The pre-integration means video platforms can offer consumers YouTube playlists and event-based content and choose topic-specific content clusters – grouped around areas of interest – that have been pre-curated by YouTube. Categories could include fitness or business, for example, or trending content, new music or sports news, etc. There is a long list of pre-qualified entertainment content curated by YouTube. YouTube APIs will surface and deep-link YouTube content recommendations across screens.

Allente, the leading Nordic Pay TV provider with 1 million subscribers, will be among the first to leverage the YouTube integration within the 3Ready platform. The operator will be able to visually curate YouTube content to enrich the customer experience across multiple devices. YouTube curated content is expected to shorten the time it takes for users to find engaging content, 3SS suggests.

3SS is a highly regarded provider of software solutions for the entertainment market. Its 3Ready Control Center helps service providers efficiently manage and optimise UI/UX in a unified way across STBs (Linux, RDK and Android TV), Smart TV, web, mobile devices, and in-car entertainment screens, all in a highly visual and intuitive manner.

“We’re extremely excited that YouTube has selected 3SS as a partner to scale YouTube across operator and carmaker platforms,” declares Pierre Donath, CPO & CMO at 3SS. “Our trailblazing integration enables service providers including car OEMs to seamlessly curate content that people love across screens.

“With 3Ready, our operators benefit from dramatically reduced integration and certification efforts, and with the integration of YouTube Recommendation API it’s easier than ever to centrally manage, curate and deliver a content-first user experience across devices. This brings us closer to the vision where entertainment super-aggregators, whether telcos, Pay TV providers or carmakers for in-vehicle entertainment, can deliver holistic, user-centric content discovery and access.”

The 3SS/YouTube integration will be showcased at IBC next month.

Editor’s comment

Super-aggregation (closely entwined with being the most trustworthy content discovery guide) is central to the Pay TV future and operators are starting to focus on content that has not traditionally been integrated into their core UX, like FAST channels. This 3Ready YouTube integration is another example of how operators can expand their content offer.

In 2011, physical records accounted for $8.3bn of global revenue, a big drop from $24.1bn in 1999. But when streaming services were launched, the record industry collectively decided to go all-in and embrace digital change. The subsequent diversified content delivery and revenue streams brought revenue back up to $26.2bn in 2022 with an onward upward trajectory. (RIAA data)

The record industry’s embrace of digital also helped it gain deeper understanding into how audiences consume and engage with (not just buy) artist content, helping it better serve the consumer. Vevo’s network of distribution was created as a result, learning not to resist, but to lean into consumer behaviour, delivering content at their request, how they want to watch.

The fall and then recovery of the record industry, caused by digital disruption, has many transferable learnings for the evolving TV landscape right now and gives an indication of what is still to come.

Be where your audience is

Today, the battle isn’t stealing content in this scenario – it’s a fight for attention. Too often media entities adopt the stance of creating a walled garden the consumer must come to, but it disrupts natural flow of consumption, especially in a post-pandemic world flooded with high-quality content services and multiple options for over-saturated consumers. Content awareness, ease of discovery, and ease of consumption win when content is not exclusive and judged as a ‘must have’.

Enders Analysis paints a very stark prospect for 2027 where only 12% of 16-24s’ video time will be spent watching traditional broadcaster content, with the majority of the rest of their time spent with SVOD or YouTube. Not cultivating a relationship on the platforms that these consumers predominantly spend time on is surely a massive oversight.

While the broadcasters have begun to adapt, taking note of BARB and Ofcom reports, Channel 4 has taken the leap to lean into pure behaviour by distributing via YouTube – where they see incremental audiences for their content. This builds a relationship that would otherwise be absent and delivers content to them through the path of least resistance.

Reluctance to distribute everywhere is understandable

Vevo distributes freely because the language of music is borderless, therefore it benefits from economies of scale. Local broadcasters can’t export their content in quite the same way, but it seems counter-productive to not have a local presence in the environments that audiences are more frequently using. If producers of quality content boldly lean into pure behaviour in this way, they will benefit from increased programming reach, but some key principles must be followed to remove risk, as not all content is the same.

