“ITV has managed to create a direct link from data to profitability and sustainability, not just for the organisation, but for its partners,” said Izlan. “We use value as a means for prioritisation among many data use cases, as a method for feedback and learning, and as a way to measure success.”

Many areas of the business are said to be improving their use of data: ITV’s own marketing campaign performance, increasing the choice and speed to market of new addressable advertising products, and the empowerment of product experimentation to drive viewer engagement.

Izlan, however, was excited for the next frontier: “We are using data as the connective tissue between all the various touchpoints, or as I like to call it, the ‘viewer value chain’. This means we can start informing and optimising the decisions we make in a much more interconnected way, so we can grow our streaming business. An example of this is data driving content positioning. It enables optimisation and experimentation, and we link that to marketing activity — so how we use data to attract new users as well as re-engaging audiences with first-party data activations across all marketing channels.

“We then link that to the product experience. By using data to personalise experiences on ITVX, we’re giving viewers what they want to see, we’re telling them what they might like to watch next, and driving engagement and time spent on the site. That, in turn, increases the advertising capacity, which we then link to commercial opportunities. It’s how we drive reach, and how we drive more addressable advertising options for advertisers.”

By incorporating everything that Izlan mentioned, ITV has created a feedback loop mechanism to continually optimise its decision making and grow its streaming business.

“It’s been a journey to get here. Over the last 18 months we’ve kept our procurement team busy. We’ve implemented a new cloud data platform, clean room technology, and a customer data platform. All that is coming together to power Flex, ITV’s first data-driven platform that offers insights and the activation of data, ” Izlan revealed.

She also told the London audience that by introducing these new ventures, ITV has recognised that digital transformation is not only about the technology. “It’s also about people and process”, she said. “We knew we needed an enterprise-wide cultural shift for this to deliver the value we want for the business. So, in parallel, the data team is transforming the operating model by moving away from centralised, back-office style data functions to a fully decentralised model where we are embedding data capabilities into the business. These align with each business area’s way of working and strategic objectives.

“We’re allowing our users to self-serve by building data, training that data, then releasing it. We want to democratise data across the business, so the data activation team sits in the same place as the business positions at all levels of the organisation. ITV knows that developing data capabilities and culture are powerful drivers of value. It also makes advertising better for end consumers and a more profitable and strategic investment for brands wanting more enduring business outcomes.”

Evelyn Rothblum, EVP Advertising, Partnerships & Distribution, Italy and Germany at Sky, emphasised that both Netflix and Disney are great partners for the Pay TV platform provider (which is also a broadcaster and a multichannel sales house). “They are aggregated into our [Pay TV] offer. We want to integrate their content to ensure people find all the content they love. It is great to see new players offering advertising but it will take a long time for some of those services to achieve the same reach as Sky in the UK and also in Italy and Germany.”

Panel moderator Thomas Bremond, SVP & Chief Revenue Officer, International at FreeWheel, (which provides comprehensive ad platforms for publishers, advertisers, and media buyers) wanted to know how we should characterise Netflix within the Total TV marketplace, and if it is viewed differently to BVOD or other AVOD. “Netflix is television,” declared Kelly Williams, Managing Director, Commercial at ITV. “They make professionally produced, long-form content, so they are part of the TV ecosystem. They’ve been around for a while, competing with us for audience, but we also make content for Netflix, so they are a great partner to work with.

“In advertising they will be a competitor, but we are in a great place to compete with them. We have a big linear business with a mass reach proposition combined with a fast-growing addressable proposition, and we make most of our own shows [thanks to ITV Studios] so we have a strong creative offer, with the ability to integrate brands into our shows.”

ITV, Sky, OMD and YouTube were speaking on a panel titled, ‘TV’s Serendipity moment?’, which focused on the evolution of the Total TV marketplace and how the industry offers cross-platform audience scale while also offering simplicity to buyers. Philip Miles, Managing Director, Video & Display Sales, UK for YouTube, highlighted the contribution of his company, including as a platform for hosting content from channel owners (like Channel 4, which started to make its long-form content available on YouTube this year).

“Up to 30 million people watch YouTube on a television set per month in the UK,” Miles declared, adding that “40% of BVOD is consumed off the television, according to Thinkbox research last month.”

He was making the point that “consumers are cross-platform and watch where they want to watch”. Miles confirmed, “We are seeing interesting partnerships with broadcasters – with YouTube as a partner distribution platform.” And on the question of delivering large-scale, cross-platform audiences and making that easy for advertisers, he said, “We have moved into a new phase where we have to think more about converging the world of linear [broadcast] and digital.”

