AdTech Collective by Seedtag
News, trends, and insights in Digital Advertising
Every week, the internet tells you what's trending. It rarely tells you how any of it felt.
Open any trends page, any weekly recap, any "most talked about" list, and the logic is the same. Volume wins. Whatever generated the most clicks, shares, or mentions gets ranked first, regardless of what that attention actually meant. A blockbuster movie premiere and a last-minute playoff upset can sit side by side on the same list, indistinguishable by the metric used to rank them.
But attention and emotion are not the same thing. A story can dominate headlines and still leave people cold. Another can spike quietly in wonder, anger, or admiration without ever cracking the top of a trends page. Volume tells you where people looked. It says nothing about what they felt while looking.
That gap between the content people consume and how they actually feel about it is exactly where Neuro-Contextual advertising begins.
From Signal to Spotlight: Introducing the Seedtag Emotion Quotient
Today, we're putting Liz, our Neuro-Contextual AI, to work with the launch of the Seedtag Emotion Quotient, a weekly ranking of the five cultural moments that generated the strongest measured emotional response, not the ones simply generating the most volume.
Each moment is scored against its own emotional baseline. Take The Odyssey: admiration and anticipation for Nolan's epic were real, but off-screen romance between its stars ended up generating the strongest emotional signal of all, stronger than the film itself. And sometimes, what stands out is how differently the same event can be felt. At this year’s US Open, coverage around Carlos Alcaraz drove admiration to 3.93x its usual baseline, while stories around Novak Djokovic's early exit pushed sadness to 2.37x. Same tournament, same week, but two very different ways of experiencing it. For advertisers, that's an important distinction. Knowing that the US Open is capturing attention is one thing. Understanding whether that attention is being shaped by admiration or sadness gives brands a much more precise read on the moment and how their message can fit within it.
That's the point of the Emotion Quotient. It's the same intelligence behind Liz, our Neuro-Contextual AI, made visible: reading not just what a moment is about, but how it's genuinely felt.
Key Takeaways
- The Seedtag Emotion Quotient turns that same Neuro-Contextual analysis into a public, weekly view of the five cultural moments the internet felt the most.
- Liz, our Neuro-Contextual AI, reads interest, emotion, and intent across content in real time, without relying on personal data.
- Emotional signals rarely appear alone. Liz identifies the multiple emotions layered within a single piece of content.
- Traditional contextual targeting can identify what a piece of content is about. Neuro-Contextual advertising reads why it matters, understanding what sets one piece of content apart from another and how it's likely to land with the person engaging with it.
- Understanding why, not just what, is what makes Neuro-Contextual advertising fully resonant, and it's the foundation of full-funnel outcomes across the open web and CTV.
It's Not About Who Someone Is. It's About What They're Passionate About, In This Moment.
What Is Neuro-Contextual Advertising?
Contextual targeting has been part of digital advertising for years. At its most basic, it matches ads to content using keywords and categories. A travel article gets travel ads. A sports recap gets sports ads. It works, but it reaches its limit there. Classification is as far as it goes.
More advanced systems now use vector embeddings, numerical representations that place related concepts closer together in meaning, even when they share no keywords at all. That's a real improvement in how machines read content. But embeddings alone only summarize meaning. They don't explain why a moment matters to the person reading it.
That's the gap Neuro-Contextual advertising is built to close.
Neuro-Contextual Advertising, our approach at Seedtag, adds a purpose-built layer of business logic on top of that foundation, one built to interpret interest, emotion, and intent within content itself.
Two articles can sit in the exact same category and still mean entirely different things. Someone reading a spoiler-filled recap of a finale and someone reading a spoiler-free review are both talking about the same show, but their intent runs in opposite directions: one wants closure, the other wants to be convinced to watch. Knowing what the content is about can't tell them apart. Understanding why each reader is there can.
The same holds for emotion. A product launch event and a product recall story can both sit under "tech news," yet one carries excitement and anticipation, the other frustration and concern. That same underlying intelligence, reading interest, emotion, and intent together, is what powers everything we build, the Seedtag Emotion Quotient included.
The same logic applies to people, not just pages. Two readers can share every demographic box, same age, same income, same zip code, and still care about completely different things. Demographics describe who someone is on paper. They say nothing about what actually moves that person in the moment. Neuro-Contextual advertising shifts the question from "who is this person?" to "what are they passionate about right now?", and content itself is where that answer shows up first.
The Tech Behind the Ranking
Behind every score in the ranking is Liz, our Neuro-Contextual AI, reading content at scale and in real time. Liz scans more than 100 million URLs every day, with native understanding across 10+ languages and access to inventory from more than 30,000 premium media publishers globally, spanning the open web, video, and CTV.
That scale matters because the Seedtag Emotion Quotient isn't built from isolated pieces of content. Liz understands the connections between content across this broader ecosystem, identifying signals of interest, emotion, and intent as they emerge. The result is a view of cultural moments grounded not in a snapshot, but in what is happening across the content universe around us.
From there, understanding goes deeper than keywords. Liz maps the relationships between topics using vector embeddings grounded in neuroscience, which is how the ranking can isolate the specific terms driving a spike, not just name the general subject behind it.
Because human reactions are rarely singular, Liz reads emotion in layers rather than assigning one flat label. A single moment can carry curiosity and excitement at once, or admiration alongside real tension, and the ranking is built to reflect that complexity.
All of this happens without relying on personal data. Liz reads the content environment itself, not the individual people engaging with it, which is what keeps the ranking privacy-first by design.
Each week, the Seedtag Emotion Quotient publishes a new read on the five moments that generated the strongest measured emotional response over the week prior. It's built to be explored, not just read: every entry breaks down the specific emotions behind it, the story driving the spike, and how that moment's emotional profile compares to its usual baseline, a starting point for thinking through which emotional signals are worth aligning a campaign with, and when.
Why Does Measuring Emotion Matter for Advertisers?
The Seedtag Emotion Quotient makes something visible that advertisers should care about directly: emotion is measurable, and it predicts performance.
That's not just true for the moments in this ranking. It holds inside real campaigns too.
The same Neuro-Contextual intelligence behind the ranking already drives stronger performance where it counts most: inside live campaigns. Liz, our Neuro-Contextual AI, is the same engine behind Seedtag NeuroX, our Neuro-Contextual Exchange, powering both from the same underlying intelligence. NeuroX connects that intelligence at scale across 30,000+ premium publishers and broadcasters, making every impression understood whether or not identity is present in the bidstream.
Working with Professor Moran Cerf from Columbia University, our neuroscience research measured real-time brain responses and found that Neuro-Contextual ads drive 3.5 times higher neural engagement than non-contextual ads, and a 26% stronger emotional response than standard contextual advertising. Full-funnel outcomes, from awareness to conversion, are consistently stronger when a message aligns with the emotional state of the moment it appears in.
Is Neuro-Contextual advertising the future of targeting? As identity signals keep fragmenting across the open web, understanding the moment becomes the only foundation that holds.
It's not about knowing what content people consume. It's about understanding how that content makes them feel.
The Seedtag Emotion Quotient is live now. Explore this week's ranking.
The industry has always chased one promise: delivering the right message to the right person at the right time. The surprising part of advertising automation in 2026 is that the creative side of that promise is largely solved. Dynamic creative platforms, modern ad servers, and workflow automation have brought the industry much closer to making personalization at scale a reality.
What hasn't caught up is measurement.
That gap between what advertising automation can execute and what teams can actually measure is where many agencies still struggle. Closing it requires more than adopting another AI tool. It demands smarter workflows, disciplined testing, and connected data that turns execution into measurable business outcomes.
In this episode of AdTech Heroes, I sat down with Lisa Markou, Executive Vice President, Platforms at Publicis Collective, to explore what advertising automation actually looks like inside a modern agency, why measurement remains the industry's biggest challenge, and how leading teams are deciding what to automate first.
Key Takeaways
- Creative automation has made personalized advertising at scale possible, but measurement and attribution have yet to keep pace.
- Advertising automation in 2026 is less about adding new AI tools and more about simplifying technology stacks and eliminating inefficient workflows.
- The biggest advertising automation benefits often come from workflow automation, replacing manual processes that slow teams down and introduce errors.
- The most successful automation strategies begin with small, focused tests before expanding across larger marketing campaigns.
- Connected data—not disconnected platforms—is what allows automation to deliver meaningful business outcomes.
Creative Automation Has Solved What Measurement Still Can't
Creative technology has advanced rapidly over the past few years. According to Markou, the technology behind creative automation, including dynamic creative platforms and modern ad-serving capabilities, has finally reached a point where that vision is achievable.
Measurement, however, remains the missing piece.
Connecting metadata, taxonomy, creative assets, and media signals across multiple platforms continues to be one of advertising's biggest operational challenges. While renewed attention on brand metrics and engagement signals can help marketers understand campaign performance sooner, accurately attributing business outcomes still requires significant work behind the scenes.
For marketers, this means the next competitive advantage won't come from delivering more personalized creative alone. It will come from proving which creative actually drives results.
What Is Advertising Automation, and How Are Agencies Using It in 2026?
Ask five people to define advertising automation, and you'll probably get five different answers. For Markou, the definition extends far beyond AI or generative tools.
Her teams apply workflow automation to the tasks that historically consumed the most time, from dashboard creation and reporting to media planning and operational processes that once relied on manual spreadsheets. The objective isn't simply greater efficiency. It's freeing the marketing team to focus on strategy instead of repetitive work.
At the same time, not every legacy system needs replacing. Sometimes a manual workaround is more effective than forcing a new marketing automation platform into an existing workflow. The real challenge is knowing when consolidation genuinely improves performance, and when it simply adds complexity.
Rather than asking, "What new tool should we adopt?", agencies are increasingly asking, "Which process no longer deserves to exist?"
The Best Way to Test AI-Driven Automation Before Scaling
One of the biggest mistakes organizations make is trying to automate everything at once.
Markou advocates for a different approach: start small. Whether it's a single campaign, a tentpole event, or one portion of the media budget, focused testing allows teams to understand the trade-offs before investing in a broader rollout.
Just as importantly, every test needs a clear objective. Without defining what success looks like upfront, even promising automation pilots generate little actionable learning.
Breaking automation into smaller experiments reduces risk, builds internal confidence, and gives leadership the evidence needed to scale successful initiatives across future marketing campaigns.