It’s the source of the content that counts

Anyone with a camera phone can make a monetisable video, talented or not, but broadcasters have strength in all the legacy points we would expect: trust, quality, high production standards, attention, regulation, editorial oversight, absence of fraud, etc. This must continue to be a strength in our industry and the cornerstone of TV screen campaigns.

Simultaneously, the net by which we define TV has got to widen (no one would doubt Netflix was TV, for instance), while still providing guarantees for viewers and advertisers alike. For example, a Channel 4 show, regardless of how it got onto a screen (via Channel 4 Streaming or C4 YouTube channel), still upholds expectations and values around quality. From an advertiser perspective, we create more legitimate TV opportunities, to reflect the modern consumer, whilst mitigating the challenges of audience fragmentation, inflation and reduced scale.

To ensure this happens, premium content still needs to be rewarded accordingly, otherwise it can’t be made, or quality will suffer in a vicious cycle. We all know it is costly to make good content. It is critical that the industry and premium content makers collaborate to define, safeguard and ring-fence quality content providers.

Industry agreed measurement is key to breaking down the TV siloes

BARB are forging a path forward on this, with ‘fit for TV content’ allowing for a more inclusive TV definition, where publishers new and old can co-exist within TV measurement. The industry needs to support initiatives like this, from publishers to buyers to tech collaborators. If we can independently define TV, based on the source of the content meeting defined standards, then the shackles are off. Studios and broadcasters alike can define their reach of viewers based on natural consumption, and advertisers can be sure of guaranteeing large scale reach in environments where they know what content their advert appears around.

Maximising premium quality

In a time where anyone can watch anything, it is ever more important to be sure that we are maximising the opportunity with high-quality, safe content and attentive environments. This is not to belittle the longer tail of a video campaign; there are different campaigns with different functions. They absolutely work together like they always have.

We can still achieve those amazing, brand building, mass-reach campaigns that uphold everything we expect from a TV screen campaign, but we need to lay down principles. This frees up those content providers that live by traditional, high-quality production values to lean into the viewer and not be stuck rigidly to certain measurement siloes. Importantly, by doing so, it creates a healthier, bigger TV opportunity for advertisers to reach their key audiences.

The company says: “As content costs have risen and we continue to invest in our quality of service, we’ll be adjusting our monthly cost, after 3 years, from $64.99 per month to $72.99 per month, in order to bring you the best possible TV service. We are committed to offering a premium way for you to stream TV, but understand this new price may not work for you.”

“We do hope YouTube TV continues to be your service of choice, but we want to give you the flexibility to cancel at any time.”

The rise in price comes in the same week that YouTube TV launched early access to “multiview,” an feature that allows viewers to watch up to four different streams at the same time. YouTube also announced it is lowering the price of its 4K Plus add-on from $19.99 per month to $9.99 per month.

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.

Linear TV is no longer the standalone video content provider. Streaming services are taking big chunks of viewing time away from broadcast television, and YouTube, with its billions of hours of content, is no different. With the rise of CTV predicted to continue, this trend is undoubtedly going to grow – by 2023, it is expected that over 75% of Western European households will be using CTVs.

With this immense growth in Smart TV ownership, and the rising popularity of consuming YouTube content, it’s about time advertisers asked themselves; could YouTube become their greatest asset?

The decline and inflexibility of broadcast TV

 Linear TV has been in decline since 2013. This has been drastically apparent for the younger generation (aged between 16-34) which has seen a loss of around 60% of viewing from 2013 to 2021. Yet somehow, according to a Comcast report, advertisers should still be looking to use a minimum of 70% of their budget on broadcast television?

Despite an obvious downward trend in consumption of broadcast TV, many advertisers are yet to get ahead of the curve and are still spending big bucks on traditional TV advertising that could be redistributed among other channels to yield a greater return on investment.

Broadcast television has far less choice when it comes to content than YouTube. Whilst there may be multiple channels, each with plenty of shows, this is still dwarfed by the overwhelming amount and diversity of content on YouTube.