Miles said YouTube can deliver incremental reach for advertisers as viewing patterns change, and has the ability to leverage targeting to drive mid-funnel and lower-funnel objectives. He referenced YouTube Select (which surfaces a diverse mix of content packages called ‘lineups’ that are contextually linked, like beauty & fashion, entertainment, technology, sports, etc.) as a way to create scale for buyers, and he pointed to global reach on the platform and consistency across markets, coming back to the theme of making life simple for buyers.

Bell emphasised the need to understand the differences between screens and platforms and viewer receptivity to advertising in the different environments – pointing out that targeted audiences on smaller screens can be just as valuable as mass audiences on a large television – albeit traded differently. “From a planning perspective, you have to stick to the principle of ‘Who are the audiences and what mindset are they in, and how do you buy into them, and through what platform, and then how do we measure those cross-platform audiences?”

Bremond asked Bell if it is easier to buy from non-broadcaster digital platforms or from classic broadcasters like ITV. “A digital person [within the agency] will say ‘yes’ and a television person will say ‘no’,” she observed.

“The challenge is that everyone is coming up with a better way to buy on their platform and every platform is simple in its own right, but it is not simple to buy across them, and we have to think holistically. Everyone is innovating, but I hope we have reached peak complexity because I need a bit more convergence through DSPs and single points of purchase.”

Williams acknowledged that digital platforms have made it easy to buy video and said ITV is trying to make television easy to buy, pointing to the investment in Planet TV (the ITV programmatic platform built specifically for television, where ITV owns and controls the programmatic value chain). “This is a self-service platform that every agency can use, and it allows them to exploit our first-party data – using clean room technology to match advertiser data with our data in a safe way. We hope that more of the television industry can use this, and we are hopeful that other broadcasters will join Planet V over the next year or so.

“So that’s what we are doing to compete with Disney and Netflix,” he added, referring to a discussion about how these companies are taking their subscription-with-advertising VOD audiences to market and their tech partners.

Williams added: “The big challenge in the next couple of years is convergence, as more television is delivered over IP. For the next ten years we are going to have to play two roles, with linear [broadcast] and addressable [streamed] and we will have to converge the ad-tech and the sales.”

He confirmed that ITVX, which succeeds ITV Hub, is about moving from a catch-up service to a streaming destination [an objective that includes a massive expansion in the catalogue and a focus on streaming-first drama launches], but that ITVX is also about building ITV’s addressable future. “We are trying to build a big streaming audience and ensure it is incremental and does not reduce linear [broadcast].”

Williams added: “Planet V is the front door for addressable and in future it will be the front door for ITV as we converge everything.”

Asked to sum-up the near-term challenges, Williams flagged regulation for public broadcasters in the streaming world, given their value for local culture and independent trusted news, and his particular focus was on prominence – ensuring some privileges in the same way that broadcasters are guaranteed prominence in broadcast EPGs.

Focusing on changes he wanted in the next year specifically, Williams asked for more collaboration among TV providers, using CFlight (the Comcast/Sky led cross-platform measurement solution that Sky, ITV and Channel 4 have now aligned around) as an example of what can be achieved when working together. “We should compete really hard on content and collaborate on technology and measurement,” he told the Future of TV Advertising Global audience in London.

YouTube’s Miles also gave a nudge to any regulators in the room, stating the value of YouTube creators to the UK production sector – with thousands of jobs now involved. “The television future has to include online platforms and online platforms have a really important role to play in supporting creativity in different markets,” he argued.

His one-year horizon prioritises measurement, which he described as critical to the industry. “It is challenging to make sense of this world [of multiple media touchpoints] but we have to commit ourselves to solutions.” Referring to efforts to establish common and comparable measurement between digital and television, he added: “This is one of the reasons we support Project Origin.”

For Sky, Rothblum had earlier noted how it was harder to sell the concept of addressable TV advertising in Germany and Italy because of a focus on linear in those markets. “They are not looking so much for that targeted advertising product on television — it’s more about digital,” she observed, comparing these Sky markets to the UK where her company has helped drive some scale for addressable.

“Italy and Germany are following behind and it is more about educating the market and working with advertisers to show the value. We know there is value, from our experience in the UK.”

And what does Rothblum want to see change in the next year, especially? “I agree that the focus is on measurement. We must also make it easier to buy audiences. There has never been so much great content for consumers to watch, so we must help advertisers and agencies find the audiences that are watching that content, in an easier way.”

Bell at Manning Gottlieb OMD had already listed some challenges during the course of this panel, including the need for two different skill sets to cover linear [broadcast] TV on the one hand and the addressable/programmatic marketplace on the other – and the need to converge those. “But when we do converge those things, it gets really exciting,” she added.  The talent shortage on the AV (television, rather than digital) side of the industry is also a problem, she admitted.