The Biggest Advertising Automation Benefits Start With Better Workflows
Throughout the conversation, one theme kept resurfacing: agencies often overcomplicate automation by focusing on what new technology to add rather than what unnecessary process they can remove.
Markou described how outdated spreadsheets, redundant platforms, and legacy approvals frequently remain in place simply because replacing them feels disruptive. Yet the long-term cost of maintaining inefficient processes often outweighs the temporary effort required to redesign them.
The biggest advertising automation benefits rarely come from the newest AI feature. They come from reducing manual work, improving collaboration, and building automated workflows that help teams move faster with fewer errors.
Connected Data Is the Foundation of Modern Advertising Automation
Even the most sophisticated automation depends on one thing: connected data.
Markou explained that aligning taxonomy, naming conventions, customer data, and measurement across vendors and platforms remains one of the industry's most complex challenges. Add evolving privacy regulations, regional differences in first-party data onboarding, and increasingly fragmented marketing channels, and it's easy to see why automation alone isn't enough.
As the saying goes: good data in leads to good decisions out. Without a strong data foundation, even the most advanced marketing automation software struggles to deliver meaningful results.
For marketers, success increasingly depends on connecting systems, not simply adding more of them.
Where Advertising Automation Goes From Here
Advertising automation is no longer a side experiment. It is quickly becoming the operating standard for modern media organizations.
The agencies moving ahead aren't necessarily the ones adopting every new AI capability first. They're the ones willing to rethink outdated workflows, test new approaches deliberately, and build connected systems that turn data into better decisions.
As automation continues to evolve, competitive advantage won't come from adding more technology. It will come from understanding which processes to simplify, which experiments to scale, and how to connect every part of the marketing process into a more measurable, efficient whole.
For a deeper look at how leading agencies are approaching automation, connected data, and modern media operations, watch the full conversation with Lisa Markou in AdTech Heroes, Episode 60.
Every summer, the back-to-school season sneaks up faster than expected. Families start planning while the last day of school is still weeks away, and by the time September arrives, most of the shopping decisions have already been made.
For marketers, this creates a familiar challenge: the back-to-school marketing window opens earlier every year, and audiences are far more layered than a simple parent-buying-supplies narrative suggests.
This season is no longer just about pencils and backpacks. It stretches across education, food, community, technology, and fashion, often overlapping in ways brands don't expect. Understanding that complexity is the real key to a stronger back-to-school ad strategy.
Below, we break down the trends, timing, and audience behaviors shaping back-to-school marketing this year, along with what these shifts mean for seasonal marketing overall.
Key Takeaways
- Back-to-school marketing now spans far more than school supplies, touching food, technology, sports, and fashion content.
- Education-related content leads the conversation, with food and lunch prep following close behind.
- Liz, our Neuro-Contextual AI, uncovered 14 distinct contextual neighborhoods within the season, each reflecting a different shopper motivation.
- Shoppers fall into distinct interest groups, from test prep researchers to homeschooling parents to sports families.
- Some of the most valuable back-to-school trends this year come from unexpected overlaps between categories.
What Are the Key Back-to-School Marketing Trends for This Year?
One of the clearest back-to-school trends this year is just how education-driven the season has become. Education leads the back-to-school content universe at 67% of mentions, covering everything from test prep to classroom learning tools.
Food and drink content follows as the second biggest driver, with a strong focus on lunchbox packaging and baking. This shows how deeply back-to-school planning is tied to daily routines rather than a single shopping trip.
Beyond these two leading categories, Liz, our Neuro-Contextual AI, uncovered 14 custom contextual neighborhoods within the back-to-school content universe, connecting topics like homeschooling, online learning, athletics, and craft making.
This fragmentation is exactly why generic back-to-school advertising ideas tend to underperform. The audience isn't one shopper. It's many shoppers with very different needs happening at the same time.
When Should Brands Start Their Back-to-School Marketing Campaign?
Timing is one of the most common questions marketers ask heading into the school season.
Back-to-school planning clearly starts well before the first day of class: the interest clusters we identified span everything from early supply shopping to major sales moments, with events like Black Friday, Cyber, and Prime Day appearing within the same shopping conversations.
This overlap between back-to-school shopping and broader seasonal discount periods suggests that families are planning and comparing prices across an extended window, not making a single last-minute purchase. School marketing campaigns built around one moment risk missing the earlier stages of that planning process.
Who Are Today's Back-to-School Shoppers?
Back-to-school shoppers are not a single audience. The season breaks into six core interest areas, each shaped by different motivations and content habits:
- Books and Study: Families researching test prep (ACT, PSAT, college admission), elementary reading tools, and classic books and authors.
- Supplies and Shopping: Parents focused on preschool learning materials, seasonal crafts, classroom tools, and teacher appreciation gifts.
- Snacking and Food: Households planning lunchbox staples, homemade cookie recipes, and weekly grocery prep tied to the new routine.
- Community: Families engaging with school sports, school trips and events, and school support topics like PTA and staffing.
- Technology: Shoppers exploring online learning tools, college and career paths, teacher digital resources, and homeschooling programs.
- Gear and Fashion: Consumers shopping for school day essentials, trusted clothing brands, and smart shopping strategies around sales.
This range shows why a single back-to-school marketing message rarely works across the board. School shoppers move between these interest areas depending on their household needs.
What Surprising Behaviors Are Shaping Back-to-School Shopping?
Some of the most interesting back-to-school trends come from where these categories unexpectedly connect. Within the Books and Study neighborhood, we identified conversations blending literature curriculum mapping with classic authors like Jane Austen, meaning academic test prep and nostalgic reading discussions live side by side.
Homeschooling shows a similar pattern. A neighborhood cluster where homeschooling intersects directly with technology interests, particularly among parents sharing digital learning resources with one another.
Within the Community pillar, school sports conversations sit closely alongside smaller school milestones like book fairs, showing that the same emotional energy fueling student athletics also extends to everyday school events.
These overlaps matter because they reveal opportunities that a single-category campaign would miss entirely.
Back-to-School Marketing Tips for Brands
Based on these patterns, a few principles stand out for building a stronger school marketing campaign this year:
Speak to more than one interest area at once. Since families move fluidly between categories like Books and Study, Snacking and Food, and Gear and Fashion, campaigns that reflect more than one of these moments tend to feel more relevant than single-category messaging.
Recognize that back-to-school shopping overlaps with sales culture. Because gear and fashion conversations already connect with major discount periods, back-to-school promotions can align naturally with broader seasonal sale moments rather than competing against them.
Don't overlook homeschooling and technology audiences. This growing segment blends digital learning tools with community-driven resource sharing, representing a distinct content environment from traditional classroom shopping.
Match tone to the moment within each pillar, whether that's the practical urgency of school supplies, the routine-driven nature of lunch planning, or the community spirit around school events and sports.
From Supplies to Sentiment: Why Context Matters More Than Ever
As back-to-school shopping spreads across six distinct interest areas and 14 contextual neighborhoods, relevance becomes harder to achieve through guesswork alone.
This is where our Neuro-Contextual approach becomes valuable. Liz, Seedtag’s proprietary Neuro-Contextual AI, reads signals of interest, emotion, and intent within content itself, identifying these clusters by both definitional meaning and how topics naturally occur together on the page.
Rather than targeting a generic "parent" profile, this approach allows advertising to align with the specific moment a shopper is in, whether that's researching test prep, planning lunches, or browsing backpacks ahead of a sale. And it does this without relying on individual tracking, keeping the experience privacy-first while still feeling personal.
The Bigger Opportunity for Back-to-School Marketing
Back-to-school marketing isn't about reaching one type of shopper. It's about understanding the many overlapping moments that make up the season, from test prep stress to lunchbox planning to Friday night games.
Brands that recognize these connections, rather than treating back-to-school as a single retail event, are better positioned to build campaigns that feel relevant at every stage of the school season.
Want to see the full range of interests, content clusters, and behaviors shaping this year's back-to-school season? Download our Back-to-School Insights report to explore the data behind these trends.
Publisher monetization has entered a new phase. As streaming consumption officially surpasses linear television, advertising budgets are following audience attention into Connected TV (CTV), FAST channels, mobile apps, and other emerging digital environments. That shift is reshaping where publishers generate revenue and how they build sustainable monetization strategies.
For publishers, this is one of the biggest stories in publisher ad revenue news today. Revenue growth no longer depends on expanding inventory alone. It depends on creating advertising experiences that are transparent, measurable, and connected across multiple channels.
At Cannes Lions 2026, Mike and I sat down with Chandra Cirulnick, VP of Global Supply Partnerships at Yahoo DSP, for The Pub Way Podcast to explore what this evolution means for publisher ad management. Our conversation covered everything from CTV and FAST channel monetization to in-app growth, programmatic advertising, and the increasing importance of omnichannel strategies.
While we discussed several emerging formats, one idea connected them all. Publishers that diversify their revenue streams while giving advertisers greater transparency into performance are building stronger foundations for long-term publisher monetization.
Key Takeaways
- Streaming has overtaken linear TV, shifting publisher ad revenue toward CTV and FAST channels.
- New programmatic advertising formats are expanding monetization beyond traditional commercial breaks.
- CTV and FAST support different publisher monetization strategies, each serving unique advertiser needs.
- Transparency around inventory and campaign performance is becoming a competitive advantage.
- Omnichannel ad revenue strategies for digital publishers are creating stronger, more sustainable revenue growth.
How Are Publishers Monetizing CTV and FAST Channels in 2026?
Streaming has fundamentally expanded the number of ways publishers can generate advertising revenue. Instead of relying solely on traditional commercial breaks, publishers now have access to a growing mix of premium formats that can be packaged for different buyers, campaign objectives, and budgets.
Pause ads, home screen placements, shoppable experiences, and live sports sponsorships have all become available through programmatic advertising over the past year. These formats create new opportunities for publishers to diversify revenue streams while giving advertisers more flexible ways to reach audiences.
This evolution is also changing how inventory is sold.
Historically, television advertising centered around large upfront commitments, where buyers purchased broad audience reach months in advance. While those agreements remain important, they now exist alongside a growing programmatic marketplace that allows advertisers to buy inventory with far greater precision.
Instead of purchasing an entire market, brands can target audiences based on household counts and campaign objectives. That means advertisers that may not have the budgets for traditional national television campaigns can now reach highly relevant audiences through CTV, making premium inventory accessible to a much broader range of buyers.
