Broadcast-to-web attribution adds new currency to local TV advertising

Long known for building brands and driving traffic into stores, local TV advertising has never had trouble convincing advertisers of its effectiveness.

It has, however, been challenged with measuring that strength. For stations, proving with clear, compelling data how well their ads generate ROI has become a significant priority.

Digital media, with its clickable ads, paid search campaigns and e-commerce pages, has its tracking mechanisms built into the format. That’s in part why digital advertising gets more credit than it perhaps deserves. Broadcasters need to demonstrate that the commercials they run are driving the same amount of (if not more) customers to go online and shop.

Their best bet for proving their case lies in broadcast-to-web attribution. This method tracks,  minute by minute, how a linear TV campaign is driving potential customers to the advertiser’s website.

Veritone Attribute shows, within minutes, how much a TV commercial boosts an advertiser’s website traffic

An attribution platform tracks the playout logs generated by a TV station’s traffic software and compares them to the Google Analytics data constantly flowing from an advertiser’s website. This allows a salesperson to see if there’s been a bump in the client’s web traffic within minutes of a commercial’s broadcast.  

Real-Time Data in a Dashboard 

“Within minutes after an ad airs, we can see how many new users and new pageviews have occurred on an advertiser’s website,” said Paul Cramer, Managing Director of Broadcast Solutions at Veritone, an eight-year-old artificial intelligence company headquartered in Denver.

Veritone tracks an average of 15 million ad occurrences a month and provides services for more than 1,000 TV and radio stations, as well as advertising and media agencies.

The company’s Veritone Attribute solution can break down the number of visits a participating advertiser’s website gets daily, weekly, or over the life of a TV campaign. It can also zero in on visits generated by station, daypart or show, and ad creative, and chart geographically the origin of the response. 

This lets reps and their advertisers test the effectiveness of different creative approaches, commercial lengths and regional targeting. 

The Road to Increased Market Share 

By using attribution data, sales professionals can “take more of a consultancy approach with the advertiser, showing them which ads work best and which daypart works best to optimize the campaign,” Cramer said. 

Broadcasters access Veritone Attribute through a cloud-based dashboard that they can use to generate reports in real-time on a laptop or tablet while calling on clients. 

By getting in the habit of meeting regularly with prospects and clients and showing them how much web traffic their TV ads are generating, stations can cut down on churn and build strong relationships with advertisers. 

They can also show clients the difference in their web traffic when they are running campaigns and when they are dark. And they can demonstrate the effectiveness of using TV and digital advertising together. 

Attribution data “lets the seller go for more share at renewal time,” Cramer concluded.

Lean-In Moments With Clients

Sales reps can pull reports showing web traffic bumps daily, weekly or monthly

Using attribution data can also help reps win new customers. “When a prospect says they aren’t sure if TV advertising works, we can pull up some reports and show them this is how we measure television,” said the sales manager at one TV station using Veritone Attribute. “We get that lean-in moment when we can tell them what we’ve got.”

To put Veritone Attribute into action, a station needs “read-only” access to the advertiser’s Google Analytics data. A rep can set this up by sending an email to the client, who clicks on a button to establish the connection. 

Some stations sign non-disclosure agreements with clients to reassure them that their audience data is kept strictly confidential.

New Currency for a Winning Medium 

Cramer calls attribution “a new currency” that empowers local TV sales professionals at a time when marketers are scrutinizing the ROI of every dollar they invest. 

The metrics also bolster a medium already known for broad reach and brand safety. 

Linear programming, for example, continues to earn high scores in Nielsen’s Total Audience Report, despite the proliferation of streaming options. The most recent report shows that live and time-shifted TV shows reach 80% of U.S. viewers aged 18 and up each week. TV and radio also still command the highest share of collective trust in advertising. In fact, 59% of people 35-49 consider TV spots very or somewhat trustworthy.

Broadcasters looking for more data on how to build ROI for their advertisers can access the Veritone Uplift Study, which shares best practices to help generate maximum lift in broadcast advertising in general.

The year-long study analyzed 250 ad campaigns at the local advertiser level, which aired on nearly 100 stations, with the goal of identifying what works and what doesn’t work in ad campaigns overall and individual markets.

Performance-Based TV Metrics

By turning their medium into a performance-based channel, TV stations can quantify and prove campaign success while underscoring their long-time status as one of the most effective advertising mediums.. 

With deep roots in artificial intelligence and experience in media and advertising, Veritone represents a stable partner to broadcasters. It works with stations from Hearst Television, Hubbard Broadcasting, Bell Media, and Bonneville International, among nearly 2,000 other television and radio stations in six countries. 

To learn more about why TV stations invest in attribution data or replace your current attribution platform, please visit Veritone Attribute.