Then there are two priorities for 2023, for Bell, the first of which is solving the measurement challenges [e.g., cross-platform] without losing sight of effectiveness. The second is the continued delivery of content to excite viewers, which means sustaining the creative economy. “I need content to enable mass reach for my clients,” the agency CEO concluded.

As part of the experience, VBG will create a web3 loyalty programme that rewards fans for their interactions with The Voice, in ways that include engaging with the show on social media, watching the show, or buying virtual and physical merchandise related to The Voice.

The company says the experience will go far beyond the real-life version of the show and will offer new opportunities to drive viewership of The Voice. Fans can sign up to get early access to metaverse games and be the first to receive rewards and challenges at TheVoiceVIPSuperverse.com

Lucie Stoffers, Head of Brand & Licensing at ITV Studios, says: “The Voice was, in many ways, an early version of the Metaverse where anonymity and being whoever you want rule. VBG is the perfect partner for us because together, we can enable a one-stop activation for all our territories and broadcasting partners around the world and give fans a year-round experience with games, giveaways, and virtual items all inspired by The Voice.”

VBG CEO and Founder, Justin Hochberg, comments: “Collaborating with ITV to deliver The Voice metaverse will redefine virtual music experiences beyond passive concerts centred just on popstars and give power to a billion people to become stars anywhere on the planet.

“The Voice metaverse experience will create a new, connected musical fan journey that only web3 can deliver – not real life, not TV, and not static Internet. Fans will be rewarded no matter how they engage – whether watching, sharing, purchasing, playing, or attending an event. For VBG, this represents the next iteration in our rapid growth, leading entertainment onto a range of new platforms.”

Rhys McLachlan, Director of Advanced Advertising at ITV, gives the example of advertising alongside food-related content: “If you are a food advertiser, you’re not just going to advertise beside food programmes. We have 24 food-related programmes but food, or meal times, as they appear across the entirety of ITV’s programming estate, are actually represented thousands of times. So we are using machine learning to understand when those meal times occur and what’s been served [in the content] – is it pizza? Burgers? Spaghetti Bolognese?

“We’re able to create advertising breaks for advertisers adjacent to that concept, unlocking what we’re calling ‘next generation contextual targeting’ using metadata already inherent in the content we have.”

The new product has been tested in market for six months and  ITV is “delighted” with the feedback it has received about its performance.

McLachlan revealed that Planet V has onboarded almost 1,300 users [meaning TV buyers], with most of them being monthly active users. The broadcaster has converted the entirety of its digital video billing system to Planet V, and does not take direct orders [for digital video] anymore. To illustrate the range of businesses using the platform to advertise across ITV’s programming he brings up several recent examples, including a chain of tanning salons across Stockport, solicitors firms in Birmingham, and a glass fitting company in Glasgow looking to amplify its proposition by advertising to customers within a certain drive time of where it is located. He says: “Everything is going through Planet V. We have thousands and thousands of advertisers – our run rate is ridiculous – and we’re driving into new markets as well.”

Speaking briefly about ITVX – ITV’s forthcoming streaming service – McLachlan believes the new offer will “revolutionise” the broadcaster’s business. We’re fully re-imagining ITV’s streaming proposition and it’s going to knock your socks off.”

McLachlan believes that broadcasters are at risk of collectively failing if they cannot compete with digital native businesses that have innovation “hard-coded” into their DNA. He argues that broadcasters do not compete with each other so much anymore, but with companies like Amazon, Google, Facebook and TikTok that have codified “disruption, agility and a hacker mindset” into developing their advertising products.

He comments: “They could move much faster. They had much greater dexterity, and were able to work with greater confidence around risk – around unknowns.” According to McLachlan, until recently ITV had not succeeded in significantly tapping into the discretionary budgets allocated to advertisers to spend on innovative ad products, but over the last two years the company has been “quietly moving innovation into the beating heart” of its business.

He notes that around September 2021, the broadcaster had put into place a process which allowed it to codify its “innovation journey” into an ad labs proposition, developing a group of teams that have the designated responsibilities of delivering innovation across the entirety of the company’s estate. The broadcaster has been reviewing its systems, data, processes and tech stack, and developed a set of concepts that went through a rigorous assessment phase – from ideation through to concept, then to pilot and on to a beta protocol that clients can participate in.

McLachlan says: “The world is crying out for more progressive solutions that allow broadcasters, advertisers and agencies to avail of the richness of the ecosystem in which we now operate.

“This is how we win. This is how we re-frame what TV is about when the ecosystem is changing so quickly and other businesses are trying to muscle in on our territory. This is how we fight back, and we’ll be more effective if we do it together.”

The first sub-segment Radcliffe outlined is ‘Everyday Event-ers’. He said: “They prefer entertainment to drama. They have slightly lower VOD usage and are younger. They want plenty of choice in a content offering and love the big tent-pole shows that ITV delivers.”

