Major Television Distributors Spearhead 'Go Addressable' Initiative to Advance Addressable TV Advertising Across the Industry

Today, several of the top U.S. television distributors and leading TV brands announce the formation of Go Addressable, an industry initiative designed to accelerate efforts to deliver scaled, addressable TV capabilities that make it even easier for advertisers to incorporate addressable TV into their advertising campaigns.

Go Addressable participants will help to achieve this through efforts around industry education, advocacy and enablement. Its mission is to address challenges facing the addressable TV ecosystem and then recommend actionable solutions, all while remaining committed to protecting personal information.

“It’s great to see distributors rallying around the promise of scalable, addressable linear TV solutions and we’re hopeful that Go Addressable spurs a broader industry effort to unify, simplify and enable activation of all impression-based video,” said Adam Gerber, Chief Global Investment Officer at Essence, a GroupM agency.

“As commercial loads decrease, viewing continues to shift, and the definition of video evolves, addressable solutions which deliver creative versioning, multi-advertiser insertion and campaign level reach/frequency optimization are critical to maintaining value and scale,” he added. “This requires everyone to recognize that point solutions for ‘parts’ of the video marketplace aren’t enough. Ultimately, we need common measurement, planning tools, buying platforms and validation capabilities that unify all forms of impression-based video across traditional, unit based linear, addressable linear, and all forms of streaming video.”

Distributors supporting Go Addressable include Altice USA’s a4 Advertising, Charter’s Spectrum Reach®, Comcast, Cox Media, DIRECTV, DISH Media and Frontier Communications, as well as smart TV brand VIZIO. The objectives of the initiative are focused on three main pillars:

• Key Industry Challenges: Go Addressable seeks to increase access to addressable inventory and reduce fragmentation in addressable TV advertising by identifying best practices, including around common terminology, technical standards and enhanced measurement solutions, using aggregated data and with a commitment to protecting personal information. The overarching goal is to simplify the process of buying and selling addressable TV campaigns, reduce inefficiencies and drive value for advertisers. Tellingly, a recent survey by Forrester Consulting, commissioned by DISH Media and other addressable leaders of over 500 brand and agency respondents, found that every respondent reported experiencing at least one challenge in pursuing addressable TV strategies.
• Addressable Advocacy and Education: Addressable TV is one of the fastest growing parts of the TV industry and is a rapidly evolving opportunity. Go Addressable understands the need to inform clients and providers of addressable TV advertising with insights, use cases and updates on a regular basis. The website, http://www.goaddressable.com/, is being developed as a living repository of addressable TV advertising knowledge for the industry, featuring the shared learnings and insights by – and for – those innovating in the addressable TV space. An industry guide is currently available on the site, and the group will be rolling out additional educational materials, webinars and industry working groups in the coming months.
  
• National Addressable Scale: Simplifying enablement of addressability in the linear environment is a key part of helping addressable TV sellers, including national programmers, implement addressable TV campaigns for advertisers. This includes, but is not limited to, the ability to execute addressable campaigns across multiple distributors in a more streamlined manner.

“Addressable capabilities open up tremendous new opportunities for advertisers by marrying the reach of TV with the precision of audience targeting,” said Mike Dean, Senior Vice President, Advanced Advertising, ViacomCBS. “ViacomCBS is delivering national addressable campaigns with many distribution partners, but the growth of addressable requires standards, scale and industry participation. The Go Addressable initiative is an important step toward achieving unified marketplace solutions that work across the TV ecosystem to drive meaningful expansion and accelerate adoption.”

“Go Addressable, which has brought multiple distributors together, is an exciting introduction and advancement for the TV ecosystem,” said Sean Cunningham, President and CEO, Video Advertising Bureau (VAB). “The appetite and outlook for addressable TV advertising is strong, and industry forces such as Go Addressable are instrumental in resolving existing challenges and helping to pave the way forward for the industry, which is currently at an inflection point – with audience-based buying growing dramatically.”