This equates to far less flexibility and accuracy in terms of audience targeting for advertisers. Ultimately broadcast TV has a wider audience range in one place, so whilst advertisers might be reaching big numbers, they have very little way of knowing if they are reaching the right audience. Which in turn will lead to lower engagement, and a lower return on investment.

Whereas services such as YouTube have a range of channels and content, all of which come with a niche and focused audience. This allows advertisers to be much more accurate with their targeting and makes their budget stretch much further.

The rise of CTV

CTV provides advertisers with a plethora of opportunities. With 68% of individuals in the UK having access to Smart TVs in their households it must be apparent to advertisers that maximising their CTV advertising will allow them to reach a wide audience.

The number of CTV apps available on the Roku Channel Store, Apple TV OS App Store, and Amazon Fire TV increased by over 38% year-over-year in 2020. This provides advertisers with a wide array of content and services to choose from, allowing them to pick those that align most with the objectives of a single advertising campaign – advertisers no longer need to settle for hitting unnecessary audiences just to reach one demographic on broadcast TV. The opportunity to diversify, and target a specific audience, combined with the increase in popularity of Smart TVs demonstrates why CTV must be seen as a potential primary advertising outlet.

YouTube & CTV – the dream team

When you combine CTV and YouTube, you create the perfect advertising partnership. YouTube’s popularity is continuing to rise, the platform represents 26% of daily video consumption for young people aged 16-34 compared to only 20% for commercial broadcast TV. However, YouTube isn’t just for the young. According to Ofcom in Q1 2021, the total number of YouTube videos viewed by UK online adults was 22% higher than in Q1 2020.

Alongside the reach that makes this combo successful is the flexibility and targeting YouTube provides advertisers. Brands can easily, and successfully diversify their audiences or target a specific group on YouTube due to the vast number of content creators on the platform. Inclusion lists can be created so that brands can reach diverse audiences with their content, and support a diverse range of creators. In a time where social responsibility is key to many brands, using YouTube advertising and inclusion lists means advertisers can add deeds to their words. Significantly, YouTube Ads on CTV drive a 10% greater lift in recall than ads on Linear TV [9] –proof that this combination works!

YouTube and CTV are evidently the advertiser’s dream team. Their increasing popularity and the opportunities they provide in terms of audience engagement and targeting make them a must-have for all brands. To drive home key brand messages, support audiences and of course maximise ROI, advertisers need to be rethinking their budgets and putting great emphasis on CTV.

Other references:

1/ Google/Media Science Lab study, 12 ads, 432 participants. Platforms included: YT OTT, Linear TV. US, November 2018. Google/Media Science Lab study, 12 ads, 432 participants. Platforms included: YT mobile, YT desktop, YT OTT, Linear TV. US, November 2018.

Peter Parmenter, SVP of Business Development at DAZN Group, shared his insights at Connected TV World Summit last month, where he was interviewed by Minal Modha of Ampere Analysis.

Investing in local teams to create the best experience

Asked how DAZN has managed to scale successfully with its expansion into new markets across Europe and the differing rights to manage across these, Parmenter highlighted the need to have boots on the ground wherever DAZN plants its flag.

“Our rights portfolio in every market is very different,” he said. “Therefore, we have to have a very local feel to the product. We’ve put new management teams in many of our biggest markets to really take us to the next level in terms of delivering to local consumers.”

One of DAZN’s biggest achievements was securing the UEFA Women’s Champions League, which was the result of a collaboration with YouTube, and Parmenter explained how this came about.

“This was the first time UEFA centrally sold the competition through the group stages right up to the final. It was a four-year deal and we desperately wanted to be involved. We operate in 9–10 core markets and didn’t feel we had the scale on our own to deliver the mission, which is ultimately to grow the women’s game.

“We took what we think was a very innovative proposition to UEFA by partnering with YouTube, the world’s biggest video platform — that can literally get video to every device in every corner of the world — to deliver on that mission. YouTube and Google massively bought into this and we had, collaboratively, an incredible proposition to take to UEFA.”