Another sub-segment – ‘Socialisers’ – are characterised by viewing VOD as their primary TV destination. This group tends to enjoy shows which are currently trending and serve as “social fuel”, such as The Only Way Is Essex, Real Housewives, and large events like the Brits UK music award ceremony. The ‘Armchair Explorer’ sub-segment are viewers who tend to be more traditional in their ideals and values, and slower to adopt new media behaviours. While they generally have lower tech literacy, Radcliffe said they are “beginning to move into VOD at speed now.” This sub-segment also has a preference for UK content over U.S. content.

The final group Radcliffe outlined are ‘Savvy Streamers’ who tend to be tech-savvy and more open to trying new things and experimenting with their TV consumption. They also have access to a wealth of choice between services but want “quality rather than quantity.”

Radcliffe said: “What we’re doing now is mapping all of the content onto these segments to make sure we can really drive growth on ITVX. All throughout this process, we’ve been listening to viewers and getting feedback. The response has been really positive.”

He also said that the broadcaster would invest £160 million incrementally into content to “super-charge” ITVX, and that more “free and fresh” content would be added to the service on a weekly basis than on any other British streamer.

ITVX will launch with 20 new FAST channels. Additionally, live channels will be included “front and centre” on the service. According to Radcliffe, three million households in the UK only watch TV via broadcaster apps on the their connected TVs. He said: “Live is still incredibly important. Whether you stream or watch in linear – live TV matters. So, alongside our Britishness, the inclusion of live TV will be a significant differentiator between ITVX and U.S. streamers.

“Just for example, during the Euros [UEFA European Championship football competition] last summer, we had over two million viewers streaming matches on ITV Hub. Viewers are increasingly choosing to watch live TV in an online environment.”

The service’s on demand offering will include 15,000 hours of content at launch, with catch-up viewing enhanced by series stacks, newly acquired boxsets, and exclusive commissions. Radcliffe noted that the streamer will be on-boarding ITV’s content partners to “give more volume and breadth of content to our viewers”, and that it would represent “a real step change” from the broadcaster’s approach with ITV Hub.

Radcliffe mentioned that the three streaming brands currently owned by the broadcaster – ITV Hub, ITV Hub+ (an ad-free SVOD tier of the service) and the SVOD Britbox – will be integrated into ITVX. ITV Hub saw 25 million people use the service last year, with over 600 million streaming hours logged, according to Radcliffe. The company currently has 1.2 million subscribers across its SVOD services and, importantly, there is “very little [subscriber] duplication.”

He also noted that ITVX will be offered as a free ad-supported service with the option of a paid SVOD tier. Radcliffe remarked: “We think ‘free’ is a very important message, particularly at a time when consumer confidence is as it is and the market is as it is.”

Radcliffe joked that the branding process for any new service is a “thankless job” but research showed ‘ITVX’ to be the clear winner among possible names for the streamer. He said: “Its got ITV in the name, which gives you a sense of trust, familiarity and quality, but also it’s going to have a whole load more as part of it as well. It will give us the opportunity to not only super-serve existing viewers, but bring in a whole load of new viewers on a regular basis. That’s where X comes in – it’s the ITV you would expect and the ITV you wouldn’t expect as well.”

In advertising, we have long known this to be true. The media environments best able to produce metrics and establish effectiveness invariably attract those in charge of managing spend.

Just look at the rise of digital over the last two decades. The decline of traditional media, such as print and TV, directly correlates with the rise of digital channels, and the growing ubiquity of smartphones. Marketers, faced with tightening budgets, want to be able to clearly demonstrate ROI.

But how we measure things in digital is changing. As privacy rises up the agenda, and tech giants respond to new consumer concerns, the world is moving away from behavioural targeting through third-party cookies.

Within this change lies opportunity for advertisers – as ITV’s results earlier this year illustrate.

CTV to the Factor of X

In March, ITV posted its largest advertising revenue growth in its history. The broadcaster saw advertising revenues rise by 24% YoY to reach almost £2bn – with its AVOD revenue up by a significant 41%.

“Our ’More Than TV’ strategy, sets ITV up for digital acceleration,” said Chief Executive Officer Carolyn McCall. “Our strong balance sheet and cash flows enable us to invest behind our strategy to build a more valuable digital media and entertainment company and deliver returns to shareholders.”

Or in other words, building on its success in CTV thus far, ITV is pressing its advantage and launching ITVX later this year, a new streaming service that will premiere new content before traditional linear broadcast. And they aren’t the only ones keeping busy.

There is a lot of movement in the UK’s CTV space: platforms like Pluto TV are running big outdoor campaigns around London – and brands like Disney are considering a move into AVOD.

