NEW YORK, April 29, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- IBM
(NYSE: IBM) today announced the expansion of IBM Watson Advertising
Accelerator for OTT and video, designed to help marketers move
beyond contextual relevance alone. Accelerator aims to leverage
artificial intelligence to dynamically optimize OTT ad creative for
improved campaign outcomes at scale, not dependent on traditional
advertising identifiers. While compatible with most streaming
platforms, IBM is partnering closely with Xandr, an industry leader
in programmatic and converged video solutions, to help scale
adoption of Accelerator.
According to eMarketer, in 2020 streaming households outnumbered
traditional cable households for the first time, and 27% of cable
households are expected to switch in 2021.[1] With this growth,
many brands may seek to increase their streaming ad budgets to
better target their core groups. According to a
survey conducted by the IAB, at the end Q1 2021 media
buyers plan to increase U.S. spending for digital video, including
CTV/OTT, to 20% of their total media budgets this year. IBM
Watson Advertising Accelerator allows brands to tailor ads at the
individual impression level, enabling personalization to the viewer
in the moment with the goal of improving campaign outcomes for
brands, translating into a win for consumers, platforms and
advertisers.
Originally designed for display advertising, IBM Watson
Advertising Accelerator now also brings powerful AI-driven
capabilities to video and OTT campaigns. It uses IBM Watson AI to
process and action real-time data signals and to dynamically
assemble ads to help brands improve campaigns and time-to-value
three-fold:
- Accelerator takes manual work out of dynamic creative setup.
Creative assets such as different music tracks, video sequences,
voice overs, and end cards for video, are organized and fed into
Accelerator.
- Accelerator leverages AI to predict and generate
impression-level ad variations. It uses Watson Machine Learning to
analyze cookieless data signals to predict and subsequently
assemble a customized video creative for each impression based on
the likelihood of a consumer converting against a KPI.
- For OTT, the KPIs span video completion rate (VCR), various
brand site actions and app installs.
All of these capabilities can help marketing teams to test and
derive audience insights from a multitude of different creative
variables to improve campaign performance.
"Brands continue to follow their consumers to OTT and CTV,
especially now as streaming audiences grow across all age groups.
However, brands are too often faced with creative resource
constraints, fragmentation, and measurement and frequency
challenges. The market is in need of advanced technology to help
deliver optimal creative at scale, and IBM sees AI as the
solution," said David Olesnevich,
Head of Product at IBM Watson Advertising. "Accelerator is designed
to help brands make their campaigns effective, perform against
business goals and derive measurable results and insights. All at
scale – which requires working together with industry leaders.
Using Watson AI, marketers can now develop personalized OTT
creative for each user and ultimately help improve campaign
performance over time."
Xandr recently announced 75% YoY growth in digital video
platform spend and 235% YoY growth in Connected TV platform spend
for Q1 2021. Brands and agencies can leverage the Xandr Invest DSP
to pilot the Accelerator OTT product today.
"The fragmentation of media consumption habits in an evolving
identity landscape underlines the need for intelligent, data-driven
technology solutions," said Doug
Hurd, Head of Corporate Strategy and Business Development at
Xandr. "Xandr and IBM's first-to-market capability will power more
relevant ad experiences in Converged Video, Connected TV and OTT
environments for brands, publishers and consumers alike."
Accelerator is an award-winning technology, on average driving
+127% lift in display performance over the length of a campaign.[2]
In initial Accelerator for video internal tests on The Weather
Channel O&O digital property, IBM exceeded its own VCR
benchmarks by nearly 20%.
About IBM Watson:
Watson is IBM's AI technology for business, helping
organizations to better predict and shape future outcomes, automate
complex processes, and optimize employees'
time. Watson has evolved from an IBM Research project, to
experimentation, to a scaled set of products that run anywhere.
With more than 30,000 client engagements, Watson is being
applied by leading global brands across a variety of industries to
transform how people work. To learn more,
visit: https://www.ibm.com/watson.
Contact:
Luca Sesti
Luca.Sesti@ibm.com
1 eMarketer, US Digital Video 2020.
Subscription-only report. See executive summary and report access
here:
https://www.emarketer.com/content/us-digital-video-2020#page-report
2 Based on results calculated from the
initial group of display Accelerator campaigns that have run so
far. The performance data discussed herein is presented as derived
under specific operating conditions. Actual results may vary.
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SOURCE IBM