Google is Getting Access to Cable TV Ad Sales: Is Digital Signage Next?
NBC Universal and Google announced a strategic partnership that would give the largest search advertising company access to cable TV ad space inventory, Ad Age reports.
The move, if successful, could enable smaller marketers, who have been using Google’s paid search ad engine AdWords and who have not been able to afford TV ads before, to buy air time on a number of NBC’s cable outlets, bypassing traditional media sales channels.
According to Ad Age, when the system is in place, it would allow ‘non-traditional’ advertisers to upload their own content and target it to cable TV households based on the desired geographic markets and viewer profiles using an online interface, thus avoiding agency overhead and media buyer commissions.
In addition, these new advertisers would be able to receive high-tech metrics via Google TV Ads application, which can report second-by-second set-top-box data, says Ad Age: “That measure has become more popular as companies such as Starcom USA, TNS and Nielsen have offered plans to help advertisers get more precise data about how viewers watch TV, skip across channels, and use digital video recorders.” The network TV ad space will not be affected by the deal, Ad Age reports.
This collaboration could give NBC Universal a much needed edge against its “Big 4? rivals amid continuing fragmentation of TV market, while providing Google with a revenue stream from traditional media.
Mainstream agencies and research companies are likely to perceive the NBC-Google agreement as a threat, as it contributes to the erosion of their control of TV ad space and has the potential of taking over at least part of network TV sales in the future..
Many attempts of creating online ‘media space exchange’-type of enterprises since the early 90s have been thwarted, not without efforts by the traditional media establishment.
If the collaboration works, I don’t see any obstacle for Google to start making inroads into digital signage (judging by company’s reported patent applications it is already working on it), as there would not be too much difference in the ad sales set up. It would make more sense, though, when digital signage ad space is more aggregated.
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