The wider socio-economic context adds credence to these moves. As inflation bites and the cost of living rises, the pressure on household finances is growing. This could see consumers opt to reduce their active subscriptions and move from SVOD to AVOD in order to save money.

Understanding households

The UK is still behind countries like the U.S. when it comes to CTV and CTV advertising; however with companies like ITV creating more opportunities for streaming content and advertising on its platforms, CTV has the potential to be fast-growing across UK households.

Modern audiences exhibit both the habits and the devices required for effective CTV advertising. Over 78% of European audiences regularly watch CTV – and 42% of households now have two or more Smart TVs. In the UK, 89% of consumers use a streaming service at least once a week and 74% use AVOD at least once a week.

These figures are naturally attracting advertisers. CTV benefits from being driven by real-time data, providing an opportunity for precise targeting at the local, household or even device level.

Brands aren’t going back to appealing to undefined audiences en-masse. Login and authentication steps empower advertisers to target individual viewers, while digital attribution helps identify the link between ad exposure and engagement.

And this data melds with other first-party data sources. Marketers can use their own customer relationship management (CRM) and transaction records, online data such as website visits and available digital segments indicating, for example, kids at home or occupation type, to identify when and where to reach their desired audience.

The media landscape is changing. But people aren’t. As Drucker noted long ago, the stuff that gets measured, gets managed. As CTV offers consumers increasingly appealing AVOD options, and offers brands the detailed metrics they crave through household targeting, more interest and investment will naturally flow through the channel.

This will include highlights from the Qatar 2022 World Cup, Love Island and I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here! Others ITV sports broadcasting which will feature includes coverage of the 2023 Rugby World Cup and the FA Cup.

Advertisers will be able to leverage Twitter’s targeting tools through Twitter Amplify while placing ads alongside ITV’s content offering on the website. Over the course of the partnership, the Twitter Next team will produce a series of activations across ITV’s schedule.

Theo Luke, Senior Director of Global Content Partnerships, Twitter, said: “Both Twitter and ITV are at the heart of so many conversations across the UK, so being able to bring the biggest cultural and sporting moments to users on an even greater scale is incredibly exciting.

Since the start of our partnership with ITV back in 2018, we’ve been incredibly impressed by the creativity of their editorial unit alongside the commercial aptitude and collaboration of their sales teams. Through Twitter Amplify and the addition of Twitter Next activations to this partnership, advertisers will have even more opportunities to engage with the very best of ITV’s programming in even more impactful ways.”

Pathman Ruthirapathy, Digital Partnerships Controller, ITV, commented: “We’re really excited about continuing ITV’s long-standing partnership with Twitter. The Twitter Amplify product will be available on some of the nation’s most loved and talked about shows including the FIFA World Cup, Love Island and I’m A Celeb.

“Over the years, Twitter has been a powerful tool in driving conversations and engaging fans around some of our favourite TV moments. This is a fantastic opportunity for advertisers to reach new audiences and extend their relationship with ITV’s content.”

Vodafone feature in a session dedicated to the future of Pay TV, titled, ‘Pay TV: Beyond exclusivity’, which is chaired by Ben Keen, Analyst & Advisor, Technology, Media & Telecoms. This session explores how Pay TV operators remain relevant in the 2020s, with a special focus on content curation, discovery and navigation in an expanded universe of global and local apps where content exclusivity becomes more elusive.

Connected TV World Summit is on May 24-25 at the Royal College of Physicians in London.

Dan Fahy, SVP Streaming, UK at Paramount is also confirmed to speak and will provide insights into Paramount’s streaming momentum and how the company will secure its place as a must-have streamer, harnessing Paramount+, Pluto and My5. Fahy will outline the role of Paramount’s existing brands and distribution in driving streaming and how genre-diversity is key to super-serving entire households. There will be a focus on how Paramount is ensuring consumer prominence, including through strategic partnerships. This presentation is part of a session called ‘The Battle for Attention’. This session focuses on how media owners increase total hours viewed and the stickiness of television services.

Rhys McLachlan, Director of Advanced Advertising at ITV will present on ‘Building advertising innovation into broadcaster DNA’, which includes more detail on ITV AdLabs and its work.  ITV AdLabs brings together all ITV’s commercial innovation, spanning contextual targeting, dynamic creative, Shoppable TV, addressable broadcast TV advertising, progressive analytics & measurement and even marketing opportunities within the entertainment metaverse, which the UK broadcaster is pioneering. Delegates will hear how ITV AdLabs works in practice, how ITV has built development agility into its DNA, and how it is helping to drive digital transformation. Early results from this initiative will be revealed.

