Report: Privacy and the Future of TV Advertising

Planning, Activation, and Measurement in the Privacy-Forward Era

ThinkMedium and Shullman Advisory have completed a project with the 4A’s and CIMM and numerous participants and interviewees to assess the state and trajectory of TV advertising in the context of privacy requirements.

Changes to the complex framework of privacy laws, regulations, and platform policies are transforming the landscape for media, data, and technology companies. It is critical that participants in the media, advertising and marketing ecosystems revisit their preparedness and risk tolerances, assess the issues associated with different services and solutions, and build and partner to enable growth in the face of privacy shifts.

Key takeaways:

TV advertising faces the same patchwork of laws and platform policies that are fundamentally changing how digital advertising works – and is arguably subject to even greater complexity, given TV-specific regulations (e.g. VPPA), a complex distribution environment, ongoing shifts from traditional B2B models towards D2C offerings, and the range of consumer engagement points (smart TVs, STBs, phones, more).
Many in the TV advertising ecosystem have viewed privacy through a compliance lens, rather than considering their risk tolerances and the privacy vs. utility tradeoffs inherent in their data strategies and chosen advertising solutions.
Though some TV stakeholders are less data-dependent than their digital media counterparts, they should still understand the interplay between shifting privacy regulations/policies and resulting strategic, technical, commercial, and operational changes – especially if they are seeking to employ richer consumer data.
Scaled relationships with consumers will be paramount to successfully navigate shifts in advertising planning, activation, and measurement, as will new and evolving advertising solutions and enabling technologies.
This report provides a heatmap view of the viability of advertising solutions and technologies in the face of privacy shifts – highlighting that established solutions that are less dependent on person-level data (e.g., MMM) are more viable than those with greater data requirements (e.g., MTA), emerging solutions and technologies are not inherently more private, and most solutions have the opportunity to evolve to meet increasing privacy requirements.
Most importantly, the report provides a structured approach for companies to audit and evolve their portfolios of advertising solutions based on self-assessed privacy/utility tradeoffs – identifying a set of foundational solutions, emerging solutions, and trusted partners that will be viable through the changes to come.