Top brands turned up in vivo for NewFronts this week, after two years of IAB’s annual event being held virtually only. The attendees laid out their plans for the year, jockeying to stake out a chunk of this year’s projected 39% increase in CTV ad spend, even after a whopping 2021.

This year’s NewFronts news ultimately fell into a few disparate buckets: content, formats, and measurement. Platforms touted content and originals in hopes to both retain and acquire consumers. New formats and improved measurement offerings were pushed to entice brands and marketers alike to help solve attribution and currency questions. We’ll cover the highlights of each below.

Copious Content

If your friends and family are bemoaning their lack of queued-up shows to binge, these fresh announcements should help.

• Roku is cooking up a storm with original expansion shows by Martha, Emeril, and even a Weird Al Yankovic Biopic.
• Peacock will get movie exclusives in addition to next-day broadcasts of Bravo Shows (which should delight Real Housewives fans).
• Fox’s Tubi is adding FAST entertainment and piping in more linear offerings.
• Amazon is expanding originals, but their biggest news was announced earlier this year: their exclusive right to Thursday Night Football for the next 11 years.

Forthcoming Formats

Are the days of the non-interactive video behind us? Well, not quite yet. But there are some options that will give the “basic” TV ad a run for its money.

• In-scene virtual product placement will be a thing, with Amazon and Peacock (NBC) leading the charge.
• Shoppable formats are coming on Roku.
• Jump ads on Vizio will take you from a linear show to streaming. (It sounds like a TV pop up.)

Modes of Measurement

Platforms such as Samsung, Vizio, and Roku shared tools to measure incrementality and more, to the point that it’s starting to feel like a choose-your-own-adventure of measurement options. With all these platforms operating independently, measurement and currency is even more key.  

This year, traditional market-setter Nielsen has seen competition from the likes of iSpot.tv and VideoAmp, who were dangled as potential new currencies for this year’s upfronts. Unsurprisingly, publishers and marketers have leaned into “better metrics” such as SOV, attention, and incremental reach, as they provide a deeper analysis of performance, compared to simply reflecting the number of households who saw a given ad.

WITHIN’s Advice for CTV Marketers

It looks like the courting period may last longer than we originally thought. As AdExchanger notes, this will be a year poised for plenty of trying, testing, and learning with alt currencies. But it’s still early in the game. It will take time for the industry to test new measurement tools and figure out how they can translate into a tradeable and potentially uniform currency. It makes more sense to crawl, walk, and then run rather than to jump from sitting to running … and potentially pulling a muscle.

If you’re looking to improve your CTV strategy, WITHIN can help. Our expert teams can devise a plan to help your brand reach its advertising goals. Get in touch anytime.