Early speaker confirmations for Connected TV World Summit also include:

• Brigita Brjuhhanov, TV Development Team Lead, Elisa
• Akhila Khanna, VP, Partnerships and Business Development, UK, Paramount
• Ingmar Schmidt, Senior Product Manager, Swisscom blue TV
• Paola Colombo, General Manager, Adtech, Publitalia ’80
• Chris Edwards, Director, Business Development – EMEA, Rakuten Advertising
• Rose Adkins Hulse, Founder and CEO, ScreenHits TV

You can see more event details here.

Delegates can register here.

There are sessions at Connected TV World Summit dedicated to content strategies, the future of free-to-view television, monetising connected TV audiences, and TV sport, among many others. A session is also devoted to ‘The Million-&-One Operator Club’ – “that special group of Pay TV providers with less than 1,000,001 subscribers who service large chunks of the global subscription TV population and have to compete with increasingly consolidated giants that could be ten times their size, and fight for consumer engagement in the face of SVOD and AVOD growth.”

This session explores how smaller operators guarantee their role as the aggregators and navigators for premium entertainment, how they onboard the apps that consumers expect on set-top boxes, and how they achieve the operational agility to introduce more complex services, faster, at reasonable cost. Brigita Brjuhhanov at Elisa will help lead the thinking in this session, chaired by Anette Schaefer, Managing Director, BIG Picture.

Connected TV World Summit boasts a list of exceptional moderators and chairs, including:

• Colin Dixon, Founder & Chief Analyst, nScreenMedia
• Jon Watts, Executive Director, The Project X Institute & Managing Director, CIMM
• Bernd Riefler, Founder & CEO, veed analytics
• Thomas Helbo, COO, JT Group
• Nathalie Lethbridge, Founder and Principal, Atonik Digital

The conference has already gathered some of the best new thinking from analyst, research and consulting firms to set the scene in each session. Presentations include:

The rise of studio ‘sell-to-self’: a revolution in content distribution. Jack Davison, Executive Vice President, 3Vision. Setting the scene for the session: Content-to-consumer

3Vision research reveals the rapid trend towards vertical integration of studio content production and distribution, driven by the growth of direct-to-consumer services. With major studios selling 40%, 61%, 93% and even 100% of new TV series to themselves in Europe, this phenomenon could fundamentally transform the content distribution business – so where are we now, and what happens next? This presentation sheds light on how ‘sell-to-self’ is unfolding across different markets, comparing the pace at which each studio has ramped up the vertical integration of its pipelines. Davison gives his opinion on whether it is sustainable for studios to give up other licensing opportunities for exclusivity on their own streaming services, and if innovative windowing improves the business case. You will hear how far sell-to-self is likely to grow as a proportion of all content deals.

The implications of subscription super-fans and a free-to-view ‘hardcore’ for Pay TV curation. Maria Rua Aguete, Senior Research Director, TV, Video and Advertising, Omdia. Setting the scene for the session: Pay TV: Beyond exclusivity

Omdia’s Multisubscription TV and Video research shows that the growth in online video subscriptions is driven by homes that are adding services to existing Pay TV and/or SVOD accounts. It also reveals a hardcore of free-only homes that is actually growing slowly and will be nearly 40% of the potential TV/video viewing population by 2025, helped by the strength of AVOD and FAST. We hear the latest data on how households globally take their television, then explore the implications for Pay TV aggregation. How do Pay TV operators make themselves central to the multi-SVOD stacking phenomenon, and should they do more to embrace free streamers behind their pay walls?

How sports leagues can leverage streaming to engage audiences more effectively. Minal Modha, Principal Analyst, Consumer Research Lead, Ampere Analysis. Setting the scene for the session: Sports TV: the second half

Ampere Analysis closely follows the migration of sports onto streaming platforms and the changing expectations of sports fans. This presentation sheds light on why streaming services are increasingly attractive to sports leagues as potential rights buyers. Minal Modha offers advice to sport federations and rights holders on how they can leverage digital platforms to grow audiences while super-serving existing fans. We will hear how streaming facilitates novel forms of non-live content – such as clippings – and the chance to connect with sports fans through a “player-first” approach.

How D2C streamers can avoid churn and grow subscribers. Tim Mulligan, Executive Vice President and Research Director, MIDiA Research. Setting the scene for the session: Winning and keeping subscribers.

What D2C streaming services must do to avoid churn and grow subscribers against a backdrop of increased competition and an ‘attention recession’. The different approaches to content differentiation are outlined, whether focusing on zeitgeisty Originals or deep libraries. You will hear why MIDiA believes the long-term strength of direct-to-consumer relies on becoming a replacement for traditional Pay TV which, in turn, requires multi-genre diversity to attract broad audiences including the Silver Streamers – with sports and news leading the list of content that can drive regular usage.

