NBCU Offers ‘Programmatic’ TV Ads, With Important Caveats

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Starting this fall, ad buyers will be able to use software to purchase TV inventory

NBCUniversal said it will start selling some linear TV ad space to advertisers using programmatic tools and advanced data targeting, a move the company called “unprecedented” in a press release on Wednesday.

So what does that mean exactly?

Marketers will now be able to take their own data sets, and employ their preferred ad-buying technology (such as a ‘demand side platform’ offered by a company such as TubeMogul), and buy ads on networks like NBC, USA or SyFy. Starting this fall they’ll be able to do this on a daily basis, NBCU said.

This offering is essentially an expansion of NBCUx, a program that allows brands to buy targeted ads in Web video content.

What’s new, here? Didn’t NBCU talk a lot about using data to sell TV ads during last year’s upfront?

Yes, but that was a different ad offering called ATP--or “Audience Targeting Platform.” Essentially, ATP helped advertisers find better shows to run their ads in using set-top box data from NBCU parent company Comcast Corp. and other sources. But those ad deals were still negotiated and executed the old fashioned way, with lots of calls and emails.

Now, starting this fall, the media giant is embracing a more “programmatic” ad buying methodology, to a degree. Ad buyers will be able to log into their preferred buying software, find available ad inventory using whatever data set they deem important (like, say, people who are likely to be in the market for a minivan), and put together a media plan without having to talk to anyone at NBC.

Don’t confuse this with the “real-time bidding” popularized in digital advertising. Unlike, say, Google keywords, this inventory won’t be sold in auctions, but instead will be available in private marketplaces for marketers to purchase in the advance “upfront” season or throughout the year. You can buy ads for programs airing within a week, though NBCU will look to compress that window over time.

“This creates a layer of automation in the workflow,” said Krishan Bhatia, executive vice president of business operations and strategy at NBCU. “Buyers can build media plans of their own and request inventory as needed throughout the year.”

Advertisers won’t be able to cherry pick individual shows. That’s not the idea here, saidDan Lovinger, executive vice president of the entertainment advertising sales group at NBCUniversal. “This is not intended to be an opportunistic scatter buy,” he said.

But marketers can pull the trigger on a buy using automated tools for the first time. And advertisers will be able to find out which shows and networks their ads are running on after the fact.

In terms of execution, although NBCU will receive orders via software, your ad won’t appear in a TV show automatically just because you clicked a button. Unlike digital media, national TV advertising isn’t capable of real-time, “dynamic ad insertion,” said Mr. Bhatia. Ads will be inserted into shows the old-fashioned way.

NBCU’s move isn’t revolutionary. But for a TV business that has hesitated to go too far down the programmatic path for fear of commoditizing prices and losing control, it represents a significant step.