Uniting linear and OTT to give sports fans choice

In addition to its streaming partnership with YouTube, DAZN worked with various free-to-air broadcasters across Europe — such as ITV in the UK — to ensure the Women’s Champion’s League couldn’t be missed.

Asked if DAZN saw a difference between their OTT and broadcast offerings, Parmenter said: “We take a very practical view about where people want to watch; we make a service available to as many people as we possibly can.

“So, it’s not just about device penetration and making sure we have an app that works on a phone screen all the way up to 85” OLED screens in your living room, which we do. But if there’s an audience out there that would prefer to watch via a linear channel, why not? There are hundreds and thousands of fans out there who have been used to watching [football] on channel 253 every Friday, Saturday, or Sunday. Why change that?

“What we can do, over time, is convert that audience into an app-based audience, but the app’s got to be better, it’s got to deliver value more than the linear channel, and that’s something that anybody who’s involved in the OTT space is trying to do.”

Avoiding streaming gridlock by collaborating with ISPs

Among all of DAZN’s successes there have also been stumbles, such as the opening weekend of Serie A in Italy when its streams became gridlocked. When it came to learnings from this, Parmenter said it was all about understanding what they could and couldn’t control, and boosting technology to avoid similar issues in future.

“We can’t control when the season starts and we can’t control Italians’ holiday plans,” he commented. “What you saw in the opening weekend of Serie A was a huge, huge amount of the potential audience travelling, particularly in the south where some of the networks aren’t as strong as they are in major cities.”

To bolster DAZN’s network capabilities, it has become more network-aware, installing its own technology stacks with big ISPs in Italy to get closer to users, while developing its video player to better support adaptable bitrates to ensure a continuity of service when there are fluctuations in bandwidth.

“It wasn’t a great weekend,” Parmenter admitted, “but every weekend subsequently we are delivering millions of concurrent streams of Serie A in full HD to devices all over Italy very, very successfully. We will never rest on our laurels, and we will continue to innovate.”

Filling the gaps with diverse content

When asked what makes DAZN better than the linear experience for investors, sports rights holders and sports fans, Parmenter said that beyond the obvious benefits of being able to watch anywhere the DAZN app is available, it was also about how the diversity of content keeps users coming back.

“We’re not just serving you live content, we’re giving editorial, we’re giving you statistics, we’re giving you data. All of these services combine in your pocket so that it’s multiple views a day rather than an appointment-to-view in front of your TV in the evening.”

Some (though not all) of the major international studio groups are going all-in on their owned-and-operated (and direct-to-consumer) ‘Plus’ apps, hoping they will become the home for digital viewing of their content. And broadcasters everywhere have been investing heavily in their ‘Player’ services, including deeper catalogues that help them evolve from catch-up services to destinations in their own right. But speaking at Connected TV World Summit three weeks ago, Jonathan Lewis, Head of Commercial Innovation & Partners at Channel 4 Television, explained that Channel 4 was taking a balanced approach to digital distribution.

Focusing on the YouTube deal in particular, he said: “We don’t think this is going to cannibalise audiences on our owned-and-operated platforms. TV is getting older, and YouTube is still the youngest social platform, and big-screen viewing on YouTube is skyrocketing and that is really important to us because people want to watch our content on the big screen.

“We view YouTube as a distribution platform in the same way that we view Sky Glass and other connected TV environments. This is a big pivot [to embrace long-form distribution on YouTube] but the YouTube strategy helps us reach younger audiences and super-charge our digital growth strategy and diversify revenues. It is a significant step in terms of delivering on our Future4 strategy [the high-level strategy C4 announced two years ago to prioritise streaming and grow digital’s share of revenue].”

The YouTube deal applies to the UK and Republic of Ireland and will see Channel 4 making an ever-growing catalogue of content available via the service – reaching around 500 hours next month and something like 1,000 hours by the end of this year. And this is part of a wider digital distribution focus that includes social platforms like Snap, Facebook and TikTok – with TikTok viewed as a natural home for 2–3-minute clips of the broadcaster’s output, which includes often irreverent comedy.