For publishers, this creates far greater flexibility in publisher ad management.
Rather than relying on a single sales model, they can package premium inventory for large brand advertisers while simultaneously making additional inventory available through programmatic channels. This balance allows publishers to maximize advertising revenue without sacrificing the premium value of their content.
More importantly, it reflects a broader shift taking place across the industry.
Publisher monetization is no longer built around individual channels. It is increasingly built around connected audience experiences, where CTV, FAST channels, mobile apps, and other digital environments work together to create more valuable opportunities for both publishers and advertisers.
The Difference Between CTV and FAST Channel Monetization
Although they are often grouped together, CTV and FAST channel monetization solve different challenges for publishers.
Connected TV, particularly across premium streaming services, is typically valued for its broad reach, premium content, and household-level addressability. Advertisers use CTV to build large-scale awareness while benefiting from more precise targeting and measurement than traditional television has historically offered.
FAST channels, on the other hand, create value in a different way.
Rather than competing on audience size alone, they allow publishers to build highly engaged communities around specific interests, genres, or cultural moments. Whether it's motorsports, entertainment, news, or lifestyle programming, FAST channels give advertisers the opportunity to reach audiences who have intentionally chosen that content.
During our conversation, Formula 1 emerged as a great example of this shift. While traditional broadcast inventory around the sport may be limited, dedicated FAST programming creates entirely new opportunities for publishers to monetize highly engaged viewers who are actively seeking that content.
That distinction matters.
CTV often delivers scale and premium reach. FAST channels deliver contextual relevance and deeper audience engagement. Together, they give publishers more flexibility to package inventory based on different advertiser objectives instead of relying on a single monetization model.
As streaming ecosystems continue to evolve, understanding the difference between CTV and FAST channel monetization will become increasingly important for publishers looking to diversify advertising revenue while maximizing the value of every impression.
Why Transparency Is the New Currency of Ad Revenue Growth
As new inventory becomes available, advertisers are asking for something beyond scale. They want transparency.
Today, publishers are expected to answer two fundamental questions before media budgets are committed:
- Where will my ads appear?
- How did the campaign actually perform?
The first question is about content transparency. Buyers want to understand the environments where their ads will run before activation, whether that's a premium streaming service, a specific FAST channel, or a curated portfolio of content.
The second is about performance transparency. Advertisers increasingly expect clear measurement that demonstrates how campaigns contributed to business outcomes, not simply how many impressions were delivered.
Publishers are responding by offering different levels of transparency based on campaign objectives.
Portfolio-based or genre-based packages provide advertisers with greater flexibility and broader reach, often at more accessible price points. Show-level sponsorships, live events, and premium programming offer greater certainty around placement, allowing publishers to command higher premiums for inventory that delivers stronger contextual alignment.
This approach creates opportunities across multiple buyer types.
Brands focused on efficiency can access quality inventory through broader packages, while advertisers seeking highly controlled environments can invest in premium placements with full visibility into where their campaigns appear.
For publisher ad management teams, transparency is no longer simply a reporting feature. It has become an important driver of publisher monetization, helping strengthen advertiser confidence while supporting long-term revenue growth.
Omnichannel Ad Revenue Strategies for Digital Publishers
Perhaps the biggest takeaway from our conversation was that publisher monetization is no longer defined by individual channels.
The next stage of growth is being built around connected audience experiences.
Instead of viewing CTV, FAST, mobile apps, podcasts, and streaming as separate revenue opportunities, publishers are beginning to package them as complementary environments that reflect how audiences actually consume media throughout the day.
These omnichannel ad revenue strategies for digital publishers create more consistent experiences for advertisers while opening additional revenue streams for publishers.
Mobile apps are a good example.
For years, app advertising was largely associated with gaming. Today, non-gaming publishers are increasingly extending their brands into mobile experiences, creating new inventory that keeps audiences engaged beyond the browser while attracting advertisers looking to diversify their media-buying strategies.
Audio is evolving in much the same way.
Dynamic ad insertion has transformed podcast advertising from a largely manual process into a scalable programmatic channel. At the same time, advances in contextual intelligence allow campaigns to align with individual episode topics instead of entire shows, giving advertisers greater flexibility without sacrificing relevance.
The boundaries between formats are also becoming less defined.
Streaming platforms continue to experiment with video-first podcasts, while traditional audio content increasingly incorporates visual elements. Rather than thinking about video, audio, or mobile as separate channels, publishers are beginning to organize inventory around audience attention and content consumption.
This shift reflects a broader evolution across digital advertising.
Successful publisher monetization no longer depends on maximizing one channel at a time. It depends on creating connected advertising experiences that allow advertisers to engage audiences wherever they choose to consume content.
Understanding the Moment Behind Every Ad Dollar
One theme kept resurfacing throughout our conversation with Chandra.
The future of publisher monetization isn't being shaped by new channels alone. It's being shaped by a better understanding of audience attention.
Whether someone is watching a live sporting event on CTV, exploring a niche FAST channel, listening to a podcast during their commute, or engaging with content in a mobile app, the opportunity isn't simply to place another ad. It's to understand what that person is interested in at that specific moment and deliver advertising that complements the experience.
As media consumption becomes increasingly fragmented, context becomes the common thread connecting every environment. Publishers that understand not only where audiences are spending time, but also the interests, emotions, and intent behind that attention, are better positioned to create advertising experiences that feel relevant for consumers and valuable for advertisers.
This is where AI is beginning to play an increasingly important role.
Rather than relying solely on historical performance or broad audience segments, AI-powered contextual intelligence helps identify the environments where audiences are most receptive to a brand's message. That creates opportunities for publishers to strengthen monetization while helping advertisers make more informed media-buying decisions across multiple channels.
At Seedtag, this philosophy sits at the core of our Neuro-Contextual approach.
Powered by Liz, our proprietary AI built on more than a decade of content understanding at scale, Neuro-Contextual intelligence interprets signals of interest, emotion, and intent directly from content. Instead of relying on personal identifiers, it helps advertisers understand when audiences are most receptive to a message, creating more relevant advertising experiences across CTV, premium publisher environments, mobile, and other emerging formats.
As omnichannel strategies continue to evolve, this deeper understanding of context will become increasingly valuable for both publishers and advertisers looking to build sustainable, privacy-first revenue growth.
The Next Chapter of Publisher Monetization
Publisher ad revenue is no longer being shaped by a single channel or a single transaction. It's being built across connected experiences.
CTV continues to expand premium video opportunities. FAST channels are creating new ways to engage highly passionate communities. Mobile apps and digital audio are opening additional revenue streams that complement traditional web inventory. Together, these environments are transforming how publishers package, measure, and monetize advertising.
The publishers that succeed won't simply add more inventory. They'll create connected strategies that reflect how audiences actually consume media, while giving advertisers greater transparency, stronger measurement, and more meaningful ways to engage consumers across every touchpoint.
For advertisers, that means moving beyond isolated media buys and embracing omnichannel planning that prioritizes relevance alongside reach.
For publishers, it means recognizing that the future of publisher monetization isn't about choosing between CTV, FAST, mobile, or audio. It's about connecting those environments into a strategy that delivers long-term value for both buyers and audiences.
As attention continues to shift, the publishers that thrive will be the ones that understand not just where audiences are, but what captures their attention in the moments that matter most.
If you're exploring new ways to grow publisher ad revenue across CTV, FAST channels, mobile, and other digital environments, our conversation with Chandra Cirulnick offers valuable perspectives on where the industry is heading.
Listen to the full episode of The Pub Way Podcast for the complete discussion.
Our Blog
After multiple delays, Google announced that third-party cookies will not be phased out. While cookies may not be eliminated from Chrome, data privacy laws and consumer demands are rising. Publishers must look beyond third-party cookies as users dislike being tracked across websites and the lack of explicit consent invites significant legal scrutiny.
In today’s privacy-conscious environment, first-party cookies have become more valuable than ever. Unlike third-party cookies that do not comply with data privacy regulations, first-party data is collected directly and responsibly, with user consent. Data collected from users’ interactions with a publisher’s site creates a privacy-friendly foundation for understanding audiences.
Benefits of first-party data for publishers
Moving away from third-party cookies and focusing on first-party data enables publishers to comply with evolving privacy standards and future-proof their revenue strategies.
- With first-party data, there’s no risk of non-compliance. The data is collected straight from the user with their explicit consent, thus reducing the risks of legal challenges and ensures a stable revenue.
- The transparent, consent-based approach to data collection strengthens user trust and loyalty and enables a better overall user experience. This further enhances loyalty and engagement, thus providing long-term benefits to publishers.
- Since the data is collected from the source, the insights are richer and more accurate, leading to better ad targeting and hyper-personalized experiences.
- Other major browsers like Safari and Firefox have already blocked third-party cookies. Switching to first-party data collection enables publishers to create more sustainable strategies and future-proof their business.
- Making the shift to privacy-safe technologies and first-party data enables publishers to cater to the needs of the audience and advertisers without relying on conventional practices that are intrusive and less secure.
- First-party data is transparent and more reliable, leading to higher ad relevance and ROI. It helps minimize the dependence on external data providers and gives publishers more control over audience insights to generate revenue.
- Beyond just supporting ad revenue, first-party data can boost engagement, drive subscriptions, and help make informed editorial choices.
Using first-party data, publishers can build deeper relationships with their audiences, deliver more personalized, relevant, and engaging content, and enhance trust and loyalty. Privacy-safe data practices improve user experience, support engagement, and create opportunities for sustainable revenue growth.
Upgrading to a combination of privacy-preserving approaches
Consumers are increasingly wary about invasive tracking practices and are expressing their concerns about data privacy. Since first-party data is ethically collected from users with their consent, publishers can gather insights from the information shared by users themselves to optimize user profiling. The aim is to make a switch to a balanced approach that creates a privacy-centric strategy that overcomes the limitations posed by traditional practices.
How it works:
- Publishers collect first-party data from user interactions on the website like site activity, engagement with content, surveys, social media, and email interactions.
- Data Management Platforms (DMPs) help gather and organize data from the various sources and analyze them to effectively segment audiences.
- Data Clean Rooms (DCRs) help publishers and advertisers collaborate seamlessly and securely.
