Go Addressable – the pay TV distributor-backed addressable advertising initiative – has added its first programmer member and formally staked a position as an industry trade group.
Last week Go Addressable announced Paramount Advertising as its newest – and first programmer – member. Simultaneously it announced the entity, initially formed in 2021, has been incorporated as an official, non-profit trade organization. In addition to Paramount, Go Addressable includes founding distributor members Altice USA’s a4 Advertising, Charter’s Spectrum Reach, Comcast Advertising, DirecTV Advertising and Dish Media.
The group cited the milestone as credence for its momentum alongside broader industry awareness, interest and adoption in addressable TV advertising. The trade group’s core mission continues to be accelerating education, uptake and awareness of addressable TV and said new participants and additional funding and commitments that have been secured can help further drive that aim.
“As we reach a pivotal point in the future of addressable TV, Go Addressable continues to find new ways to enhance, innovate and drive momentum behind this medium across the TV ad ecosystem. We’re very excited to lead programmer participation in this industry group,” said Maribel Becker, VP of Addressable Advertising Partnerships at Paramount, in a statement.
Since forming, Go Addressable has taken on efforts such as launching industry guidelines and keeping tabs on the adoption, usage and trends of addressable advertising, according to a statement by Larry Allen, board chairman of the trade group, and VP and GM of Data and Addressable Enablement at Comcast Advertising.
“Today’s incorporation as an official trade organization will further enable us to amplify our thought leadership and education rooted approach to raising awareness and adoption of this medium, as well as drive future innovation in this space,” Allen stated.
In addition, Allen told StreamTV Insider via email that officially forming as a trade group provides Go Addressable with “the foundation to operate and govern the group under a set of bylaws giving clarity of purpose to the members and providing further structure to make decisions, fund initiatives and administer,” such as having a legal entity to hire vendors and pay bills, among other functions.
The group intends to announce its plans as a trade organization during this week’s annual Go Addressable event, with Allen noting it’s “doubling down” on education and research to support marketers’ use of addressable TV.
“There are many myths about addressable that we plan to change perception about, especially given the convergence that is needed to efficiently bring together live liner and CTV addressable inventory for scale,” Allen told STV. And with Paramount now on board and the new organization formed, Go Addressable expects to add more programmers and other members to its roster, he added.
In terms of traction, a Go Addressable study with Advertiser Perceptions released in August found that 73% of marketers were using addressable TV, marking a 16% increase compared to the year prior. A separate September survey from the organization found nearly half (47%) of advertisers said addressable TV played a role in their Upfront negotiations, with over 80% of those also citing it as an important aspect of negotiations and close to half pegging it as “extremely important” to their planning.
A key goal of the trade group is to educate buyers on the benefits of addressable TV and make it easier to implement. That said, there are areas where advertiser perceptions still see the medium as falling short, with Go Addressable noting respondents felt there’s currently “inadequate attribution to prove the ROI of addressable TV advertising” – though the group called out the fact that it works with 20 top attribution vendors in the market, contrasting what’s available in the market and highlighting the need for education.
In June Ampere Analysis released a forecast that suggested some advertisers were still wary about some aspects of addressable TV but that those who use the method saw it as very cost effective, with the firm projecting significant growth for the medium over the next few years.
According to Ampere, addressable TV advertising accounted for $56 billion of global TV ad revenue in 2022 and forecast that to climb to $87 billion in 2027 when it expects the medium to capture one-fifth of global video ad buying. While Go Addressable is focused on traditional linear distributors, Ampere defined addressable TV as encompassing a range of platforms and technologies – including AVOD, FAST, SVOD, linear, connected TV and others, which allow advertisers to buy TV inventory in a targeted way.
Ampere's June report highlighted core drivers for the larger addressable market, such as broader awareness of the format among buyers, alongside more comfort with the capabilities and effectiveness.
Members of Go Addressable have taken on their own efforts to make linear addressable TV advertising easier, such as an April partnership between DirecTV and Dish to streamline the workflow for programmers and remove the need for custom integrations.
And cable-backed Ampersand, a TV ad sales company owned by major MVPDs (including Go Addressable members) Charter, Comcast, Cox, Altice and Verizon, at the start of the year automated elements for buyers to speed up the process for addressable campaign planning across the supply partners.
As for Go Addressable, the newly incorporated industry trade group is hosting its third-annual industry summit this Wednesday, November 29. And as TV ad buying fragments across platforms and distribution modes, the focus of this year’s event is on the converged future of addressable TV advertising.
Article updated with additional comment from Larry Allen.