Asked why Channel 4 does not want to ‘force’ streaming viewers to come to its streaming service, All4, to see content [a theoretical possibility in the streaming space], Lewis declared: “We will fish where the fish are.”

He added: “We are doing both [D2C via owned-and-operated, and third-party streaming distribution partnerships]. We are trying to appeal to an audience that we are pretty confident are not going to come to All4. That is why we are going to start building a big presence on TikTok, because we recognised that the format, and the types of content you find on TikTok, won’t work as a 30-minute show [within All4].”

Lewis believes it is important for the Channel 4 brand to be seen, including by people that may not come to the owned-and-operated app. Focusing on TikTok again, he said: “We need to be on that platform and talking to that audience because we want 16-24 year-olds to have an empathy with Channel 4 as a brand, and a sense of what our brand means, and they are not going to get that if we just sit within our walled garden expecting them to come to us.”

Channel 4 views these third-party streaming services / social platforms, and also long-established partners like Sky, as key elements in the future digital distribution strategy. “We were a launch partner on Sky Glass,” Lewis pointed out, referring to Sky’s Pay TV operator created/branded retail Smart TV that ditches satellite tuners and relies on streaming. “We want to offer our service to users where they want to consume it. We see IP [digital/streaming] as a TV delivery that allows us to hold onto audiences, grow them where we can, and in particular grow younger audiences.”

Lewis emphasised how third-party content distribution complements the owned-and-operated environment – observing that when Channel 4 signs a syndication deal for Netflix to show archive programming, viewing of the more recent episodes increases on All4. He cited the [outrageous teen comedy] ‘The Inbetweeners’ as one example. “There is a halo effect.”

The deal with YouTube does not cover international markets but Channel 4 is looking at how it can increase non-UK revenues and it was clear that if the rights agreements could be agreed with the Indie producers (who retain their rights on Channel 4 broadcasted content) then a wider YouTube deal could at least be considered. The same applies for potential FAST channels, although Lewis acknowledged that the broadcaster would need to convince the programme rights holders that Channel 4 curation for international streaming was their best option.

One key point about the UK YouTube deal is that Channel 4 (whose 4Sales is one of the major UK television sales houses) will sell the advertising that appears. “We will have the relationship with the advertisers. We have great relationships with them already and now we can offer a reach extender into younger audiences off-platform.” This direct Channel 4 sell means advertises can also buy directly against content (rather than buying only against an audience).

The company has now said it will also be making 4,000 series episodes available to viewers for free in the U.S., with at least 100 new movies and episodes per week. Titles added in March include Legally Blonde, Runaway Bride and Gone in Sixty Seconds. Many of the titles will be available in high definition 1080p with 5.1 surround sound audio on supported devices.  

In addition to the AVOD expansion, YouTube hopes to help viewers more easily discover titles by launching a new streamlined navigation for its CTV app, along with immersive banner art. The company cited Nielsen data which shows that, in December 2021, the online video platform reached over 135 million people on connected TVs in the United States.

The Original Content division of the company was established in 2016 to create exclusive content for YouTube’s premium pay-per-month service. Initially the division focused on producing scripted shows and movies centring on star creators, such as the comedy series Scare PewDiePie. YouTube’s most popular series have included Hollywood style drama series Cobra Kai – which has now been sold to Netflix – comedy Liza on Demand, and docuseries Justin Bieber: Seasons.

Later the company began making ad-supported content available to viewers without a YouTube Premium subscription, and creating unscripted shows featuring celebrities such as Kevin Hart, Will Smith and Katy Perry.

After six years of expanding its catalogue of original productions, the Original Content division has now been shut down. The division’s Global Head, Susanna Daniels, will be leaving the company in March this year. YouTube has assured creators that it will honour existing commitments to shows already in production.