- DCRs facilitate privacy-safe matching and analysis of publisher data with advertisers, without sharing any personally identifiable information (PII).
To further enhance strategies, publishers are using first-party data repositories along with contextual advertising to create more compelling content and impactful interest-based audience segments. When used in conjunction, it empowers publishers to overcome privacy concerns and deliver ads relevant to users’ current interests.
These campaigns enable publishers to look beyond users’ personal data and monetize more of their inventory using a content engagement-based targeting approach. This enables publishers to widen their target group and potentially boost ad revenue as they can target even the users who opt out of tracking.
Non-intrusive, interest-based ad campaigns have shown better results as relevance increases the likelihood of clicks and conversions, thus commanding higher ad rates and improving publisher revenue. Leveraging first-party data and an interest-based targeting approach can help publishers develop premium content that they can monetize and grow revenue by increasing purposeful engagement.
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Advertisers have a wide array of campaign options to capture the audience's attention. With shifting consumer demands, evolving privacy laws, and numerous ad creatives and channels, there’s much to navigate.
To optimize campaign performance and ROI, a comprehensive marketing plan is essential, covering key areas such as target audience, ad channels, creative elements, and messaging. An increasingly popular addition to marketers' toolkits is Connected TV (CTV) advertising.
Audiences have warmly embraced CTV, contributing to the rise of cord-cutters moving away from traditional cable. The rapid growth of CTV viewership has drawn advertisers’ interest, prompting budget shifts from linear TV to CTV. This shift allows marketers to future-proof their strategies and connect with a growing, engaged audience.
Marketing in the era of Connected TV and OTT
Unlike the limitations of traditional TV advertising, CTV allows brands to tailor messaging and display personalized ads to niche audiences.
Marketers can access key data points like viewer preferences and habits that provide deeper insights into their likings and preferences. Based on the understanding of viewers’ interests, the ads and the viewing experience are personalized to increase engagement. While traditional TV displays the same ad to all the viewers watching a particular show or channel, CTV ads can be tailored to align with a user’s interests.
The benefits
- Advertising to an engaged user base increases effectiveness as the viewers show a greater propensity to engage and interact with the ads.
- The ability to ensure precise targeting and serve personalized ads boosts engagement and conversion rates as the ads appeal to users’ interests.
- More detailed metrics to track and measure campaign performance, optimize on the go, and improve ROI.
The future of CTV ads
Connected TV (CTV) advertising is still a fresh, emerging channel that marketers and brands are exploring in depth. With continuous innovation on the horizon, there’s much potential left to unlock in this space.
CTV ads have already surpassed the limitations of traditional television, offering hyper-personalization, customization, and niche targeting. This unique medium allows brands to establish connections and build relationships with a growing audience. Advanced targeting capabilities enable marketers to engage audiences on a personal level, capture attention, and earn trust.
Seedtag Contextual TV provides a holistic approach by combining CTV signals and ad data with AI-driven contextual insights from the open web. This integration enables advertisers to understand user interests, target precisely, tailor creative content, and optimize performance. With CTV, brands can move beyond generic categories, access key attention metrics to measure campaign effectiveness, and create attention-grabbing ads.
As the future of advertising shifts to the OTT world, brands are increasingly targeting viewers based on the content they’re watching. Aligning ads with a viewer’s current interests fosters stronger connections and enhances the overall viewing experience.
Learn more about CTV advertising capabilities with Contextual TV by Seedtag.
Additionally, register for Seedtag Academy to become an expert in all things CTV!
As Connected TV (CTV) becomes a central channel in the advertising landscape, publishers are navigating new challenges and opportunities around audience engagement and revenue generation. At the Beachfront Publisher Summit, industry leaders came together for discussions on how contextual targeting and advanced adtech can help publishers meet these evolving needs, including practical approaches to CTV advertising that prioritize relevance and audience connection without relying on personal data.
Discover the key outcomes straight from Seedtag President North America Brian Danzis and Beachfront VP Business Development Marni Rommel as they share key insights on how contextual technology can empower publishers to enhance ad relevance, improve viewer experience, and unlock new revenue streams while aligning with privacy expectations.
- What is the role of video in the current advertising landscape?
Brian Danzis: Video continues to be one of the most impactful advertising formats because sight, sound and motion can evoke powerful sentiments which can help shape perception and drive people to action. The traditional thirty second spot once dominated the format, but over the last twenty years not only have new lengths emerged, but so has variety in screen orientation, customization and interactivity elements to make the format even more powerful.
- What are the keys to harnessing new technologies in CTV?
Marni Rommel: The role of contextual targeting and how Seedtag contextual AI and tech capabilities will enhance Beachfront’s proposition.
In today’s CTV landscape, having a deep understanding of your audience’s viewing preferences and habits is a critical starting point. This can be achieved through rich data analytics and insights, and then leveraged on campaign plans via advanced targeting methods like contextual.
Our belief is that contextual targeting will play a significant role in how CTV media is transacted going forward, as it allows media buyers and sellers to deliver ads based on what the consumer is currently watching – leading to improved ad relevance, engagement, and yield.
- How can publishers benefit from tech advancements in CTV?
Marni Rommel: The value Seedtag brings to Beachfront publishers
Through recent tech advancements in CTV, including those brought on by Seedtag, today's CTV publishers are well-positioned to enhance their monetization and drive new revenue streams, even amid changes to the broader privacy landscape.
With deeper audience insights and enhanced targeting capabilities, publishers can deliver a more seamless and engaging viewing experience for CTV audiences. Seedtag’s contextual CTV targeting offering specifically, as an example, has been proven to improve ad relevance and increase campaign scale – giving rise to new, contextually-driven demand opportunities for publisher
- How events like this CTV Publisher Summit add value to the CTV publishers industry?
Marni Rommel: The CTV ecosystem is evolving rapidly, so creating forums for collaboration, feedback, and knowledge sharing is absolutely essential to aligning on common challenges and goals. We’re all navigating the same industry dynamics after all.
We were delighted to host so many of our key partners and give them the opportunity to hear from Seedtag as well as some of their trusted media buyers. Seedtag’s strength in data, creative, and contextual makes them a critical partner for today’s CTV publishers, as we are collectively well-positioned to bring value to the buy-side in a way that drives engagement, revenue, and efficiencies for media sellers.
- What does the future hold for CTV in the United States?
Brian Danzis: CTV continues to be one of the fastest growing ad channels in the US, because of shifting user behaviors in how they consume video content. At Seedtag we expect more content to be made available through CTV channels and even more customization of ad formats including more advanced HH level targeting, customized creatives that are contextually relevant, engaging and fun!
- How can we strike the right balance between utilizing data for CTV without crossing the line into overly personal targeting?
Brian Danzis: Today’s consumer is much more aware of how companies track and target them online and are increasingly taking active measures to block these practices. While CTV is naturally “cookie free” as an industry we need to still be careful about how we use IP addresses and other HH level data to deliver ads. At Seedtag we believe wholeheartedly in delivering a privacy compliant approach that protects the end user from unnecessary data collection, stereotypical audience bucketing and other traditional targeting tactics that rely on third party sources.
- How can publishers achieve better ad personalization and relevance for both advertisers and audiences in the streaming ecosystem?
Marni Rommel: CTV publishers can achieve stronger ad personalization and relevance in streaming ecosystems using contextual monetization solutions, such as Seedtag’s, which utilizes Contextual AI to analyze and package content in real-time. It is through technology like this that publishers can deliver higher-yielding ads that align closely with the context of the programs the viewer is watching, ensuring that the ads are not only relevant to the in-the-moment content but also to the audience’s interests.
By focusing on contextual signals rather than relying solely on user data, publishers can create a more engaging and seamless ad experience that satisfies advertisers' goals for targeted messaging while enhancing viewer satisfaction and engagement. This approach fosters a win-win scenario where both advertisers and audiences benefit from more relevant and impactful advertising.
As digital advertising continues to evolve, actionable and privacy-compliant solutions for CTV enable publishers to maintain relevance with audiences while optimizing monetization models. By focusing on context over personal data, Seedtag’s approach offers a sustainable pathway forward for CTV publishers. Want to know more about achieving a balanced approach that meets both audience needs and industry standards? Let’s talk!
The shopping season that kicks off around Halloween only intensifies as we step into November, marking the start of the holiday shopping season. The early purchases of the biggest sale of the year begin in early November and continue through the end of December. Our trend analysis on Black Friday & Cyber Monday showed that consumer interest peaks significantly on the official date of Black Friday. The highest level of interest is captured on the weekend following Black Friday, indicating sustained interest even after the event.
The peak in interest in Black Friday is followed by a rise in interest in Cyber Monday, which is high on the day and the week of the event. Travel Tuesday also garners a lot of interest for travel-related discounts. Advertisers must focus on utilizing the months leading up to the busiest online shopping days to associate brands with Black Friday content and capitalize on the increased interest during the weeks leading to the events.
Learn more: Seedtag Black Friday & Cyber Monday Insights report
Black Friday & Cyber Monday: Content categories of interest
Our insights on the categorization of articles showed that over 45% of the Black Friday articles are related to technology and computing, and shopping. The same categories contributed to 50% for Cyber Monday.
- Shopping Category: The key areas of interest that bring in the views are Fashion Deals, Outlet and Discount Stores, Supermarket Discounts, and Stylish Seasonal Outfits.
- Technology & Computing Category: The trending article topics are Top Deals and Discounts on Electronics, High-Performance Computing Devices, Tablets and Mobile Devices, and Smart Home Devices.
Capitalizing on trends: What are the audience’s main interests?
The Black Friday and Cyber Monday audiences have many interests but, what’s top of mind?
- Tech Bargains: The topic generates 39% of visits and mainly caters to tech enthusiasts and gamers seeking the best prices on high-end products and accessories. This includes topics like the latest tech gadgets, electronics, and gaming deals that clock 323K monthly brand-safe impressions.
- Self-Care Offers: Next in line with 28% of visits, this topic covers trends like best deals on clothing, shoes, and accessories. It also discusses current fashion trends, outfit inspirations, and style guides for the season. This topic has the maximum monthly impression share at 866K.
- House Discounts: 16% of visits are articles on home appliances and home decor items. This includes articles about significant discounts on refrigerators, washers, and dryers, as well as decor items like furniture and bedding.
- Travel Deals: Articles that cover discounts and special offers on travel packages, flights, hotel bookings, and deals on car rentals receive 9% of visits and 217K impressions.