Delivering digital growth: European broadcaster strategies. Richard Broughton, Director, Ampere Analysis. Setting the scene for the session: The future of free-to-view

Assessing how broadcasters can maximise linear (broadcast) audiences and grow their ‘share of time’ in the streaming space, with a special focus on the evolution of BVOD. This presentation assesses the strategies seen across multiple European markets, highlighting the common themes and local innovations. Among other things you will hear about commissioning, windowing and licensing strategies, and the development of solo and collaborative SVOD services. We ask: is there a repeatable winning formula for engaging the 18-34 demographic, and what is it?

Technology decisions and the battle for consumer experience. Tom Morrod, Research Director, Caretta Research. Setting the scene for the session: Next-Generation Entertainment Platforms.

The battle for consumer experience is fought on two fronts – content and technology. How platforms approach technology strategy has a huge bearing on the devices they can reach, what content is available, how content can be discovered, how experiences are personalised and how attention is monetised. Platforms must make critical decisions as to how much they invest in in-house development to have that ‘secret sauce’ or work through technology vendors and partners to scale their offering in an ever more complicated and technologically advanced world. This presentation explores the options and reviews how tech choices are influencing short and long-term implementation strategies.

Connected TV World Summit is produced by Mediatel Events, which owns Videonet.

For more information about this event, including remaining speaking opportunities, please email: team@mediatelevents.com

The umbrella theme for this year’s Connected TV World Summit is The Great Recalibration, with the event organisers saying: “TV is changing at breakneck speed and much of what we took for granted is being challenged or reimagined. Studio groups are now their own distributors. Broadcasters are becoming digital-first. Sports leagues are going direct-to-consumer. Streamers are winning domestic sports rights. Pay TV has lost its exclusivity on premium networks. Movies are premiered in SVOD. Boxsets precede linear release. Aggregation is morphing into super-aggregation. Pay TV operators make their own Smart TVs. Television makers aggregate channels and sell advertising. ‘Library channels’ produce Originals. Advertising can be individually targeted. Streaming can look as good as broadcast…

“What we are witnessing is The Great Recalibration of television, as the forces of convergence create new media companies, business models, partnerships, audiences and user experiences – all backed by technology innovation. Connected TV World Summit 2022 will explore the new TV blueprint and what every TV stakeholder must do to grow their business and ensure their continued relevance into the 2030s. This is where we combine business-critical strategy with implementation detail, and share best practice from around the world. And this is where we look for the revenue pipelines that can sustain an expanded ecosystem.”

Importantly, the company announced a digital-first windowing strategy that will see much of its new content appearing first on ITVX before making its way to ITV broadcast channels not days later, or weeks later, but months later (6-9 months later for a wealth of dramas, for example). All the drama and comedy commissions, and most reality series, will also be dropped onto ITVX as a full series or boxset as soon as the first episode has aired on linear (broadcast) TV.

Viewers are not being forced into a subscription tier to see this content early – the shows are going into the free ad-supported version of ITVX, leaving the core value proposition for the subscription tier as the absence of advertising and a wider content offer that will include shows currently found in BritBox (the subscription streaming joint venture with the BBC) and partner SVODs yet to be announced.

ITV plans to scale the content offer on ITV Hub ahead of the transition to ITVX – currently the free BVOD service has 4,000 hours of content and ITVX will have 15,000 hours at launch. Another key innovation within the new service will be the presence of specially curated and themed FAST (free ad-supported TV) channels, including ‘Hell’s Kitchen US’, ‘The Chase’ (harnessing the popular quiz show) and ‘90s Favourites’.

The FAST channels will evolve and “pop-up” to align with viewer preferences and popularity, with those curation decisions drawing upon the data ITV has available via its digital services. ITV is promising a new themed channel every week of the year! ITVX contains the classic ITV linear channels, of course.

FAST channels featuring library content are becoming part of the staple diet on aggregated content offers on Smart TV platforms. Indeed, ITV Studios just announced a deal with Samsung TV Plus to distribute FAST channels in the UK and other European markets like Italy and Germany, as well.

With its larger catalogue, ITVX is going to be home to a variety of past classics (like ‘Brideshead Revisited’) to current favourites like ‘Love Island’. A wide selection of popular U.S. series is also promised, with WarnerMedia International Television Distribution announced as the first content partner for this endeavour, with more to come. This deal will include UK premieres (on ITVX) for ‘The Sex Lives of College Girls’ and ‘All American’, among other shows.

ITV says blockbuster films will also be part of the service. “ITVX intends to stream 500 films for free in its first year alone, with a constantly refreshed selection of titles and 150 films on the service at any one time,” the company said last week. Major live events like sport (including the FIFA World Cup) and tentpole linear shows like ‘I’m A Celebrity’ or the ‘Love Island Final’, will be simulcast on broadcast TV and ITVX.