In a statement released on social media platform Twitter, Robert Kyncl, Chief Business Officer for YouTube, said that the growth of the companies’ Partner Program for ad revenue sharing with creators, was a factor in the recent decision. He said: “With rapid growth comes new opportunities and now our investments can make a greater impact on even more creators when applied towards other initiatives, like our Creator Shorts Fund, Black Voices Fund, and Live Shopping programming to name a few”.

In Q3 2021, the video platform’s ad revenues reached a record $7.2B – a figure which represents an astonishing 43% annual increase. The company also reports 50 million subscribers for its music and YouTube Premium services.

A significant theme on the agenda is the imperative of establishing adequate cross-platform measurement for TV advertising, and the major initiatives currently taking off. Tom Sherwood (Product Lead at YouTube), Rhian Feather (Head of Media Planning, OMD), Kristin Dolan (CEO of 605) and Martin Greenbank (Head of Advertising Research and Development, Channel 4) will reflect on the core challenges associated with cross-platform measurement, and assess how fast the industry should adopt impressions, deterministic data, attention metrics or pure business outcomes as a standard for measurement. CFlight – the Total TV campaign evaluation tool developed by Sky and NBCUniversal, which is set cover 98% of broadcaster advertising exposures in the UK – will be discussed on a panel, which includes Lucy Bristowe (Director of Insight & Research, Sky), Greenback and Glenn Gowen (Head of Audiences – Commercial, ITV).

Chrissie Hanson (Global Chief Strategy Officer, OMD Worldwide) and Nicholas Grand (SVP Transformation, Global Investment, Omnicom Media Group) will take a deep dive into attention metrics as a way to increase brand awareness and business outcomes, as viewers become exposed to fewer ads in their migration to connected TV platforms.

Thomas Bremond (GM International, FreeWheel) is joined by Verica Djurdjevic (Chief Revenue Officer, Channel 4), Paola Colombo (General Manager at Publitalia ’80 Mediaset), and Katie Coteman (Vice President, Advertising and Partnerships at Discovery), to explore the impact of CTV on TV’s evolution and discuss the key role and strategies of media brands in sustaining TV’s value. They will provide broadcaster perspectives on the current landscape and discuss why it is time to ‘reset’ TV, ensuring interoperability and growth opportunities across the entire ecosystem.

The event also tracks the latest developments for improving media planning, campaign outcomes and targeted advertising. A panel discussion between Lara Izlan (Director of Data Strategy, ITV) and Jean Paul Edwards (Chief Product Development Officer, OMD EMEA) will take a look at advertiser/media owner data matching, including what is possible, and practical considerations when using these first-party data sets.

Samira Ebrahim (European ICP Strategy Director, Mars Pet Nutrition) and Richard Fuller (Senior Director of Engagement at Finecast) will explore how brands can target high value audiences in a new era of TV and data driven solutions. The extent to which connected TV is able to achieve incremental reach in Total TV campaigns will be evaluated in a panel discussion including Andy Jones (Samsung Ads), Paul Gubbins (CTV Strategy, Publica), Julie Selman from Magnite and Mara Negri (Publieurope EBX Board Director).

Several sessions will look at broad shifts in strategy across the industry. Research Director at Ampere Analysis, Guy Bisson, will shed light on the distribution and content strategies leading media companies are using to maintain and grow audiences, reviewing the different approaches employed by broadcasters, studio/subscription channel groups, AVODs and SVODs. Additionally, Emmanuelle Godard, Digital Marketing and Innovation Director, Canal Plus, will explain how CONNECT+ allows advertisers to measure and optimise broadcast campaigns on their own KPIs.

Eleni Marouli, Head of Market Developments at Ofcom, will run attendees through the latest developments in UK television with regards to viewing, revenue and spend, and the impact of the pandemic on linear and online viewing patterns. Christian Kurz (SVP, Global Streaming and Corporate Insights, ViacomCBS) will outline the profound cultural importance of TV, revealing the results of a study where ViacomCBS challenged consumers aged 16-49 in Italy, the UK, USA, Mexico, South Africa, Indonesia and Australia to go about their lives without engaging in any conversations about TV in any of its forms (including streaming). He also reflects on the dynamics informing the health of the television industry.