Strikes Expected to Create Media Content Gap, Drive FAST Investment
An expected gap in the creation of new media content caused by the ongoing writer and actor strikes is likely to lead to increased advertising on free ad-supported streaming (FAST) TV channels, but the industry still faces difficulty in reliably measuring reach and return on advertising spend, said streaming and ad industry officials on panels at the virtual StreamTV Advertising Summit Tuesday. “We need to have best practices, we need to have consensus around a coin of the realm,” said Tastemade Head-Global Sales Jeff Imberman.
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The strikes and the accompanying limited production schedules in Hollywood mean less new content will be available over the next six to 12 months, so advertisers will be looking for platforms that have content and carry ads, said Dave Kersey, chief media officer at ad agency GSD&M. “It’s going to make people try and get a lot more mileage out of the existing content they have.” FAST channels are “the new syndication,” said Darren Olive, Crackle Connex president-national advertising sales and strategy. Concerns about a global recession could also buoy FAST channels, said Roku Head-Ad Revenue Strategy Katina Papas Wachter. “Anytime there's economic uncertainties from a user perspective, it's a good thing for ad-supported content,” she said.
Measurement for the streaming industry is “a bit of a mess” with no universally agreed upon metrics and methods and no holistic collection of data, said analyst Paul Erickson. Ad agencies want “consistency” and transparency, said Kersey. It's “more challenging” for advertisers to understand how their ad spend is doing when they can’t get a complete view of the data, he said. “We have a lot of disparate players” building “walled gardens” instead of sharing data with the rest of the industry, said Imberman. Increased economic pressure on streaming companies is driving them to invest more in personalization and data collection to try to reduce viewer churn, said Erickson.
Privacy concerns are a major limiting factor on ad targeting and measurement, said Kent Tseng TelevisaUnivision vice president-product management, advanced advertising. Increased attention on privacy and evolving state laws on data collection are creating “a roller-coaster ride,” he said. Tseng said there's “no holistic answer” to the tension between advertiser desire for data and increasing privacy regulations. The industry will likely never create a perfect measurement solution, said Jose Moreira, Dish Media general manager-advanced TV analytics. “The only way to do that is to embed tracking devices on everybody that tracks everything that we are exposed to, and that’s not gonna happen.”