Ad-tech companies Imagine Communications and Operative Media have teamed up to develop a cloud-native platform that simplifies advertising across digital and linear channels. The technology’s “audience-first” approach allows advertisers to sell their product on the local and national scales, while reducing operational complexity and costs.
Advertisers can use the platform to consolidate assets across their portfolios, reduce manual work and improve responsiveness to buyer needs. Specific capabilities include ongoing synchronization of ad orders and campaign performance as well as real-time inventory management.
Companies can also take linear ad placement rules and apply them to digital inventory, so that ads don’t repeat on digital platforms. Imagine and Operative tout interoperability as the platform’s key feature.
“Our partnership with Operative enables our clients to streamline their operations across multiple media forms and to address the increasing desire to be able to sell on an audience basis,” said Tom Cotney, CEO of Imagine Communications, in a statement.
Operative CEO Lorne Brown added customers look for flexibility and extensibility for processing modern data and technology.
“Operative has always had an ‘open’ philosophy and our flagship product AOS was designed to accelerate data sharing across the entire ad workflow,” he said. Through Imagine and Operative’s platform, AOS will allow buyers to target audiences across a variety of impression-based currencies.
Imagine and Operative’s efforts highlight the need for media companies to have simplified, flexible tools to expand audience reach amid a fragmented advertising landscape. Broadcasters and OTT providers are particularly eyeing cloud technology to achieve that goal. Cox Media Group recently brought on software-as-a-service (SaaS) provider Amagi to help expand the company’s linear and digital footprint. Clinch, a marketing automation specialist, unveiled in February Flight Control, a SaaS platform that offers a unified tool for ad strategy and measurement across OTT, connected TV devices and more.
“The industry needs more open, standards-based platforms to allow broadcasters to innovate and evolve as audiences fragment and new technologies offer more opportunities for advertisers,” said Del Parks, president of technology at Sinclair Broadcast Group. Sinclair is one of the companies intending to use Imagine and Operative’s platform.
Emerging ad tech isn’t limited to broadcast and OTT media. TvScientific recently released an advertising solution for video game developers to expand their audience reach.