Longtime readers and podcast listeners – especially those with their eyes fixed on the CTV space – have probably noticed some changes at AdExchanger lately.
Back in July, we rebranded our CTV Roundup newsletter to “Streamlined” and increased the output to twice a week on Tuesdays and Thursdays, rather than just once a week. The idea is to expand the newsletter’s audience to include not just ad tech experts but also the readership of our sister brand Cynopsis, which includes people who work in TV programming, production and marketing.
Not long after that, AdExchanger senior editors Victoria McNally (that’s me) and Alyssa Boyle started handling the day-to-day management of the Cynopsis newsletter, which hits inboxes on the Mondays, Wednesday and Fridays in between Streamlined issues.
Odds are, if you were previously subscribed to the CTV Roundup, then you’re already subscribed to both Streamlined and Cynopsis. But if you’ve only been checking in on our ad tech stories, it might be a good to take peek at all the other topics we’re unpacking.
Why care about the stuff in between the ads?
Many of the biggest news stories in the entertainment industry end up affecting advertisers as much as they impact the TV production business. Take the Paramount-Warner Bros. merger, the ongoing lawsuits against the Federal Communications Commission brought by various network and telecom players and the massive increase in sports programming.
These developments all influence what kind of ad inventory is available to buyers and how effective those placements may be.
Keeping abreast of what’s going on in TV and film production can also help marketers identify developing trends before they’ve been monetized, both on the content side – YA and true crime are very big right now, for example! – and on the production side. AI, short-form video and digital platforms like YouTube are driving many of the most important conversations in the industry right now.
“As advertisers know very well,” Boyle says, “the better you can predict things, the better you can make money off of them.”
Speaking of making money
We also chat in this episode about one of our favorite CTV topics: home screen ads. Full programmatic availability is still a long way off, but it’s becoming more feasible thanks to recent advances made by Samsung, Magnite and Nexxen.
One of the biggest challenges, which Nexxen in particular is trying to tackle, is standardization. Right now, most TV manufacturers have different creative standards and technical specifications for their own home screen ads, making it difficult for advertisers to optimize their ad buys at scale like they can with more traditional CTV ad breaks or other forms of digital inventory.
As these issues get worked out, expect to see a much wider variety of advertisers on smart TV home screens beyond the media and entertainment brands that dominate today.
