The Need for Integrated Inventory Management
The traditional approach of managing linear and streaming ad inventories as separate silos leads to inefficiencies, which in turn can lead to missed opportunities in ad sales and audience engagement. Merging these inventories into a single, holistic system can unlock greater profitability by allowing greater optimization for how ads are sold and delivered across platforms.
Rather than continue to treat linear and streaming as isolated entities, broadcasters today can view the inventory as a unified whole, representing a re-aggregated audience and focusing on delivering that audience regardless of the platform. This integrated approach allows broadcasters to streamline processes, enhance efficiency, and ultimately drive greater profitability by targeting and engaging the entire audience more effectively.
“We are a convergence media company, not linear dabbling in digital, but a cross-platform media company,” said Rob Weisbord of Sinclair Broadcast Group. “The challenge when we look at national business is that they’re siloed, and the silos each have a budget, each having different goals.”
Jeff Eales of Sky Media built on that idea, saying: “It’s one viewing experience still, but it’s multilayered, as we all know, how different services — either broadcast, cable, satellite, or streaming services — go into the same home with the same content. So why on earth should ad inventory be sold differently? We have seven currencies now, and we need to get back to one.
Segmenting Premium Inventory
When broadcasters differentiate premium inventory from non-premium content, ensuring that it is strategically priced and marketed to reflect its true value, they can capitalize on the higher demand and willingness to pay associated with premium slots. Emphasizing and optimizing premium inventory is critical to increased profitability, enabling broadcasters to make the most out of their most valuable content. At the same time, non-premium can be optimized by automating the placement of those ads within the available inventory within the available audience at the lowest possible cost.
Weisbord discussed the importance of strategically segmenting and managing different types of inventory. Premium inventory, such as live sports events or high-demand shows, naturally attracts higher-value audiences due to its scarcity and the quality of the content. This type of inventory holds significant value because it offers advertisers access to engaged viewers who are more likely to respond to high-impact advertising.
“Of course, as broadcasters we would say the non-premium is just slightly less premium,” said Eales. “Everything is premium. The less-premium is auto-booked, and that’s about 85% of our inventory in terms of numbers of spots.”
Accurate Measurement and Data Integration
The effectiveness of merged linear and streaming ad sales will depend in part on accurate measurement and data integration. A unified measurement system would enable broadcasters to track and deliver consistent results across both platforms.
These are just a few themes and highlights from the recent TVREV webinar. Check out the full replay to hear more on boosting efficiency and profitability of ad sales from this exceptional panel.
