Despite the significant growth in digital advertising, TV advertising is as important now as it ever was. It's not diminishing, just evolving, as technology and consumption evolve. Graeme Lynch (pictured below), director business development EMEA, TubeMogul explains to ExchangeWire that programmatic TV (PTV) is part and parcel of this evolution, playing a complementary role to the ever-powerful linear TV reach.

Have you ever noticed that special occasions are like London buses? There are none on your calendar and then they all come at once. In the TV industry this seems to be the case, as TV advertising celebrated a number of milestones as of late. Last year marked 60 years of TV ads in the UK. This year sees Australia celebrate that magic number. Meanwhile, the US can lay claim to the biggest number of all with 75 years of TV advertising being celebrated in 2016.

Today, we look towards the next era in an industry that is about to be transformed by the advent of programmatic ad buying. Until now, innovation in television has been largely relegated to product development (from B&W to colour and, subsequently, digital television) or through better and more interesting creative. With programmatic, innovation comes to the back-end, the process of buying TV ads (a process that has largely remained exactly the same as it was in its early days).

So why now?  TV advertising has never been more powerful, nor more expensive. Despite audiences diminishing due to the competition from online content and mobile, TV remains the number one choice on which to base a brand campaign – and for good reason, as it is still the best way of getting a message to a mass audience. The cost remains high simply because there is limited premium inventory and increasing demand for slots. It’s a seller’s market.

Graeme Lynch, Director Business Development EMEA, TubeMogul

At TubeMogul, we believe that there should be no question around whether TV should remain the cornerstone around which a media campaign is built: it is – and it will be for a very long time. However, the ability to plan, buy, and optimise a TV campaign on a single platform alongside the media buys for all other formats (such as online video, digital display, and digital OOH) in order to reflect the cross-screen habits of the average consumer means that PTV is a must. While broadcasters have been reticent to make inventory available programmatically, due to a belief that it will drag down pricing of premium inventory, the reality is that the opposite is true. Instead, new opportunities will rise out of undervalued and undersold inventory in off-peak time slots as data reveals niche audiences tailor-made for specific products. For example, late-night ad spots may not be right for all FMCG advertisers, however, data could reveal that gamers switch on the TV while playing on a separate screen, thus, making this inventory right for game consoles and new game launches.

Programmatic TV is not anti-TV. Without question, linear TV is still the dominant way of reaching audiences in the country. No other medium can compete with television’s ability to reach audiences quickly and at scale. Where programmatic can make an impact is primarily where we can place ads based on new data decisioning. We already do OTT and VOD (catch-up TV) in this market – linear programmatic TV is just the next (and final) piece of the puzzle.

The key to making this a success is data and the ability to fuse that data together to create new data sets that don’t exist today. To make it relevant for advertisers, planners will also need the ability to integrate their own first-party data, confident that it remains their property and inaccessible to other advertisers or broadcasters. Ideally, marketers should ask PTV platform suppliers whether they have the ability to bring in private marketplaces and commercial deals.

Frequency capping will be one of the main positives of programmatic television, but it won’t be available just yet. What we can take advantage of now is the use of data to make intelligent decisions in order to make a more efficient buy.

But, it’s not just a plus for advertisers. Every side of the coin can receive value. If you are a marketer, your spend will go further and you will get new, insightful reporting about audiences. Broadcasters get new value placed on inventory that was undervalued.

Programmatic television is not a threat. It isn’t a break away from the mould of years of advertising. Rather, it is an improvement that makes buying more effective, efficient, and adds value to previously disregarded inventory.

They say old age is no longer a time for going out to pasture. Frankly, I agree. Because if all golden agers were this innovative and exciting, I’d be eagerly counting my birthday candles until I reached my own milestone. Luckily for the advertising industry, that time is now and the opportunities are here. Let’s celebrate by having our cake and eating it too.