Cross-border, cross-platform data consortium launched
February 6, 2018
Four leading industry participants – Sky, Adobe Systems, TVbeat and Alphonso – have formed a new thought leadership consortium that will work with the European TV industry to explore future opportunities enabled by new developments in measurement, metrics and data, in areas such as advanced targeting, audience profiling, viewability and attribution, and advanced analytics.
Building collaboratively on the work of Europe’s JICs [Joint Industry Committees] and television audience measurement providers, the Consortium will facilitate an extensive programme of research, dialogue and engagement – exploring the new opportunities and priorities opening up for the industry and working to discuss potential priorities and principles. The Consortium is being supported and advised by egta, the European trade association for television and radio sales houses, and EACA, the European Association of Communications Agencies.
According to the Consortium, the rapid growth and development of multiplatform TV viewing and growing competition from new digital competitors are stimulating new developments and growing investment in measurement and data across the TV industry. Across Europe, the TV industry is already investing heavily in the roll out of next-generation hybrid TV audience measurement solutions, to better measure multi-platform viewing. However, alongside these investments, opportunities are proliferating – to personalise interactions with viewers, to leverage data from TV platforms and OTT services, to introduce new quality metrics such as viewability, dwell time and context, to demonstrate effectiveness in new ways, and to unlock the full potential of advanced advertising.
However, addressing these opportunities presents challenges for the TV industry, says the Consortium. Many solutions will require greater collaboration, across industry value chains, and new partnerships to unlock their full potential.
Launching in February 2018, the Consortium will undertake a detailed investigation of these new areas of opportunity, working closely and collaboratively with the industry to explore and suggest opportunities to benefit the industry and advertisers. Managed by research and strategy consultancy MTM, the Consortium will conduct a programme of European industry seminars in March 2018. A major report, summarising the Consortium’s conclusions and recommendations, will be published in Q2 2018 and presented to industry stakeholders at key events through the year.
The Consortium is open to conversations with qualified TV industry executives interested in discussing future opportunities in relation to TV data.
“TV has moved far away from being the piece of furniture in the corner of the room” commented Jamie West, Deputy Managing Director of Sky Media UK & Group Director of Advanced Advertising. “The cross- border and cross-device nature of content means that we need to ensure that as the industry innovates we are able to harness data to increase effectiveness in planning, execution and analysis. More impactful, consistent, joined-up and brand safe campaigns is what is demanded by advertisers and we need to make it as simple as possible.”
“We believe there is a large opportunity to introduce advanced audience measures across linear, addressable, and connected TV – but the industry must collaborate and work together to make this happen,” added Philip Duffield, Adobe Advertising Cloud Managing Director, EMEA at Adobe.
“The new technologies now available to deliver forecasting and planning across all TV properties will deliver both reach extension and targeting opportunities to further TV’s competitive position,” explained Abbas Tahzib, Chief Revenue Officer at TVBeat. “Extending existing collaborations can only speed up this process across Europe. We look forward to engaging with the industry to develop these collaborations and to develop proposals that the industry can support.”
Katty Roberfroid, Director General of egta, said: “Regardless of the side of the industry we work on, the general consensus is that the lack of harmonisation in standards and metrics must be addressed. We believe that the TV industry must take a pioneer role to foster improvement in this field. Through the AV Currency Working Group, our latest insight publication on Advances in Hybrid Television Audience Measurement and other upcoming initiatives, egta’s goal is to continuously contribute to the on-going discussions and contribute to the creation of the new generation of television audience measurement.”