Curious to know more about marketing to this seasonal audience and boosting sales this holiday season? Download Now: Seedtag Black Friday & Cyber Monday Insights report.
Build brand awareness and presence this Black Friday
The key to driving sales during the holiday season lies in appealing to the right audiences at the ideal time and place. The October audience is the Early Black Friday shoppers who focus on thorough research and smart financial planning. Product reviews, credit card deals, and loans and finances appeal to them.
During Black Friday in November, the audience is on the lookout for the best prices on the latest gadgets, wellness products, home improvements, travel packages, and reliable reviews that help make informed decisions.
The audience is all for Christmas shopping, gifting, and traveling in December. Shoppers look for the best products and deals to make the best purchases for the festive season.
Key takeaways for advertisers and publishers
- Focus on creating engaging, informative content
- Capitalize on consumer interest
- Highlight shopping tips and exclusive deals
- Reviews and guides to help consumers make informed decisions
Learn how you can capitalize on our in-depth findings with the Black Friday Seasonal Audience.
It's time to bring out those costumes, get your scare on, and let your imagination run wild! With the 31st of October nearing, costumes, masks, decor, candies, and parties are already on people’s minds. As people gear up for the festivities, understanding what’s on consumers' minds and what they are looking forward to is essential intel for brands.
Halloween offers an opportunity for brands to engage with consumers in a fun and memorable way. Consumers look for everything ranging from costumes and party supplies to home decor, events, and activities. Brands that can strike a chord with the audience by sharing relevant, quality content will garner interest, increase brand awareness, and drive sales.
Halloween 2024: Top categories of interest
To keep brands and advertisers abreast of the season’s trends and consumer interests, Liz Events powered by Seedtag Lab brings to you the exclusive 2024 Seedtag Halloween Insights report. Our research shows that the audience is interested in an array of categories that vary from events to pop culture, hobbies, and home decor.
Download the full report here.
Based on the number of articles in each category and the number of visits per article, here are the most notable categories:
- Family & Relationships: Articles on Halloween family activities like trick-or-treating with kids and parents.
- Events & Attractions: Special promotions at theme parks like Halloween discounts, haunted houses, and zombie survival experiences.
- Shopping: Guides on Halloween costumes, popular costume trends, home decorations, and accessories.
- Movies: A selection of horror movie recommendations, from classics to new releases in theaters and on streaming platforms.
Halloween 2024: Main content focus
With ~3+ million impressions, entertainment, decorations, costumes & accessories, and food & treats are the topics that capture maximum audience interest.
- Entertainment: 32% of articles revolve around entertainment as the audience loves binge-watching horror movies and TV shows or visiting amusement parks to experience themed attractions and haunted mansions. Movies & TV Shows garner 48% of total views, and the other clusters include theme parks, video games, and scary tales.
- Decorations: The decor is an important ingredient for homeowners and event planners eager to create spooky, festive environments to celebrate the holiday. This topic has an article share of 32%, and the main clusters are parties, decoration deals, and DIY projects.
- Costumes & Accessories: 26% of articles are for the majority that’s on the lookout for creative and themed attire. From playful outfits for children to themed party attires for adults, the clusters focus on influencers' costumes, quick & cheap costumes, costumes for women, and pet costumes.
- Food & Treats: An important element of any celebration, 15% of articles appeal to trick-or-treaters, home bakers, and party hosts exploring creative recipes and indulging in themed sweets. The main cluster trick-or-treating receives 43% of total views and other topics include Halloween candy and Halloween recipes.
This seasonal audience drives anywhere between 2.39 million to a whopping 3.69 million brand-safe impressions per month. The key to leveraging findings like these to a brand’s advantage lies in targeting niche or customized audience segments.
The 2024 Seedtag Halloween Insights report: Download now
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Consumers are becoming more proactive about protecting their privacy, using tools like VPNs, privacy-focused browsers, and Apple’s Private Relay.
In the U.S., 40% of the population reportedly uses VPNs, and many are increasingly opting out of cookies, blocking third-party tracking, and employing anonymization features in their browsers.
When it comes to ad blockers, a growing number of users (31%) use them. This behavior reflects a groundswell of consumer demand for privacy and control over how personal data is collected and used.
This growing awareness has been shaped in part by a series of high-profile scandals, and increased media coverage of privacy issues. As more users take these steps to safeguard their privacy, they expect businesses to follow suit by handling data responsibly.
Signal deprecation and privacy are not the same thing
In responding to this imperative, big tech companies have caused a great deal of confusion. Many recent “privacy-safe” advertising solutions are really just short-term fixes for the problem of signal deprecation, such as the loss of third-party cookies or mobile ad IDs (MAIDs). Contextual and behavioral targeting methods are now being evaluated as viable alternatives. Signal deprecation—often initiated by big tech companies in the name of privacy—differs from privacy laws..
The decision to deprecate cookies or MAIDs mostly stems from corporate strategies aimed at consolidating data control rather than purely complying with regulations. This has led to many in the industry looking to solve for signal deprecation without addressing the broader shift in the regulatory environment or the change in consumer sentiment that inspires it.
The privacy misconception around CTV
CTV is often considered privacy-safe because it doesn’t rely on cookies for targeting. But cookieless doesn’t automatically mean privacy-first. CTV targeting relies heavily on tracking IP addresses, which brings its own privacy challenges. While IP addresses don’t necessarily identify individuals, they can identify households—and new regulations increasingly classify IP addresses as personal data.
States like California and Virginia now designate IP addresses as personally identifiable information (PII), requiring stricter regulations under laws like the California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA) and the Virginia Consumer Data Protection Act (VCDPA). Because CTV depends on household-level data, its privacy compliance is facing more scrutiny.
While CTV doesn’t use cookies, it remains vulnerable to future disruption if privacy laws further restrict IP address tracking. This issue isn’t limited to CTV; any advertising channel that relies on tracking individuals or households could be disrupted as privacy protections continue to tighten.
The case for contextual
The long-term solution to these privacy challenges is contextual targeting. Instead of tracking a user’s behavior over time, contextual targeting focuses on the page content being consumed at that moment. This approach is inherently privacy-friendly, as it doesn’t require personal data or behavioral insights. Advertisers can deliver contextually relevant ads by analyzing the web pages a user is engaging with, ensuring alignment with their current interests—without needing their personal history.
Some may argue that permissioned, opted-in consented data offers a future-proofed alternative for deterministic targeting, but there simply isn’t enough scale in this data to serve as the foundation for global targeted media exange.
Contextual targeting works by allowing advertisers to reach users in real-time based on their current environment, bypassing the need for personal data entirely. And yes, for this reason, contextual advertising is also much less susceptible to future signal deprecation.
One of the primary benefits of contextual targeting is that it enhances the user experience by ensuring that contextually targeted ads match the content of a webpage. Rather than bombarding users with irrelevant messages, advertisers can use targeting methods that align with the interests and intent of the user in the moment. This leads to improved engagement and a more seamless browsing experience.
The future of privacy-first adtech
The path forward for adtech is clear: Privacy must be prioritized while continuing to deliver effective, targeted ads. This doesn’t mean eliminating personalized ads altogether, but it does require rethinking how things are going to work long-term. The shift away from individual tracking isn’t just a trend—it’s a secular transformation that will reshape digital advertising for years to come.
Consumers are increasingly aware of the value exchange between their data and the content they consume. Many feel the benefits of ads based on their behavior don’t always justify the privacy risks. Contextual targeting strikes the right balance—delivering relevant content while protecting user privacy and meeting the needs of both advertisers and consumers.
As more brands embrace contextual advertising, they are also refining their ad placements to ensure maximum visibility and engagement. By strategically placing contextual ads in environments where they naturally fit, advertisers can optimize performance while maintaining compliance with privacy regulations. This shift is also leading to innovations in display ads, making them more interactive and engaging.
In the evolving landscape of digital marketing, contextual targeting works as a sustainable solution for both advertisers and consumers. By shifting focus from user tracking to matches the content of a webpage, brands can continue delivering effective advertising in a privacy-first era. As regulations tighten and consumer preferences evolve, businesses that adopt contextual and behavioral targeting strategies will be better positioned for long-term success in digital advertising.
By Brian Danzis, President North America at Seedtag. This article was originally released on AdWeek.
Advertisers and publishers are increasingly capitalizing on the thriving Connected TV ecosystem as the channel continues to garner more viewers. CTV is the hottest new trend in digital marketing and the fastest-growing ad channel in the US due to the 2+ hours spent leaned in watching and 88% of GenZ and millennials owning an advanced TV. For publishers, CTV presents a significant opportunity to reach a targeted audience, monetize content on this channel, and provide interactive experiences that better engage users.
CTV provides publishers with a new and bustling platform to create and distribute content across video, display, and creative ad insertion that reaches new potential customers and generates revenue. While CTV advertising is an exciting channel to explore, it comes with its own set of complexities. The fragmented CTV landscape, lack of control and transparency, and absence of CTV-optimized solutions pose multiple challenges.
Digital advertising in the evolving media landscape
From monetizing content to choosing the right marketing strategy, managing operations, ensuring brand safety, optimizing ad revenues, and delivering exceptional user experiences, the right technology partner and marketing partner is pivotal in ensuring publisher success.
- Publishers must ensure the business partnership has a global reach to network with a larger pool of advertisers and agencies.
- The partnership marketing approach must be flexible, transparent, and tailored to cater to business-specific needs that yield better campaign results.
- Publishers should choose partners that leverage new-gen capabilities like AI and ML, ensure privacy-first practices, and leverage brand safety and suitability best practices to stay ahead and future-proof their business.
- Since CTV is a relatively new space, it is key to look for a marketing partner with a proven track record in the industry and carefully evaluate the platform’s capabilities and features.
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The Benefits of Choosing a Solid CTV Technology & Marketing Partner
With CTVs increasingly replacing traditional cable, it offers publishers access to a large and growing audience. It presents an opportunity to generate revenue through advertising, subscriptions, or premium products or services on CTV platforms.
- Real-time bidding (RTB): Enables publishers to efficiently allocate ad inventory to the highest bidder and maximize their revenue.
- Header bidding: Allows publishers to simultaneously offer ad inventory to multiple ad exchanges, thus increasing competition and improving pricing.
