The upfronts are no longer just the season of the year when TV and ad execs get together to lock in a bundle of ad-spending commitments for the year ahead.<\/p>\n
Thanks to new connected TV consumption and new ad selling techniques, things are becoming more flexible than that.<\/p>\n
In this video interview with Beet.TV, Neil Vendetti, president of US investment at Publicis Groupe’s Zenith – which buys ads on behalf of brands like Verizon, Coty, Toyota, Inspire Brands and RB – says the upfronts are changing.<\/p>\n
“The upfront now offers us a lot more opportunity to be flexible,” Vendetti says. “In the past, it was a very simple – we bring money and we are in ourselves pricing type of mechanic.<\/p>\n
“And now there’s so much both sides can bring to the table, that it’s different.”<\/p>\n
So, what is changing Vendetti cites new capabilities including:<\/p>\n
Major broadcast owners’ upfronts presentations kick off this month<\/a>, with digital NewFronts continuing into June<\/a>.<\/p>\n Last year’s TV upfronts were affected by pandemic ad spending constraint and turmoil. Many brands called for a delay to the season.<\/p>\n The whole episode was an instructive lesson in how modern brands want to be agile and responsive in their media spending, perhaps preferring flexibility to being locked in, especially to a traditional medium whose audience is declining.<\/p>\n At the same time, however, new connected TV services have been blossoming, and its ad capabilities include audience targeting and ad outcome attribution.<\/p>\n “It gives us the opportunity to look a step deeper at the targeting side of it,” Vendetti sees. “We’re trying to build brands, we’re trying to build reach.<\/p>\n “But we’re also trying to find specific audiences and drive specific outcomes, and the ability through our own technology and through third-party technology to be able to activate CTV in that manner is something that we’re trying to bring into the conversation more this year than we have in the past.<\/p>\n “Being able to incorporate CTV strategically into both of those buckets is an important part of the strategy work we’re doing now.”<\/p>\n Even as the capabilities roll out, however, Vendetti is concerned that digital developments are also making life more complex than it ideally should be.<\/p>\n As welcome as connected TV tactics may be, the medium is still splintered – broken up not only by the many different competing viewing options but also the many and varied ways to buy and measure ads placed there.<\/p>\n “When we look across the supply landscape, it’s interesting, because I think, if I put my consumer hat on, I have the same concerns about the marketplace as I do as a buyer.”<\/p>\n He sees viewers concerned about questions like: “How many of these services am I going to subscribe to? How many do I need? How much is too much when it comes to separating yourself out into these different services?”<\/p>\n And he says the ad-buying community is coming to feel the same way. “It feels like, as an industry, we move towards this idea of we’re bundling a massive amount of content together within a cable subscription. And now we’re chopping it all back up and living in silos.<\/p>\n “I don’t know if it’s best for us as an industry to be separating it out. So I do see a point in time where some of this stuff will start to come together, at least from a measurement standpoint.”<\/p>\nLooking deeper<\/h2>\n
Back to silos<\/h2>\n