Vizrt has partnered with Ithaca College to help deliver a pipeline of new talent into the media technology industry. “The media tech skills shortage is a challenge for customers,” said Griet Johannsen, Global Center of Excellence Lead, Training and Certification. “And we are dedicated to taking action to support and inspire the next generation of content creators, our partnership with Ithaca College does just that.” The school brought in graphics platform and rendering engine Viz Engine 5, graphics control application Viz Trio, and graphics design tool Viz Artist to serve as the foundation of its graphics solution.

Teads released the Teads Omnichannel Graph, a proprietary tool extending contextual and audience-targeting capabilities into the CTV environment. Key capabilities include a curated household and user graph enabling precision targeting; incremental reach planning and measurement; and granular CTV contextual insights.

AI

Forty-nine percent of consumers are confident they can distinguish ads generated by AI versus traditional methods, according to insights released by LG Ad Solutions. The survey also found:
– While 74% of respondents stated they have noticed advertisements they believe are specifically tailored to them, consumers aged 55 and older state they don’t report noticing these types of ads as much.
– 38% of consumers agree that brands using generated AI ads enhance their perception of the brand’s innovation, with 51% of consumers ages 35-54 aligning with the statement. Separately, 31% are neutral about the use of AI in advertisements.
– Despite 30% of consumers stating they would like ads more if they were personalized with AI, 80% believe there should be regulations on the use of AI in specific contexts like political advertising for the upcoming 2024 election.
“It is now clear that consumer appetite is shifting towards innovative technologies that enhance the advertising experience,” said Tony Marlow, CMO at LG Ad Solutions. “This interest is already evident in critical growth areas for CTV, such as shoppable TV and discoverability for brands and content. However, it will be important for advertisers to understand where consumer sensitivities lie with it – especially around events like the 2024 US election.”

AI and AdTech startup Qualitative Intelligence announced new capabilities for Real-time Message Testing and Risk Assessment, developed in collaboration with Silicon Valley’s NEC X venture studio. Its SaaS platform can now analyze hundreds of multi-channel videos, images, and texts in minutes, allowing advertisers and brands to create personalized communications.

Snowflake is adding an AI-powered audience segmentation and discovery tool from GrowthLoop, the composable CDP provider, as a native app in Snowflake Marketplace. The integration, which utilizes the Snowflake Native App Framework and Snowflake Cortex AI models for generative AI capabilities, enables marketers to leverage GrowthLoop’s existing generative AI solution without their data leaving Snowflake.

Yahoo Advertising released the latest update to its AI engine Yahoo Blueprint – Yahoo Blueprint Performance – which powers a suite of features that guide performance throughout the Yahoo DSP. This enhancement redefines how advertisers manage and optimize digital campaigns by leveraging AI technology to boost efficiency and effectiveness, while maintaining control. Yahoo Blueprint first debuted in late 2023 and capitalizes on more than 20 years of AI and machine learning development and proprietary data derived from 335M+ logged-in users globally.

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Albertston Media Collective, the retail media arm for Albertsons Companies, debuted Collective TV, a solution aimed at unlocking the combined value of retail media and TV, providing advertisers with a modern currency for targeting, measuring and optimizing campaigns across streaming, digital video and soon linear TV. “Advertisers need a smarter, more effective way to execute CTV and video campaigns. With Collective TV, we’re removing the silos between publishers, demand-side platforms, and identity solutions by offering an outcome-driven TV solution that is flexible, scalable and measurable,” said Kristi Argyilan, SVP of Retail Media for Albertsons Media Collective. “With Collective TV, we’re taking the wonder out of TV advertising.”

In-game advertising platform Anzu and dentsu have partnered to bring advanced gaming strategies to dentsu clients, including advanced data integrations, highly customized gaming audiences, and better targeting and decision-making during the campaign planning and execution stages. “With a focus on enhancing the quality of creative, integrating data & measurement, and scaling commerce in games, we are excited to offer this new strategic approach to our clients,” said Brent Koning, Global Executive Vice President of dentsu gaming. “The reality is that in-game solutions need to benefit the advertiser, publisher, and most importantly, the player. Together, we will work with Anzu to set standards for advertising in gaming that are authentic and respectful to the players and the gaming community while improving the ease to market and onboarding for our current and future clients.”

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Goodway Group and Vizio have joined Innovid’s Harmony initiative to optimize CTV advertising. Launched in April, Innovid Harmony Initiative brings together industry leaders to work collaboratively to optimize CTV at the infrastructure level to improve efficiency and ROI, enhance transparency and control, reduce carbon emissions and provide better viewing experiences for consumers. As part of the initiative, Innovid launched Harmony Direct to streamline the workflow for guaranteed, non-biddable CTV media to its purest form by removing all friction points, including additional technology hops, fees, and energy waste. Goodway Group and Vizio join Assembly, CMI Media Group, PMG, and Roku, as the first partners to use Harmony Direct.