- Demand-side platform (DSP) integration: Facilitate connections with myriad ad networks and exchanges, enabling access to a wider pool of advertisers and agencies.
The right blend of context and affiliate marketing forges a very effective strategy. Contextual-led CTV advertising will help publishers deliver based on the specific page content being watched, ensuring a higher relevance and better engagement as they are more likely to resonate with viewers. Higher engagement and click-through rates can help publishers attract higher-quality advertisers who are willing to pay a premium.
By leveraging affiliate programs and content partnerships, businesses can further increase brand awareness and extend their reach. Forms of partner marketing such as joint ventures with content creators or CTV platforms enable brands to tap into established audiences, boosting brand recognition and engagement while ensuring a cost-effective strategy for reaching new markets.
Enhancing User Experience and Ad Performance
Contextual CTV advertising also enhances the overall user experience as the ads are non-intrusive and relevant to their watchlist and preferences. The ads are also placed in safe and appropriate content environments, preventing any negative associations. Brand safety and suitability measures are integral elements in the busy media landscape as they help avoid harmful content and ensure the ad placements align with the brand’s overall messaging and ethos.
- Precise targeting: First-party data and contextual advertising help identify and build specific audience segments. The ads delivered are contextually relevant to the content being consumed by viewers, increasing engagement and key attention parameters.
- Privacy-first: Contextual-led CTV does not invade user privacy by accessing third-party data, thus making it a preferred choice among advertisers as it helps build relationships and gain user trust.
- User experience: The campaigns are highly targeted and personalized ads are effective, but the placements are non-intrusive and do not disrupt the viewing experience.
What can we expect of Connected TV Advertising
As competition in CTV advertising grows, companies that invest in partnership marketing will gain an edge by collaborating with strategic partners to optimize marketing initiatives. This approach not only ensures cost efficiency but also drives lead generating campaigns that convert high-intent viewers into loyal customers.
The right marketing partner is crucial for navigating the complexities of CTV advertising, and Seedtag is here for you. By leveraging affiliate marketing, content partnerships, and joint ventures, brands can develop cost-effective strategies that drive brand recognition and enhance audience engagement. As CTV continues to evolve, businesses that prioritize strategic collaborations will maximize their reach and long-term success.
Discover how we bring our Open Web expertise to the CTV landscape with Seedtag Contextual TV.
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Connected TV is all the hype today as the rapid shift from traditional TV continues. People love having complete control over what they watch and when and enjoy having access to a vast library of content to choose from. The flexibility to connect to the internet, browse popular streaming services, and seamlessly switch between traditional TV and online content has garnered massive viewership for CTV over the years.
The ever-increasing number of “cord-cutters” has naturally persuaded advertisers to rethink ad budget allocation. The booming OTT platform subscriptions and CTV viewership have shifted investments toward CTV advertising. Like traditional TV commercials, CTV ads are placed within streaming content and operating system apps across internet-connected televisions.
The benefits of CTV advertising
CTV ads enable advertisers to reach the growing audience base that owns smart TVs by delivering the ads within streaming content such as movies and TV shows. CTV targeting is also more precise when compared to traditional television as the ads appeal to the real-time interests and viewing habits of users.
CTV advertising improves campaign performance as it reaches a larger audience base and helps advertisers engage with the audience that’s cutting the cord on traditional cable.
CTV also ensures improved audience targeting as the ads are displayed to specific segments where they are relevant and align with their area of interest, thus leading to higher engagement and better ROI. Overall, CTV ads reach a wider audience and increase brand awareness, making them a powerful tool in digital advertising.
Brand safety and alignment in CTV (Connected TV)
While advertisers opt for privacy-first alternatives and new advertising channels like CTV, it is imperative to ensure the brand image is upheld and always shown in good light. Brand safety measures help prevent a brand's ads from appearing alongside content that’s inappropriate or offensive. Brand alignment helps to create a consistent and positive brand experience by ensuring the ads align with the brand's overall messaging, values, and targeted audience.
Key considerations for brand safety and alignment
- Choosing content categories that align with the brand's values and overall positioning.
- Ad placement that aligns with the content of the streaming video.
- Preventing ads from appearing alongside topics that are harmful, offensive, or could damage the brand reputation.
Contextual CTV advertising brings the powers of AI-powered contextual advertising to Connected TV. Similar to ads matched to the content of web pages, contextual CTV matches ads to the content streamed by users. For example, users who watch more content about wildlife, nature, or documentaries about the environment are more likely to be interested in ads about eco-friendly, sustainable, and cruelty-free products or services.
Contextual CTV is emerging as a privacy-preserving ad strategy that enables brands to boost engagement, increase brand awareness, and improve brand reputation. With a better understanding of viewer interests, advertisers can serve ads that are contextually relevant to the current content browsed by the audience. Contextually targeted ads are non-intrusive and in line with a brand's ideas and values.
Additionally, contextual advertising-backed CTV targeting empowers brands to ensure brand safety and brand suitability with more precise and relevant ad placements. These measures prevent ads from appearing in environments that are inappropriate or harmful.
The Role of a Brand Safety Service in CTV Advertising
Given the complexities of programmatic advertising, a brand safety service is essential to ensure ads appear only in safe and brand-suitable environments. These services leverage AI-powered tools to analyze ad space and implement brand safety measures effectively.
Some of the key elements of a brand safety service include:
- Exclusion lists: Blocking certain categories of content that do not align with brand values.
- Real-time monitoring: Ensuring brand advertisements do not appear alongside fake news or offensive content.
- AI-driven contextual analysis: Identifying and classifying content to match ads with relevant content.
- Protection across social media and digital advertising: Applying brand safety strategies across multiple platforms.
Protecting Your Brand with the Right Tools
As brand safety issues continue to evolve in digital advertising, companies must invest in brand safety tools that provide real-time protection and ensure brand safety in every campaign. Implementing brand safety measures safeguards a brand’s ad placements from appearing in harmful or inappropriate content and helps protecting your brand from reputational damage.
Seedtag Contextual CTV brings our expertise from open web campaigns to the CTV landscape.
Our expertise brings granularity and helps advertisers to go beyond generic categories, garner valuable attention metrics, and build a more memorable brand experience. Reputable inventory sources coupled with brand safety and suitability measures help mitigate the risks of negative publicity or brand associations.
Brand safety service is crucial in the CTV landscape, ensuring that ads remain in brand-safe environments and align with a brand's messaging. Contextual CTV helps brands reach the intended target audience, ensures ads align with brand values, improves overall campaign effectiveness, and builds trust among consumers. Learn more.
Consumers have been voicing a growing number of concerns about how their data and personally identifiable information are collected and used by brands. Data collection practices have raised significant privacy concerns, leading to regulations that impact in the future of digital advertising.
Data privacy laws and Google’s Privacy Sandbox address these consumer concerns. They aim to give users more control over their data. This includes how brands access and use this data and contextual AI.
Privacy protection laws, like GDPR in the European Union and CCPA in the United States, set rules for businesses. These laws guide how companies can collect, use, and share personal information. . Google designs its Privacy Sandbox APIs and technologies to provide a more private and secure web experience. The main objective of these privacy initiatives is to give users more control over their online privacy and to limit the amount of party data collected and used.
Why the shift in focus toward privacy-first advertising?
Traditional audience targeting has been the norm for decades. Audiences are grouped and targeted based on their past interests and buying habits, this relies a lot on third-party cookies. Cookies are small snippets of code that are used to store data on a user's computer that enable websites to remember login details, preferences, etc.
The privacy issues arose because of third-party cookies that are set by domains other than the one visited by a user. These cookies allow businesses to monitor browsing patterns and customer data across multiple websites, and the data collected is used for programmatic advertising and tracking purposes.
Third-party cookies may be helping advertisers target users. However, they are intrusive, non-consensual, and manipulative, raising multiple privacy concerns. While Google decided to back out from its cookie deprecation plan after years of delays, the efforts toward improving online privacy continue.
The future of advertising is shifting toward privacy-first strategies, and marketing strategies need to adapt accordingly. Cookieless developments are a priority for Google as it aims to preserve the ad-supported internet by promoting the adoption of privacy-preserving digital advertising practices.
What are the privacy-preserving alternatives in advertising?
Whether it is privacy protection laws, browser controls like cookie blocking and tracking protection, or Privacy Sandbox APIs, the focus lies on consumer behavior and enabling users to make informed choices when they’re browsing. Consumers’ demand for data privacy has compromised reach and measurement for advertisers, impacting key areas like cross-site tracking, personalization capabilities, and audience categorization.
In the bid to create a privacy-focused ecosystem, contextual AI is swiftly emerging as a go-to solution among advertisers who are evaluating privacy-first alternatives to conventional advertising practices. Contextual AI offers an advanced solution that leverages the capabilities of artificial intelligence and its subsets like machine learning and Natural Language Processing algorithms to analyze millions of web pages.
A key advantage of contextual AI is its ability to provide hyper-personalized advertising without compromising user privacy. By analyzing content rather than user-specific customer data, brands can deliver highly relevant ads that align with the interests of their audiences in real-time. This shift allows digital marketers to implement AI-powered strategies that enhance engagement and improve the effectiveness of their campaigns.
Contextual ads are displayed based on the analysis of web pages to ensure they align with the content and context of every page. Contextual advertising is a complementary technology that caters to the needs of consumers and businesses. The advanced targeting capabilities move beyond the traditional audience categorization practices that are based on stereotypes, cliches, assumptions, and past browsing patterns.
Contextual AI and The Future of Digital Advertising
Contextual AI analyzes both the written and visual content of a page and places ads in the most optimal locations where the ad messaging aligns with the page. Contextual advertising relies on artificial intelligence to deliver ads on relevant websites that target the right audiences without using cookies. It allows brands to enhance their understanding of consumer behavior and makes ads more relevant and relatable.
Another significant trend shaping the future of digital advertising is the rise of short-form videos. These videos are a strong way to engage audiences.
Platforms like TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts have demonstrated the effectiveness of video-based content in capturing audience attention. Video content, along with AI targeting, helps brands show ads that are engaging and relevant. This leads to higher conversion rates.
As marketing strategies evolve, brands are increasingly relying on AI-driven analytics to optimize their campaigns. Programmatic advertising powered by machine learning enables businesses to make data-driven decisions and allocate resources more effectively. This shift towards automation and AI-powered insights is helping advertisers navigate the complexities of a privacy-first digital landscape.
