What Is Addressable TV Advertising & Why is it Important?

Addressable TV advertising is a form of targeted advertising, like online targeted ads. While watching linear television programming, each viewer is dynamically shown different ads depending on their history and personal information.

Addressable TV advertising is a recent development and is still gaining traction as more content providers and television manufacturers support the technology. It is not yet available on some devices and in some markets.

Addressable TV ads are programmatic in nature, with automated ad bids and buys happening in fractions of a second. An addressable tv campaign can be more expensive than traditional linear tv ads, but according to experts, addressable ads also provide significantly more value.

Here’s more about addressable TV advertising and how it works: 

What Is the Difference Between Addressable TV Advertising and Linear TV Advertising?

Traditional TV advertising (aka linear TV advertising) provides the same ads for anyone viewing the program in a set geographic area. The only customization for the ads is determined by the type of program on the TV and when it’s being aired. 

For example, a Saturday morning kids show is going to have a different target audience than a Sunday night football game, and have ads that reflect the change in audience. But that’s about as customizable as it gets.

Addressable TV allows marketers to reach specific audiences based on their household data, no matter the time, channel, or program they are watching. The ads are customized for their household and target their needs. 

With addressable TV advertising, two families can watch the same live broadcast programming but experience different advertisements. This way, a newlywed family with no kids is served different ads than an elderly couple in retirement.

On the advertising side, addressable TV allows marketers to focus more on individual consumers rather than trying to pair programming with generalized advertisements.

What Is the Difference Between Addressable TV and Connected TV?

A connected TV (CTV)—often known as a smart TV—is connected to the internet. It is able to stream over the top (OTT) media through internet streaming services like Netflix or Hulu as well as a cable connection. Advertisements that transmit through a connected TV streaming OTT media utilize targeted ads, while traditional broadcast television offers linear tv advertisements. 

Technically speaking, all CTV advertising is addressable because it allows for an advertisement to be placed according to the personal data of the viewer. When it comes to addressable TV vs OTT advertising, OTT already uses addressable advertising but is limited to streaming content. Addressable TV elevates OTT advertising by making targeted advertising an option even during regular broadcast television programming using a set-top box. 

What Does Addressable Mean in Advertising?

Addressable advertising is a form of targeted advertisement. The ad is shown to a selected audience based on certain traits like their geographic, demographic, and behavioral information. 

Targeted advertising explains how, when you search for home improvement tools for a weekend project, you are later shown multiple ads about hammers, saws, and power tools. Simply put, targeted advertising makes sure you’re getting relevant ads for your interests.

What Is an Addressable Audience?

An addressable audience is a subsection of the potential market advertisers hope to target. In the ideal scenario, an addressable audience is an audience of only one, so marketers can hyper-specialize their advertisements to speak directly to their personal pain points and needs. Some characteristics that can be targeted to create an addressable audience include: 

• Age

• Gender

• Socio-economic status

• Education level

• Income level

• Employment status

Some addressable audience values go beyond physical identification and can include psychological factors like: 

• Personal values

• Attitude

• Opinion

• Personality

Who Are the Addressable TV Partners?

Addressable TV has partnered with eleven national TV content providers:

1. A&E Networks

2. AMC

3. Discovery

4. Disney

5. Hearst Television

6. Fox

7. NBCUniversal

8. Scripps

9. Univision

10. ViacomCBS

11. WarnerMedia

Together, these eleven partners count for 90% of all linear TV viewership. Additionally, cable and satellite providers like Comcast, DIRECTV, and Dish offer addressable programs. Finally, Addressable TV is quickly being supported by major TV manufacturers including Vizio, LG, and Samsung.

Agility Can Help

At Agility, we keep up with all digital marketing trends to help you get the most from your marketing budget. Rather than casting a large net and hoping something shows up, we believe in narrowing your focus and targeting specific audiences so you can place the right ad—across all ad formats—in front of the right audience at the right time and place. We call it precision advertising.

Precision advertising is data-driven and built to help you maximize your ad spend and meet your return on investment goals by utilizing several data sources to accurately target prospective customers. Multiple channels and ad formats are simultaneously utilized to create the perfect mix for your target customer. With advanced analytics, you get a complete view of all performance metrics of your ad campaigns and real revenue impact.

Contact Agility today to schedule your free demo so you can see for yourself the power of precision advertising.

Frequently Asked Questions

How does addressable TV advertising target specific audiences?

Addressable TV uses multiple sources of household data to provide advanced targeting capabilities. Specific audiences can be refined, filtered, and segmented to only reach the people who matter to you. Where normal linear ads would be—usually in the commercial break—addressable tv ads are inserted tailored to the user’s interests.

What are the benefits of addressable TV advertising for marketers?

Addressable advertising holds an advantage over traditional tv ads by providing much more targeted audiences and serving those audience segments with the right ads for them. Conversion and attribution is also easier to calculate than with linear TV advertising.