PubMatic has partnered with Cognitiv to deliver a contextual targeting solution using GPT 4, which understands sentiment and is able to capture nuance unlike previous Large Language Models. Cognitiv’s advanced ContextGPT product helps advertisers to achieve positive sentiment plus DE&I media buying goals at scale. “At PubMatic, we are committed to building a better future for advertising across the open web, and offering robust cookieless solutions is critical,” said Don Lee, VP of Addressability at PubMatic. “Through this expanded partnership with Cognitiv, we can help our clients improve ad relevance at scale – benefiting buyers’ campaign objectives, publishers’ yield, and most importantly, the end user’s browsing experience, all while respecting online privacy.”

The Digital Advertising Alliance has updated the advertising industry’s opt-out mechanism, shifting the technology platform for its participating companies from a cookie-based opt-out tool to a browser-based extension in WebChoices 2.0 that supports opt-outs across both cookies and emerging technologies. The WebChoices 2.0 tool is compatible with most major browsers and will enable users to express category preferences around topics of interest, in addition to company-specific and industry-wide opt-outs. “Over the past 14 years, the AdChoices icon has become a trusted gateway for privacy information and control for millions of Americans,” said Lou Mastria, President & CEO of DAA. “As the advertising industry undergoes dramatic change, the DAA’s opt-out tools are keeping pace with those changes, so people can express their choices for both existing and new technologies used for advertising IDs. This choice tool will ensure Americans continue to have one-click access to information and choices about targeted ads directly from the ads themselves and on the apps or websites they visit.”

IPG’s design and innovation company, Huge, announced that for the first time, 25% of its projects contain AI components. “For 25 years, Huge has excelled at knowing what’s next in technology and helping clients navigate new frontiers to design beautiful, human-centric experiences that unlock growth,” said Huge CEO Lisa De Bonis. “Today, we’re doing the same with AI. Leveraging its power to elevate what we build and how we build industry-defining experiences.” The “next wave of intelligence experiences” in development, dubbed IX (for intelligent experiences), includes projects for clients including:
– Darling Ingredients: Huge launched a new flagship digital experience using a imagery created entirely by AI to deliver both production efficiencies and brand elevation.
– Google: Huge is enhancing Google’s Keyword blog and news site with AI to make Google product news and tips more accessible.
– Hublot: Huge is developing the first “Luxury AI” prototype to deliver highly personalized, white-glove experiences aimed at increasing customer lifetime value.

Fox plans to leverage datafuelX’s SaaS platform, M3, to provide optimized data-driven linear media plans against advertisers’ advanced audience targets for transactions using Nielsen and VideoAmp. “Today, it is table stakes for buyers to have more precise advanced audience guarantees, and data-driven linear provides just that,” said Darren Sherriff, SVP, Advanced Ad Solutions at Fox. “With our trusted partner datafuelX, we are confident that M3 will provide us with the tools to optimize opportunities in this space.”

Comcast Technology Solutions and Inspired Thinking Group announced a strategic relationship and integration between CTS’ AdFusion ad management platform, and ITG’s Storyteq’s Creative Automation platform. The new integration leverages AdFusion’s advanced data-driven ad management capabilities to seamlessly automate ad and traffic delivery, with Storyteq’s platform that automates and scales omni-channel creative versioning. The integration aims to close the marketing execution gap by quickly and cost-effectively enabling brands to deliver creative campaigns at scale.

SaaS data management platform Optable announced a strategic partnership with ID5, the identity provider for digital advertising, aimed at providing publishers who have already deployed ID5 to increase addressability across their properties. Both agency and in-house advertisers will also now have the opportunity to execute data clean room based collaborations using the ID5 framework. “The adtech industry is shifting towards data collaboration as the go-to method for advertisers to connect with their key audiences while maintaining privacy standards,” said Mathieu Roche, CEO of ID5. “This collaboration with Optable streamlines addressability for both sides, acting as a bridge in the ecosystem. Additionally, it marks the first time ID5 has been integrated into a first-party identity resolution and data collaboration solution, setting an important precedent for future collaborations.”

