Expand reach with TV Audience Targeting

Is addressable TV the future?

When searching for more effective ways to reach audiences advertisers increasingly consider the idea of addressable TV, a form of account-based marketing, utilizing data and customized segments. Through the use of household data, addressable TV allows advertisers to simultaneously run different ads for customized audience segments to precisely target and increase their message’s impact. By employing this strategy brands will boost ad relevance, maximize budget impact, and provide wider visibility to greater understand audiences.

While addressable TV is beneficial in theory, it faces challenges in execution. Data gaps reduce the level of ad targeting precision due to a lack of available household data and undefined user privacy policies. In addition, its complex framework is missing a support structure. The uncertainty of addressable TV’s structure, demand, and usable data render it out of reach in the short term. Although in the long term, it has potential that is contingent on the lengthy process of resolving these uncertainties. Therefore, a better way to elevate traditional TV now is to combine it with digital.

Elevating with TV and digital

To enhance traditional TV, brands turn to cross media strategies which combine TV and digital. Over the past few years, this strategy has become the baseline brands use to benchmark media strategies. The relevance of this is visible in how today’s audiences with 87% of US television viewers watch TV with another device. This allows brands to see the big picture in how their own strategy can cross media channels and how it performs amongst competitors. Now there is a way to take this strategy one step further: combine scale and precision in a deterministic approach.

Breaking the mold: TV Audience Targeting

TV audience targeting has the ability to target specific viewers with increased precision as well as even out client touchpoints. So how does it work? Household TV viewership data comes from a combination of Internet service provider’s boxes, smart tellys and our TVTY proprietary real-time TV ad detection technology. With this powerful technology combo, brands are able to control ad repetition and increase their message’s impact by rebalancing ad exposure levels.

Two key components comprise this strategy: transparency and control. Transparency allows brands to measure impressions, which allows the identification of viewer demographics via cable boxes and smart TVs. Once determined, brands are able to control with certainty how often a user is exposed to their digital campaign. To clarify, exposure refers to the number of times audiences see a brand’s ad and includes both TV and digital ads.

For example, TV audience targeting allows brands to distinguish between frequent and infrequent or non-exposed viewers. Therefore, exposure can be decreased for frequent viewers and increased for infrequent and non-exposed viewers. Brands can determine how many times, on average, that they create touchpoints with their audience.

Most importantly, this strategy creates value for brands. They can distinguish whether or not a household has seen their ad, and then adapt their strategy accordingly, either including or excluding those viewers from digital campaigns.

This is the future of TV. Traditional television can no longer afford to remain siloed. With TV and digital coupled together in one innovative strategy, TV audience targeting has enormous potential to help brands reach their audience while simultaneously regulating the level of exposure across a diverse group of viewers. Brands want to reach their audience in a positive way that allows them to respect their audience while also effectively portraying their message. TV audience targeting is the solution.

Emily Raneri, digital marketing specialist, TVTY