ITV has emphasised the importance of this service housing both an ad-supported free option and a subscription funded offer under the same roof. “It is the UK’s first integrated AVOD/SVOD platform and will be the first streaming service in the UK to offer viewers the flexibility to access free content with ads and ad-free paid subscription, all in one place,” the company declares. The subscription tier pricing will be revealed later this year.

Carolyn McCall, ITV’s Chief Executive, has made it clear that ITVX should be viewed as part of the broadcaster’s digital acceleration. “We are supercharging our streaming business, fundamentally shifting our focus to think digital-first, as well as optimising our broadcast channels, by continuing to attract unrivalled mass audiences.

“In doing so we are responding to changing viewing habits, but also the evolving needs from our advertisers. This will enable ITV to continue to be both commercial viewers and advertisers’ first choice.”

Kevin Lygo, ITV’s Managing Director of Media and Entertainment, confirms: “Our broadcast channels are very important to what we do, and we are still focused on delivering what ITV does better than anyone in commercial TV: creating programmes that bring audiences together, in-the-moment, in their millions, for that shared viewing, scheduled TV experience.

“However, we know we have to deliver our programmes to as many people as possible in all the ways they want to watch them and going forward viewers will now see a wide array of shows premiering first on ITVX, which is the cornerstone of ITV’s digital acceleration.”

Editor’s Comment

This is BVOD for the 2020s – the answer you might expect from one of the world’s most important content and broadcast groups – a large, multi-genre offering combining vast boxsets, standard linear channels, themed FAST channels and live events like sport, all available as a free or paid version, and making full use of the enormous intellectual property ITV owns.

So, if this is the ‘answer’, what is the question? The question is how broadcasters grow their digital share-of-time and therefore guarantee their total-share-of-time as more people stream more of the time, especially when faced with the arrival of global studio direct-to-consumer services like Paramount, Disney+ and Peacock on top of the global SVODs like Netflix and Amazon Prime Video.

The change in ITV windowing is the concrete evidence that ITV is thinking digital-first. If you put your big new shows into your BVOD service up to nine months ahead of their broadcast TV debut, you are encouraging people to migrate to digital. It is worth stressing: these shows are going early into the free window as well as the pay one, so this is not about encouraging a subset of the free-to-view broadcast audience into paid streaming instead – it will encourage free-to-view broadcast viewers into free-to-view streaming (even if some switch to paid).

When you do that, as a leading commercial broadcaster with large ad revenues, you must be sure you can fully monetise large-scale audiences in streaming. ITV has become an advanced advertising leader over the last few years and Planet V is one of the hero ‘technologies’ behind that journey, giving the company full control, in a broadcast-friendly way, of programmatic sales as well as direct-sold advertising across its streamed content.

More on related subjects

Interested in the future of free-to-view television, the evolution of content strategies (including windowing) and (subscription and ad-supported) streaming strategies? Then check out Connected TV World Summit in May, which also has three sessions dedicated to advanced TV advertising. Full details here.

One of the channels is a ‘Hell’s Kitchen’ channel, which will air episodes round-the-clock from the popular U.S. Gordon Ramsay show. The other channel – Storylands – will “become the home for the best European drama” according to ITV Studios. Shows on the channel will be produced by labels which are part of ITV Studios and include dramas such as Norwegian legal series Aber Bergen, the period drama Un Village Français, and the procedural crime drama from the producers of Gomorrah, called Masantonio.

The move follows ITV Studios’ launch of four non-scripted YouTube channels last year – Our World, Our Life, Our Stories and Our Histories. The agreement will see Samsung TV Plus –  Samsung’s free ad-supported app – broadcast content from the ITV Studios catalogue 24/7 across all Samsung Smart TVs made in 2016 and onwards, as well as select Galaxy devices.

Ruth Berry, Managing Director at ITV Studios Global Distribution, commented: “We are very excited to partner with Samsung TV Plus to launch FAST channels in EMEA. We have an amazing library of 90,000+ hours of IP and the FAST/AVOD space is a key strategic focus for ITV Studios as we look to provide global audiences with new ways to access some of our best-known scripted brands, formats and non-scripted entertainment content.”

Richard Jakeman, European Head of Business Development for Samsung said, “The growth of Samsung TV Plus has everything to do with the quality of the content. We are working hard to deliver the best content possible to our customers, wherever they are. The addition of Storylands by ITV Studios and Hell’s Kitchen will enforce our commitment to a wide variety of quality programming for everyone.”

The partnership represents a continuation of the relationship between ITV and Samsung TV Plus. Early last year, Samsung TV Plus became the first third-party publisher on ITV’s advanced advertising service, Planet V. The agreement allows media buyers to plan and buy  Samsung TV Plus inventory via the ITV platform’s workflow.