Total television advertising revenue, excluding political spending, will dip 0.6% to $64.1 billion in 2024, projects GroupM. Revenues from CTV rise 20.7% in 2024, and by 2029 will generate 51.1% of all TV revenue, according to the forecast, which includes some YouTube spending in its TV totals. By the end of 2024, less than half of all U.S. households will be pay-TV subscribers, and linear TV revenue will fall 8.9%. Tack on political advertising and the picture is rosier – that segment is expected to surpass $15 billion during the 2024 Presidential election cycle. Retail media is expected to be the fastest growing segment again in 2024, up 22% to reach $47.9 billion in revenue.

On the local advertising front, Borrell Associates expects local to grow 3.2% for the year. That’s down 1.2 points from the company’s estimate last November. Since 3Q23 and continuing through the second quarter of this year, Borrell’s barometer survey has shown that a consistent 50% of SMBs consider it to be harder to sustain a small business than it was six months prior. Highlights include:
– Local advertising is forecast to reach $148.9 billion, up 3.9% from 2023.
– The largest growth is forecast for online listings, with local ad spend forecast to grow 8.1%, topping $20.4 billion.
– Targeted display advertising, driven by social media, is forecast to grow 6.2%, reaching $27.2 billion.
– Local broadcast TV advertising is forecast to grow 5.9%, hitting $9.9 billion.
– The steepest declines are pegged for yellow pages (-14.3%), untargeted banner advertising (-8.4%), print newspapers (-6.7%) and cable TV (-6.0%)
– Streaming video advertising among local buyers is growing far slower than initially predicted. The forecast calls for 3.9% growth this year, topping $23.3 billion.

MEASUREMENT

Integral Ad Science has partnered with Reddit to provide AI-driven measurement to Reddit advertisers, who will have access to IAS’s Brand Safety and Suitability, Viewability, and Invalid Traffic measurement to safeguard and scale their campaigns. “Our partnership will give Reddit customers additional confidence that their ads are appearing alongside content that aligns with their brand values via reliable and accurate data, so they can focus on driving business growth within Reddit’s uniquely valuable archive of human experience,” said Lisa Utzschneider, CEO of IAS. IAS’s Brand Safety and Suitability Measurement complements Reddit’s user and brand safety investments, which includes human moderators and AI-driven moderation tools, brand safety content detection, and customizable Brand Suitability controls.

The Yahoo DSP is the first platform to integrate measurement and audience data from VideoAmp, in a partnership will bring VideoAmp’s targeting and measurement solutions to every stage of CTV campaigns when activated against households that the Yahoo DSP reaches. The partnership sees the integration of Yahoo ConnectID, the Yahoo DSP cookieless identifier, and VideoAmp’s big data and tech engine VALID (VideoAmp Linked Identity & Data). “For advertisers, the CTV landscape is increasingly complicated but great data can ensure optimized planning, targeting, and measurement,” said Elizabeth Herbst-Brady, Chief Revenue Officer, Yahoo. “The recent JIC certification granted to VideoAmp is an important milestone for the industry and recognition of the importance of having accurate data measuring and informing media for today’s marketers. As the first DSP to work with VideoAmp in this way, we’re helping advertisers navigate this new normal by building on our industry-leading tools and ensuring campaigns are independently validated by a trusted, currency-grade measurement leader.”

iSpot has joined the LinkedIn Marketing Partner program to support the platform’s new CTV offering. “As the advertising industry faces increased pressure to drive results, building solutions that measure the effectiveness in reaching B2B audiences is critical,” said Logan Kingman, Director of Business Development, LinkedIn. “Through our collaboration with iSpot, we’re helping our customers better measure the accuracy and reach of their CTV campaigns against target audiences.”

STREAMING

Streaming bundles could be a key to reducing churn, according to data from Magid, which found predictive rate of churn was 16% lower due to the increased availability of bundle plans, and bundles boosted customer intent to keep a subscription longer than six months by 15%. “In the low-to-no-growth market that is now streaming, growth only comes from stealing share,” said Kate Morgan, EVP, Global Media, Entertainment and Games. “With an increasing proportion of subscribers now accustomed to dropping and resubscribing services, SVODs urgently need to stabilize at least a proportion of their subscriber base. Bundling, whether with friends, or, even frenemies, is a smart and strategic answer to that.”

AVOD FrightPix, launching tomorrow, June 15, will rely on Brightcove’s platform to distribute its content to audiences across. The new streamer will feature classic scares, modern thrillers, true crime tales, and FrightPix Originals.

Streaming Ink Media has launched a new animated comedy streaming service and studio, Animation+, available on Samsung TV Plus. At launch, the FAST Channel and AVOD offering includes over 600+ hours of series popular with Millennial and Gen-Z audiences in the US and Canada, with plans to expand internationally as well as to other major streaming services later this year.

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