Tag: audience data

Verizon To Acquire Yahoo’s Core Assets For $4.8 Billion

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Verizon announced on Monday morning that it has reached an agreement to acquire Yahoo’s core assets, primarily its internet business along with some real estate, for $4.8 billion in cash. Verizon says it plans to integrate Yahoo’s internet assets into AOL, which it acquired for $4.4 billion last year. Pending the usual regulatory approvals, the deal is expected to close in Q1 2017.

Why Brands Should Care
Much like buying AOL, this Yahoo acquisition should give Verizon’s ad business a strong boost in terms of audience reach and user data. The online properties and user data that Yahoo brings complements the mobile properties and user data that Verizon already has, and the combined data pool should significantly increase the cross-platform targeting capability of Verizon’s ad operations, similarly to the way that buying AOL’s ad operations has. Granted, the operation likely won’t be able to truly challenge Google and Facebook’s dominant positions in the mobile advertising space. But by joining forces, it might emerge as a competitive rival that provides an alternative for brands to consider when it comes to digital advertising.

Source: Ad Exchange

Viacom Inks Data Deal With ComScore For Cross-Platform Measurement

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Viacom has reached a new multi-year deal with comScore to leverage the latter’s vast data on digital audiences to help advertisers target specific audiences across the various Viacom properties. Last year, comScore merged with TV audience measurement firm Rentrak to better compete with Nielsen. With this new deal, marketers are able to access the audience data from comScore via Viacom’s Vantage platform, and use it to target and track audiences across linear TV, digital, and VOD services within Viacom’s media network.

What Brands Need To Do
As digital and OTT distribution channels continue to grow, consumers’ TV and video consumption is increasingly fragmented. Therefore, brand advertisers should embrace the new data-driven tools Viacom offers to better measure and serve content and ads across multiple devices and channels.

To read more on how brands can reach shoppers on OTT platforms with shopping apps and branded content, please check out the Appified TV section in our Outlook 2016.

 

Source: AdWeek

Viacom Puts Data Front And Center Amid Upfront Talks

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Viacom, owner of cable channels including Comedy Central, Nickelodeon, and MTV, claims that 80% of its upfront deals this year will offer marketers access to its audience data in some way. Aiming to make that data a central part of its upfront deals to appeal to marketers, Viacom says it is rolling out five new products designed to simplify and expand the reach of buying target audiences, allowing ad-buyers to automate targeting based on buying intent and more granular data points. For example, Vantage Instant Audience enables marketers to tap into audience segments already identified by Viacom, while another product, Vantage Target Discover, aims to help marketers find potential customers through Viacom’s behavioral data.

What Brands Need To Do
As more and more brand advertisers start to look beyond basic demographic information, audience data is essential for advertisers seeking to identify and reach their target their audience in the increasingly fractionalized media space. Similarly to Viacom, NBCUniversal also launched new targeting tools last month to help marketers tap into its audience database and target them across multiple platforms. As more audience data becomes available, TV advertisers should take advantage of the new targeting tools that the networks are offering and leverage them to create and implement more effective brand campaigns.

 

Source: AdWeek

Viacom Teams Up With TiVo For More Audience Data

Posted on by Lab Team

What Happened
Viacom is about to offer advertisers a lot more audience data that goes beyond the usual metrics that Nielsen provides. Striking a new partnership deal with TiVo, Viacom will be able to use its set-top box data from over 2.3 million households using TiVo devices to boost Viacom Vantage, its ad tool that allows advertisers to target their buys based on consumer habits.

What Brands Need To Do
Following Comcast’s recent move to tap its set-top boxes for more viewer data, Viacom is likely hoping that this move will help increase the value of  its ads in the face of its declining ratings. For brands advertising on Viacom networks, this new partnership should provide them with better targeting tools and more accurate audience insights to help reach their desired audience segments.

 

Source: The Hollywood Reporter

Mozilla’s Cookie Policy Divides Publishers

Posted on by Lab Team

Mozilla’s decision to not store third-party cookies by default has divided online publishers. Many publishers that have embraced cookie-based targeting available through ad exchanges will suffer as a result of the new policy. On the other hand, the premium publishers that offer direct ad sales will be able to value their content more highly without programmatic buying available for many Firefox users. It will be interesting to see if any other browsers follow suit with Mozilla.