The news: Sell-side company Magnite announced a private marketplace in collaboration with video advertising firm ITN on Thursday that will enable programmatic access to local linear TV.

• The offering will see local linear TV inventory become available through Magnite’s ClearLine programmatic platform. Advertisers can activate live local linear TV alongside streaming and digital video, while local stations receive streamlined workflows to operate at the same pace of digital platforms.
• The marketplace offers self-service deal ID creation, auto-bidding for delivery management, digital-like delivery dashboards, and precision controls for geo targeting, daypart, program, genre, and affiliate.
• Future innovations will enable advanced capabilities for spot TV, precision audience targeting enhancements, capabilities for spot TV, and specialized features for verticals like political advertising.

The trend: Linear TV is increasingly adopting programmatic buying and selling practices, but the transition has been gradual. Linear programmatic advertising leverages software to offer select programs and ad packages to households and is capable of identifying high-indexing programs and time slots. But ad insertion has been less commonly automated—and Magnite and ITN could move the needle in this direction.

Magnite and ITN’s offering showcases a new evolution in programmatic linear advertising, offering automation for linear that makes activation “as simple as buying digital,” said ITN CEO Todd Watson.

Keeping linear afloat: As connected TV (CTV) eats linear’s share of time spent with TV, aligning with digital programmatic gives linear enduring value to brands and performance advertisers. Magnite and ITN’s advancement allows linear TV to better compete with CTV on targeting, efficiency, and measurement—key strengths of digital platforms.

What it means for advertisers: The private marketplace represents a new opportunity in linear that helps reignite its relevance for brands. Automation helps modernize linear programmatic advertising, delivering the same efficiency capabilities that are standard in digital. As a result, advertisers gain access to simplified buying and execution processes while capitalizing on linear’s enduring ability to boost key metrics.