Curating the Future: Transforming the Programmatic CTV Buying Landscape

There seems to be little doubt that 2024 has become the year of curation. Some believe this curation frenzy is being driven by continued efforts to prepare for the deprecation of cookies. This has left the buy-side and sell-side scrambling to build solutions for a future where identifying and targeting audiences may become more difficult. However, curation for CTV was never about cookies. Instead, curation was purpose-built for CTV.  

CTV is the perfect match for programmatic transactions because of its inherently digital features like audience targeting. Most premium channels and formats are best activated via Private Marketplace (PMP) and Programmatic Guaranteed (PG) deals, and CTV can be defined as the most premium of the digital channels. In addition, the limited supply of CTV inventory means the cost of demand can only be maintained by preserving direct relationships between programmatic buyers and sellers.  

CTV Audiences in a Curated World 

Programmatic buyers find that most of the advantages of PMP or PG deals align with their needs when it comes to CTV supply specifically. First, these curation platforms can identify and package the best inventory based on objectives, making it easier for the buyers to activate without having to search endlessly for the supply that aligns with their campaigns. Simultaneously, the integrations that Sell-Side Platforms (SSPs) have enabled with data marketplaces allow for more accurate matching of data to supply and take that burden off the Demand-Side Platforms (DSPs), allowing their algorithms to focus on performance metrics and auction dynamics. Furthermore, curation provides more transparency from a supply breakout and campaign performance perspective.

Despite these benefits, the shift from linear to digital poses a challenge for curators to truly be indispensable partners to advertisers and agencies – especially when many of those curation platforms have not participated in the linear TV world. That is one of the reasons why Cadent is uniquely positioned to address the needs of programmatic buyers looking to reach CTV audiences in a curated manner. Aperture Viewer Graph is Cadent’s patented technology that can identify and match multiple TV devices to a single household. This technology allows TV advertisers to match and de-duplicate audience segments back to the full TV universe, providing a more precise measurement of targeted reach. Viewer Graph serves as the foundation for Cadent Aperture Platform, which includes a leading SSP for direct-to-publisher omnichannel supply, Aperture MX.   

What Does This Mean for Programmatic Buyers? 

So, how does this help make buyers’ jobs easier? First, Cadent can help provide a more comprehensive and unified offering to reach fragmented TV audiences scattered across linear and CTV. As a longstanding partner of holding company agencies, Cadent can now help those same agencies more efficiently include programmatic investment into their buying strategies for both linear and CTV.  

Second, Cadent’s latest offerings, Audience PMP and Audience Direct, allow programmatic-focused demand partners to more efficiently and accurately onboard first-party data and extend audiences with third-party data, matching those segments to Aperture Viewer Graph based on audience viewership data. The data is then mapped to over 4 billion match keys across zip codes, emails, IP addresses, and other identifiers 125MM+ households – without the use of cookies. And finally, the mapping is used to curate premium supply that most directly aligns with the target audience. This approach cuts down the overall cost, and auction waste, and increases transparency into how those audiences and inventory are performing. Plus, there is value in the flexibility by which Cadent can curate those audiences for agency and brand partners, whether that be vertical, seasonal, or live sports audiences.  

Lastly, since Aperture MX is one of the only SSPs with a proprietary identity graph and a data and measurement marketplace, Cadent provides a high level of innovation for performance-based solutions, including reach extension, exposed audience insights, and attribution. 

How to Take Your CTV Campaigns to the Next Level 

As the industry shifts beyond converged TV to omnichannel video, the need for consolidation and efficient pathways to supply means that media buyers must focus on partners that provide more comprehensive solutions to manage media investments, effectively reach key audiences, and drive performance.  

Get in touch to learn more about how Cadent is bridging the gap between supply and demand.