In an era where data privacy and user control are paramount, contextual AI is emerging as a transformative force in the future of digital advertising. By leveraging artificial intelligence, machine learning, and real-time analytics, brands can deliver relevant, hyper-personalized experiences while respecting consumer privacy.
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Google’s renewed focus on the Privacy Sandbox aims to improve online privacy while preserving an ad-supported internet by promoting the adoption of a privacy-first approach. While Google may have dropped its plan to complete the deprecation of third-party cookies after multiple delays, the anchor continues to be data privacy and transparency.
Privacy Sandbox APIs have the potential to achieve this feat as they serve as an alternative to traditional tracking methods like third-party cookies. The APIs reduce tracking but ensure businesses continue to thrive using technology that can gather user data and deliver targeted ads without compromising personal information.
The key Sandbox APIs like Topics API, Attribution Reporting API, and Protected Audiences aim to protect user privacy and reduce reliance on third-party cookies. Whether it is enhancing audience targeting or improving ad effectiveness, these APIs allow businesses to continue thriving in the digital economy whilst being respectful of data protection regulation GDPR and other data privacy laws.
The shift toward a privacy-first digital landscape
From third-party cookie tracking to data breaches, changing regulatory landscape, and evolving user preferences, the transition to Privacy Sandbox APIs is driven by the need to protect personal data while allowing businesses to continue to flourish.
The aim is to create a more sustainable and trustworthy digital ecosystem by striking a balance between consumer data protection and business needs. Adopting a privacy-first marketing strategy ensures that businesses comply with GDPR and CCPA, giving users control over their data while still enabling effective advertising. Contextual advertising is a frontrunner in the privacy-focused ecosystem that these APIs aim to create.
Contextual advertising: A privacy-first approach alternative
Contextual advertising is moving away from conventional targeting practices that leverage keywords and phrases and rely on stereotypes and assumptions to reach audiences. With Custom AI, advertisers can shift from predefined audience targeting and build custom Contextual Audiences. Advertisers can create unique and dynamic audiences to suit business-specific needs and requirements for greater precision and impact.
With the right blend of data-driven audience targeting, creatives, and ad placement, contextual advertising empowers brands to engage with users at the most optimal time and place by delivering personalized and relevant experiences.
Building Trust Through Privacy-First Advertising
A privacy-first approach not only ensures compliance with regulations but also helps build trust and customer relationships. Consumers today are more conscious about the data you collect, and ensuring transparent and ethical handling of their information fosters trust and loyalty.
By prioritizing privacy-first advertising solutions, brands can create long-term strategies that respect consumer privacy while driving engagement and business growth. The shift towards privacy-conscious advertising is not just a trend—it is the future of digital marketing.
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In the era of short attention spans, constant multitasking, and myriad distractions, global brands are battling it out for the most desirable currency: attention. A contextual approach provides a strategic framework to capture this attention while prioritizing data privacy. Attention metrics are the KPIs advertisers closely monitor today to understand campaign performance and how the audience resonates with ads.
Attention is the most sought-after metric in the advertising world as a multitude of brands vie for the top spot and aim to capture a larger market share. The biggest challenge advertisers have faced is the inability to quantify campaign performance beyond mere views or clicks.
The shift from Viewability to Attention Metrics
Conventionally, media quality has been assessed based on viewability percentages, which only measure the potential of an ad to be viewed and not its ability to draw user attention.
While the focus has been to increase viewability, it is not a detailed measure of the effectiveness of ads or where to serve them. A contextual approach, by contrast, allows advertisers to leverage modern social learning theories, stemming from the work of Russian psychologist Lev Vygotsky, to create more meaningful interactions. Attention metrics provide a more precise evaluation of how ads perform, directly correlating campaign performance with brand outcomes. This shift reflects a deeper understanding of ad effectiveness.
Understanding Attention Metrics
Attention measurement moves beyond superficial metrics, employing advanced technologies like eye-tracking and predictive modeling. This method relies on machines, eyes, and faces to provide legitimate signals. The predictive model is built on key metrics that include ad format, screen real estate, duration in view, scroll speed, page geometry, and domain.
Attention metrics enable advertisers to go beyond the basics and truly understand higher psychological processes involved in engagement. These metrics measure how engaged or focused a user is on an ad and their ability to absorb the ad’s message, which is more effective in measuring the impact of an ad when compared to views or clicks.
The eye-tracking technology focuses on what parts of the page users look at and how much time they spend. Eye-tracking surveys are conducted to understand how users scroll through a page to gauge ad recall and the probability of users purchasing after seeing the ad. The data gathered from the survey also helps understand what content and creatives resonate better with the audience.
Contextual approach: winning attention with contextual advertising
Advertisers are moving away from one single approach and are looking at leveraging a combination of approaches to win audience attention and improve ROI on advertising spends. One such strategy is contextual advertising—a data privacy-first alternative to traditional ad targeting practices, enabling advertisers to garner attention by producing ads that resonate, placing them in the most ideal locations, and displaying them to the desired audience.
- With various restrictions, ad and cookie blockers, compliances, and the broader shift towards privacy, advertisers have realized the need to shift toward a more inclusive, privacy-first approach.
- Traditional audience targeting practices rely on stereotypes and assumptions and fail to capture the right attention as the target audience is broad and not truly focused on the real addressable market share.
The Role of Context in Cognitive Development
Taking inspiration from cognitive development theories, John-Steiner & Mahn (1996) emphasized the timeframe which emphasizes contextual factors in cognitive development. This perspective aligns with advertising strategies that adapt dynamically to their environments. Just as American psychologist Urie Bronfenbrenner (1917-2005) suggested that a child’s growth is influenced by the mesosystem, which includes larger organizational structures, advertisements function within a layered ecosystem that affects user engagement.
Contextual advertising is a complementary technology that integrates well with new privacy initiatives like universal IDs and Privacy Sandbox, providing a more effective strategy that adapts to user preferences.
- Contextual ads effectively amass attention by producing impactful ad creatives and ensuring ideal creative placement.
- Whether it is images or video, contextual creatives resonate with users and capture their attention.
Contextual Creatives and Their Impact
Contextual ads effectively amass attention by producing impactful ad creatives and ensuring ideal creative placement. Whether it is images or video, contextual creatives resonate with users and capture their attention. With the right approach, advertisers can create a climate where social interaction plays a critical role in children’s learning—a principle that can be applied to audience engagement, where contextual relevance fosters deeper connections.
By leveraging a contextual approach, advertisers can create meaningful interactions while respecting data privacy. In doing so, they align with society’s self-image, growth, sense of accomplishment, and schedule, thereby impacting the audience physically, cognitively, and emotionally. This shift not only ensures compliance with privacy regulations but also enhances the efficacy of ad campaigns, making them more resonant and impactful.
With a focus on all the right elements, our contextual advertising solution powered by AI is empowering brands to grow affinity, achieve higher accuracy, and drive more intentional attention.
The digital advertising landscape is undergoing a profound transformation, driven by a relentless focus on consumer privacy. Regulations like GDPR and CCPA, coupled with browser restrictions, are rapidly eroding the traditional addressable advertising ecosystem. While the recent news about Google's decision on not deprecating third-party cookies has caused ripples, it's essential to recognize that the broader shift towards privacy is irreversible.
At Seedtag, we've been at the forefront of privacy-first advertising for a decade. We develop tools for advertisers to thrive beyond an evolving landscape, delivering campaigns that matter to users at the most relevant moment for them. Here is how we foresee going from an era of change to a change of an era:
Cookie limitations: Losing Signals and Reach
With Chrome market share ranging from 75% to 50% depending on the country, according to web-tracking firm StatCounter. Furthermore, if you factor in legislation, penetration of ad and cookie blocking apps and users choice (53% of users reject cookies on certain websites and 32% in all websites according to a study conducted in conjunction with YouGov), it’s clear marketers are now facing numerous restrictions.
Traditional audience categorization and targeting methods are becoming ineffective because they rely on stereotypes and assumptions and fail to comply with privacy regulations, but even more importantly, user preference. Conventional advertising methods aim for a broad audience, but they often miss the mark, leading to wasted ad spend as many viewers may not be interested in the product or service; and fails on delivering the message to the total addressable market. Modern targeting strategies move beyond conventional identity-based approaches and focus on users' current interests and the context of the content they consume. Interest-based targeting, which breaks away from stereotypes, is seen as a more effective, non-intrusive, and privacy-centric alternative.
Cookies have carried the industry far, but time has come to pass the torch - a significant challenge for many advertisers and a unique opportunity for those who can adapt.
Contextual: The key to Precision & Scale
Contextual advertising is the cornerstone of our approach. It focuses solely on the content of the page rather than the user, mitigating privacy concerns and complying with data protection regulations. Contextual advertising delivers both precision and scale by leveraging the context surrounding ads rather than tracking individual users. This method respects user privacy while providing highly relevant ad placements.
Contextual signals can be particularly effective on platforms like Connected TV (CTV), cookieless by nature, which accounts for one-third of combined US linear and CTV ad spend in 2024, according to eMarketer. With strong projected growth in 2025, these signals ensure that ads reach the right audience at the right time without compromising privacy. Our Contextual Graph, combined with advanced AI, allows us to target audiences with precision and scale, delivering exceptional results in a privacy-centric world.
Beyond Contextual: A Hybrid Approach
In the changing world of digital advertising, there is no one-size-fits-all solution. The future is undeniably hybrid, combining traditional signals with emerging privacy-first methods. Integrations with new privacy-focused initiatives, such as universal IDs, Privacy Sandbox, are becoming increasingly important.
By using a mix of contextual advertising and available tools, advertisers can achieve a balanced and effective strategy that adapts to ongoing changes and user preferences. This approach allows advertisers to diversify their tactics, ensuring they do not rely on a single method and can reach their target audiences effectively.
Seedtag’s Commitment to Privacy-Preserving Advertising
Powered by Liz, our pioneering AI technology, we at Seedtag offer future-proof, thoroughly tested contextual targeting solutions that find and engage with nuanced audiences and capture their attention by aligning with their current line of interest.
We believe that by focusing on context, relevance, and user experience, we can build a more sustainable and effective advertising ecosystem.
Are you ready to embrace the future of advertising? Want to learn more on how Seedtag can help you navigate the complexities of a privacy-centric world?
