewing of digital platforms such as streaming TV. It’s a massive undertaking that requires collaboration among marketing and media industries.

“Working together is only going to make the industry stronger,” Lewis said.

While she has seen dire predictions about the demise of TV and video advertising, especially as households subscribe to ad-free services like Netflix and Disney+, video content will always find an audience.

“Video is powerful, because video is content. If consumers weren’t before seeking out content, they’re 100% seeking out content now,” Lewis said. “They’re searching for what they want to watch. Video has evolved…but we just have to buy it and look at it holistically.”

You are watching “An Open Ecosystem Is Key to Advanced TV Success,” a Beet.TV leadership series presented by Dish Media. For more videos, please visit this page.

We have already seen the annual upfront TV ad sales season delayed, and a new call for a further delay plus significant reform, as advertisers and agencies grapple with the realities of limited spending visibility and a poorer content roster.

In this video interview with Beet.TV, Cara Lewis, EVP for video investment at Amplifi USA, the innovation and investment arm of Dentsu Aegis Network, says, at a time of adaptability, she is searching for change.

Flexibility needed

“We need flexibility and we need that more than ever because there’s so many still unknowns,” Lewis says.

“We want to get the best pricing obviously, but we also want to get the best content.

“Content being so unknown and sports (programming) being so unknown, it’s definitely on top of mind … clients have to have the flexibility and they want to have the time to be able to make these really large decisions.

“If we can’t advertise, then the networks don’t have our money if we are in a client in the future.”

Personalization rises

The traditional TV UpFronts events have been cancelled or have gone virtual. Negotiating in this climate has proven challenging to the nation’s marketers as they assess TV ad investment.

Now the ANA, representing ad buyers, has demanded upfront sales, which were due to be for ads airing between October 2020 and September 2021, should occur this fall for ads transmitting starting 2021.

Amid the turmoil, Amplifi’s Lewis sees brands leaning into personalization.

“We were on the phone with a couple of vendors this week, just talking about M1 and partnering together to get them in as a PAM (Publisher Addressable Marketplace) partner and I think we’re hearing from a couple that they’re more interested to do it now than ever,” she says.

She is talking about M1, Dentsu Aegis Network’s people-based identity and data platform, and its Publisher Addressable Marketplace, which provides insights on person-level marketing results through programmatic platforms.

Content placements

Lewis is also seeking other changes in the way agencies engage with programmers.

“We would love to integrate into more content and not have it be costing millions of dollars to do so,” she says. “(For example), how can we partner when we’re giving you a car on set that costs our company money?

“And maybe that flexibility is within the actual partnership and within the actual parent company group, since there’s seven or eight big companies that own the majority of the impressions out there.

“But I think really being flexible, honest, trusted, and allowing us to not have to spend the same amount of money that we did pre-COVID, is very important.”