Transforming the streaming landscape with innovative programmatic ad delivery

ITV uses SAS^® 360 Match to drive viewer engagement with customized ad experiences

The global increase in advertising-based video on demand (AVOD) revenues mirrors a large shift in viewer preferences. With viewers becoming increasingly discerning and budget conscious, the attraction toward ad-supported choices is growing. This trend opens fresh possibilities for advertisers to connect with audiences in a more precise and captivating fashion.

With weekly audience numbers exceeding 100 million viewings, ITV is the UK’s largest commercial broadcaster. While its ITV Studios business unit creates, owns and distributes content for broadcasters and streaming platforms worldwide, its ITV Media & Entertainment unit distributes that content across ITV’s ad-funded linear channels that follow a programming schedule (e.g., traditional TV) and ITVX, the broadcaster’s new, free ad-supported streaming platform.

Launching to great fanfare in December 2022, ITVX is a supercharged, binge-worthy content discovery destination that allows viewers to stream thousands of exclusive shows, movies, sports and live events, and, in exchange, its users receive programmatically delivered targeted advertisements.

Adapting to shifts in the advertising landscape

ITV offers an array of advertising options across TV and digital, with direct sales teams as well as indirect, programmatic means of buying advertising. Programmatic ad delivery has long been a digital advertising standard, but lack of transparency, concerns about relevance, and the loss of third-party cookies have prompted advertisers to move budgets to platforms that can provide verified audiences and automated buying options.

Streaming services and connected TV are well placed to benefit from this shift, but they need a robust advertising technology foundation that’s also flexible enough to integrate and develop in-house solutions. That’s why ITV chose SAS 360 Match.

“We believe ITVX will drive a significant increase in viewers and revenue,” says Alex Maison, Head of Digital Ad Platforms at ITV. “Our goal is to be a leader in UK streaming and grow digital revenue to £750 million [US$960 million] by 2026.”

Striking a balance between viewer preferences and advertiser goals

A year after its launch, the ITVX platform boasts an impressive milestone of 40 million registered viewers and a remarkable 2.7 billion streams, setting a new record for ITV. Particularly noteworthy is the success of the 2023 Rugby World Cup streams, which reached 60 million views, marking an 80% increase compared to the 2019 tournament.

“When we have a challenge or see an opportunity, we have a conversation with the brilliant minds at SAS,” Maison says. “We often come back with something better than what we were thinking. We've been able to progress at a great pace and keep ahead of the market because of those conversations.”

One of these key innovations is Planet V, ITV’s self-serve programmatic platform that provides advertisers with a range of campaign-booking options based on show content and audience data. Planet V, self-built by ITV and now the UK’s second-largest programmatic platform, is a high-fidelity integration with the SAS 360 Match solution for ad delivery and campaign management.

“We have 40 million registered users on ITVX, and all of them are monetized by SAS 360 Match,” Maison says.

SAS 360 Match – an API-driven, first-party ad server – offers a unique blend of campaign delivery, advanced analytics and workflow tools to create new revenue streams while simultaneously improving the customer journey and experience.

“The flexibility of SAS 360 Match allows us to develop things at our own pace,” Maison says. “We define our own development queue – we’re not waiting for a third party. We’re able to build most of the things we need to get to market ourselves.”

With SAS 360 Match, ITV can:

• Confidently forecast its digital audience and ad inventory across scheduled programming and on-demand content.
• Take control of its ad monetization strategy with intelligent AVOD – even in a cookieless world.
• Deliver contextually relevant ad content based on deep analytics about viewers’ content preferences.
• Build an AdTech stack with embedded advertising intelligence to take control of monetization and the digital advertising ecosystem.

SAS provides highly targeted, real-time ad decisioning on an immense scale in on-demand and live simulcast delivery.

“The FIFA World Cup, Harry & Meghan, Harry: The Interview and Love Island are massive programs, but SAS is able to manage with all of the throughput viewing that brings,” Maison says.

“The automation we’ve achieved with SAS 360 Match is around creative delivery, ingesting program schedules, user data flows and campaign optimization,” he continues. “And we’ve managed to reduce operational errors and introduced significant efficiencies.”

The future of ad delivery

What’s next for ITV?

“The main challenge we now face is keeping up with future ways of delivering advertising,” Maison says. “One of the biggest things on the horizon is addressable linear.”

Ads delivered on standard broadcast TV are the same for every viewer, but addressable linear advertising allows different ads to be shown to different households, even though they are watching the same program. This is achieved through set-top boxes and smart TV technology that can receive and display ads based on the household’s demographics, viewing habits or other targeting criteria.

“We would swap out a linear-booked television ad with an addressable SAS 360 Match delivered advert,” Maison explains. “That’s where we will see real growth in the future.”

As TV shows and viewing habits continue to evolve, Maison looks forward to building on ITV’s decadelong relationship with SAS.

“ITV’s collaboration with SAS has allowed us to develop something that’s best-in-class and meets all of our needs,” Maison concludes. “We’ve been able to progress at a great pace and keep ahead of the market because of those great conversations and partnership.”