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Can you hear the bells ring? School’s here.
The academic year kickoff is fast approaching, and the atmosphere is bubbling with energy as students and their families gear up for the new chapter. In the latest Seedtag Lab report - Back to School 2024, we uncover key details like the keywords and topics that are top of mind of the audience and align with the key values within the Back to School topic.
With a 30% article share, Student Finances is the key topic of interest as the audience focuses on the financial aspects of university life like student loans, budget management, scholarships, accommodation costs, and banking options tailored for students.
Next in line is School Material with a 28% article share. This includes notebooks, art and science kits, educational software, and stylish classroom materials that help students prepare and stay motivated to learn.
Next up we have Parenting with 23% of articles covering concepts like childcare, financial planning, educational support, school safety, and parenting strategies to ensure the academic and personal development of students.
Education & Learning is the final topic with a 19% share of articles. From classroom learning and curriculum enhancement to the integration of technology and extracurricular activities, the topics focus on the diverse aspects of education.
What are the main clusters garnering interest within the Back to School theme?
1. Student Finances
This topic garners 2.4M impressions during the back to school season.
- Cost of Living: Total views 43% and ~18 Avg. views
- Financial Solutions: Total views 19% and ~8.5 Avg. views
- Studying Abroad: Total views 15% and ~8.5 Avg. views
2. School Material
This category amasses 2.1M impressions.
- Integration of Technology: Total views 18% and ~7.6 Avg. views
- School & Sports Attire: Total views 15% and ~9.9 Avg. views
- School Supplies Bundles: Total views 13% and ~4 Avg. views
3. Parenting
With 3.8M impressions, parents are the main area of audience interest during the season.
- Back to School FAQ: Total views 25% and ~12 Avg. views
- Financial Assistance for Parents: Total views 23% and ~11 Avg. views
- Educational Standards: Total views 19% and ~8 Avg. views
4. Education & Learning
Learning is the second-most trending area of interest with 3.1M impressions.
- School Initiatives: Total views 37% and ~11 Avg. views
- Ofsted Ratings: Total views 25% and ~6 Avg. views
- Learning Approaches: Total views 15% and ~4.9 Avg. views
- Special Educational Needs: Total views 9% and ~4 Avg. views
For more on Contextual Audiences tailored for the season, reach out.
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Connected TVs (CTV) are emerging as the device of choice globally, swiftly replacing traditional television. With the number of people canceling their linear cable subscriptions in favor of subscription-based streaming services and apps on the rise, CTV advertising is one of the most popular marketing channels today. To put that in perspective, CTV viewership is set to hit 55 million in 2024 with strong projected growth in 2025!
The CTV audience is distributed across various CTV devices, including smart TVs, set-top boxes, and gaming consoles. As traditional TV viewership declines, advertisers are skipping the broad demographic targeting practices of linear TV advertising and switching to CTV ads for potentially higher engagement. CTV advertising empowers advertisers to zero in on their ideal customers based on key parameters like demographics, interests, viewing habits, and purchase history.
- CTV measurement - Why is important.
- What are the CTV KPIs?
- How is CTV advertising success measured?
- The furure of CTV ads.
CTV measurement - Why is important
Access to the right data helps advertisers understand how campaigns are performing and gathering insights to optimize video ads for better results. Unlike traditional TV, where viewers can easily switch channels during commercials, CTV ads are harder to skip but less disruptive, leading to higher view-through rates. The process of tracking and analyzing video ad campaigns on connected TV channels is crucial to CTV measurement. CTV measurement enables seamless tracking, ad podding, and performance analysis of advertising campaigns to understand how effectively ads are reaching the target audience, incrementality, and achieving campaign goals.
Marketers plan their campaigns with specific objectives in mind, and the correct definition of CTV measurement and ad exposure enables them to evaluate the success of those objectives. CTV measurement is essential to identify if the ad investment is reaching the right viewers at the right time, understanding the benefits of CTV advertising, and assessing the ROI through conversion/site tracking and other relevant metrics involved. Just as important as ROI Measurement, it is also crucial to help identify suspicious activity and ensure budgets are reaching real viewers.
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What are the CTV KPIs?
To evaluate the performance of a campaign or strategy, these are the KPIs that are most commonly tracked by advertisers:
- Reach: How many unique viewers have seen an ad on streaming TV.
- Impressions: How many times has an ad been displayed on a viewer's screen.
- Viewability: What percentage of CTV ad impressions were seen by a viewer for 50% of the ad's duration or more. On platforms like connected TV, where ads typically occupy the entire screen, viewability rates are generally very high.
- Completion Rate: What percentage of viewers watched the ad until the end.
- Conversions: How many viewers take a desired action after seeing an ad. For example, make a purchase or sign up for a newsletter.
- Cost per Completed View (CPCV): A key revenue metric, measuring the average cost paid by an advertiser for each time someone watches an entire ad.
- View-through rate: How many people visited the site after viewing the ad.
- Incrementality: What was the incremental reach from one initiative.
These metrics help advertisers understand if the results match the goals and objectives of the campaign, make adjustments, and determine if the CTV ads messaging and streaming video content align with the right audience and resonate with them.
How is CTV advertising success measured?
From an overall visibility and campaign exposure perspective to the frequency of an ad display, the number of unique views, and conversions, key metrics help advertisers analyze campaign performance. Beyond the core CTV advertising engagement numbers, consequences and combined impact are also closely tracked.
The cumulative effect of a CTV ad campaign reflects on website traffic and the lead pipeline. Website visits, time spent on site, bounce rate, lead form submissions, share of voice across marketing channels, and overall brand awareness are key areas that see consequential effects and help determine the impact created by a CTV advertising campaign.
An in-depth analysis across these KPIs and impact areas helps advertisers uncover who viewed the CTV ads, how often and for how long, and what actions they performed after viewing the ad, to evaluate how the results tie back to the campaign goals.
One of the greatest advantages of connected TV is the ability to deliver video ads to a highly specific target audience, ensuring that messages reach the audience at the right time. Unlike traditional TV, where advertisers rely on broad demographic assumptions, CTV advertising enables real-time optimizations, providing valuable insights to refine targeting strategies.
The furure of CTV ads
Recent studies indicate that over 70% of households in the U.S. now have at least one connected TV device, demonstrating the rapid shift towards digital streaming over traditional cable services.
This shift has paved the way for more precise audience targeting, allowing brands to connect with consumers in more meaningful and measurable ways. As a result, advertisers can better allocate budgets, ensuring higher engagement and improved ROI.
In the fast-evolving world of CTV ads, staying ahead requires leveraging cutting-edge analytics and adapting to shifting consumer behaviors. By integrating CTV measurement strategies with real-time insights, advertisers can refine their approach, maximize impact, and ensure they reach the right viewers with the most relevant content.
Explore Seedtag Contextual TV, our comprehensive approach to navigating the Connected TV (CTV) landscape and measuring success.
Seedtag continues to pursue strategic expansion, making a bold move with the acquisition of JustEggs, a powerhouse in creative intelligence solutions for brands and advertisers. This play marks Seedtag’s grand entrance into the Australian market, further solidifying our footprint in the APAC region.
Founded in 2013, JustEggs is renowned for its innovative digital solutions that craft truly engaging campaigns with measurable results. The exciting news? JustEggs will be integrating Seedtag’s industry-leading contextual AI technology Liz, into their offerings starting this month. This means even more targeted and effective campaigns for JustEggs’ clients, powered by the potential of contextual AI.
A seamless transition is on the horizon, with Seedtag and JustEggs working closely to ensure smooth integration of their technologies. JustEggs’ founder, Nik Kontoulas, will continue steering the ship as Managing Director of the Australia & New Zealand region.
This strategic move follows Seedtag’s successful market entries into India, Peru, and most recently Canada. With the acquisition of JustEggs, Seedtag’s presence expands to a total of 17 markets globally.
Australia’s digital landscape is booming, with Statista predicting the number of internet users to surpass a staggering 23.3 million by 2025, translating to an internet penetration rate of over 89%. Seedtag’s entry into this thriving market is a natural step in its mission to become the go-to contextual partner for brands, agencies, and publishers alike. Users in Australia can now benefit from all the advantages of privacy-first advertising that reaches consumers based on their real-time interests at massive scale, with truly unbiased targeting.
How will we redefine contextual advertising in Australia?
- Contextual Targeting meets Creative Intelligence: Seedtag’s industry-leading contextual targeting paired with JustEggs' innovative digital solutions enables advertisers to reach highly relevant audiences with pinpoint accuracy
- Privacy-First Advertising that Delivers: In a world increasingly focused on user privacy, Seedtag and JustEggs' combined expertise ensures impactful advertising that respects privacy regulations and delivers results.
- Expanded Reach and Insights: With the integration of Seedtag's AI and JustEggs' creative solutions, advertisers and publishers gain a comprehensive view of their target audiences, optimizing campaign planning and execution across all digital platforms.
“The acquisition of JustEggs perfectly exemplifies Seedtag’s unwavering commitment to global expansion, particularly within the APAC region,” said Albert Nieto, Co-CEO & Co-Founder of Seedtag. “We are thrilled to partner with such a stellar team in our industry, pushing the boundaries of contextual intelligence to new heights.”
“Joining forces with Seedtag catapults us into a new era of digital advertising innovation for the ANZ market,” said Nik Kontoulas, founder of JustEggs. “With their cutting-edge technology and global reach, we’re equipped to conquer the cookieless world and beyond. The future is bright!”
“Australia boasts a highly sophisticated market driven by data and technology, and we’re confident we have a lot to offer the local digital advertising scene,” said Dal Gill, VP of New Markets at Seedtag. “Following our successful foray into India, this marks our second market launch in APAC. We’re firmly convinced that our unique contextual advertising solutions will empower Australian brands and publishers to achieve their advertising goals while fulfilling the demand for privacy-centric, scalable targeting.”
With privacy concerns on the rise and consumers demanding more relevant and engaging experiences, this strategic alliance ensures brands can flourish in the privacy-first era, delivering exceptional results along the way and empowering brands to connect with audiences in more markets than ever before.
Are your ad campaigns keeping pace with these evolving trends? Discover how Seedtag’s enhanced contextual advertising solutions can propel you ahead of the competition and connect with your audience in a whole new way. Contact us today to learn more.
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