Executive Summary

Data-driven linear (DDL) TV advertising is looking to hold steady during the COVID-19 pandemic, while addressable TV test initiatives portend expansion of ad inventory to be realized in 2021.

How is the coronavirus pandemic affecting DDL TV advertising?

COVID-19 has softened advertising demand, including for TV. Earlier this year, there was strong evidence that the volume of DDL TV ads would dramatically increase as marketers pursue more ways to bolster advertising effectiveness. At least two scenarios will be at play: Advertisers will bargain-hunt standard linear ad inventory in lieu of paying DDL premiums; and those who have reduced budgets may deploy DDL to spend more selectively.

How will DDL TV advertising achieve future scale?

Future scaling of DDL TV advertising requires more standardization of executional processes across buyers, sellers and data firms. OpenAP, a consortium of four TV network groups, has streamlined the processes for media agencies to simultaneously execute these types of campaigns across multiple networks.

What progress is being made on testing sources of expanded addressable TV ad inventory?

Two initiatives, Nielsen and Project OAR, have been launched to test commercial overlays on smart TVs during the 14 to 15 hourly minutes of national ad inventory.

Live campaign testing will involve monitoring the rate of successful on-screen rendering of addressable ads as well as workflow processes such as target selection, trafficking and creative optimization.

The COVID-19 lockdown has delayed in-market testing until the latter part of 2020.

WHAT’S IN THIS REPORT? This report covers the most recent outlook for DDL TV advertising and updates on testing of new addressable advertising sources.

KEY STAT: After shelter-in-place orders were enacted, US consumers increased their time spent with TV in 2020. We have revised our forecast for time spent per day with TV upward to 229 minutes, a 9.3% rise over 2019.