Speaker 1: There may be no bigger frustration in the media business
Speaker 1: than among TV programmers out to make sure they get
Speaker 1: a fair account of every eyeball they deliver to advertisers
Speaker 1: across screens. That's job one for my next guest, cavitaz Rani,
Speaker 1: executive vice president of Insights and Measurement in NBC Universal
Speaker 1: Accurate measurement is just the top of a list of
Speaker 1: reforms she's helping drive at the company. Tavita, thanks for
Speaker 1: coming in and talk to me. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: It's nice to be here. Cool. So you've got a
Speaker 1: pretty big sort of reform agenda when it comes to
Speaker 1: the current state of measurement. Put it out there for me,
Speaker 1: all right. So I think you know that prior to
Speaker 1: joining NBCU, I was a marketer and I was Comcast Yes,
Speaker 1: and I was responsible for a billion and a half
Speaker 1: of paid and owned media across six different brands, and
Speaker 1: every day we were focused on how is our investment
Speaker 1: helping us get subscribers to our business and so that
Speaker 1: is a passion point for me that was really important.
Speaker 1: But the industry was coming in and saying, oh, this worked,
Speaker 1: here's the ratings we delivered, here's you know, here's the
Speaker 1: eyeballs were delivering, here's the impressions, And I always went
Speaker 1: back to, but how did it help my business? So
Speaker 1: coming to NBCU transforming that dialogue internally as well as
Speaker 1: with our clients to say we have a research we
Speaker 1: have a measurement continuum. The first thing is, yes, we
Speaker 1: do need to count impressions because that is the starting point.
Speaker 1: It is the basis of a media plan. And in
Speaker 1: order to do that at because TV is no longer
Speaker 1: the way it used to be, we are content lives
Speaker 1: on television, the linear television screen, and it lives in digital.
Speaker 1: How do we bring that together? So counting unified impressions
Speaker 1: across digital and linear. That was job one, which was
Speaker 1: C flight, and that is you know, going to continue
Speaker 1: to evolve. We launched that with NBC Prime and so
Speaker 1: C Flight essentially is unifying impressions across unifying ad impressions
Speaker 1: that run on linear and digital. But it's not tethered
Speaker 1: to the linear broadcast of the show. So I may
Speaker 1: be watching This is Us on a Tuesday night live
Speaker 1: or on a DVR and I'm caught up on this season,
Speaker 1: but another person might be consuming season one, episode one
Speaker 1: on digital and if an AD impression ran runs during
Speaker 1: that week, we want to be able to count the
Speaker 1: ad impressions. The consumer is that this is us watcher,
Speaker 1: the environment is the same, why shouldn't they be counted together.
Speaker 1: So we did that with NBC Prime and Sports. Going
Speaker 1: into next year, we're going to expand it across the
Speaker 1: portfolio and continue to UM enhance the measurements. So we're
Speaker 1: looking at how do we look at set top box
Speaker 1: v o D, how do we look at coviewing We
Speaker 1: know people watch together, how do we count all of
Speaker 1: the impressions across all screens and all platforms, and partnering
Speaker 1: with many different UM research measurement partners, so Nielsen being
Speaker 1: a core of them, but there's others that we will
Speaker 1: be talking to to build that capability because we feel
Speaker 1: really strongly that we have to make sure that the
Speaker 1: starting point is as accurate as it can possibly be,
Speaker 1: and when that has developed, it will be open source,
Speaker 1: just like we did with C Flight. One point oh
Speaker 1: it was we met with all of our network partners,
Speaker 1: We met with our clients and agencies to go through
Speaker 1: the methodology in great detail, and we saw success from it.
Speaker 1: The marketers they for them, it was conceptually yes, why
Speaker 1: haven't been doing this? Um for agencies, it was conceptually
Speaker 1: brought it bought in, But you still have to figure out, Okay,
Speaker 1: how do you work now with the current systems that
Speaker 1: a second You r NBC Universal, You're just one of
Speaker 1: a number of programmers out there. Why is it even
Speaker 1: to you to to lead the way here? Shouldn't you
Speaker 1: be deferring to a third party like Nielsen? Well, Nielsen
Speaker 1: is a part of it, but I think as a
Speaker 1: leader in the industry, I think we just got tired
Speaker 1: of having everyone talk about this issue. We had to
Speaker 1: take the first step. Most of the conversations, even in
Speaker 1: my first year, was why you know why this is different,
Speaker 1: or why Nielsen has measured? Nielsen measures television this way
Speaker 1: and digital this way, And no one wanted to just
Speaker 1: take that first step. Yes, it may not be perfection,
Speaker 1: but someone had to take that first step. And I
Speaker 1: would say that the other networks are doing a form
Speaker 1: of it, and they're trying to do it. They may
Speaker 1: not call it sea flight necessarily, but everybody is trying
Speaker 1: to figure out how do you unify impressions within television
Speaker 1: and digital? But doesn't the unification strategy need to be unified.
Speaker 1: In other words, shouldn't just be standardize you all have
Speaker 1: the same exact approach. Yes, And I think that was
Speaker 1: part of Linda's State of the Industry, Linda Yaquarina's State
Speaker 1: of the Union last year during Thanksgiving, where she said
Speaker 1: the industry must come together, and so we bought all
Speaker 1: of the network partners. We bought all of the major
Speaker 1: networks and said this is the methodology. So I know
Speaker 1: that you know, decisions are happening internally. You know, obviously
Speaker 1: not everyone may call it see flight, but the concept
Speaker 1: of unification of impressions is something that all I think everybody,
Speaker 1: including marketers, are taking seriously because they're trying to understand, Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm buying all this media across all of these platforms,
Speaker 1: and I have this number from one place, another number
Speaker 1: from another place. No one's make it easier for me
Speaker 1: to understand what that is. Got it? So just one
Speaker 1: last question before we moved to yet the other things
Speaker 1: on your list of reforms. What is what are the
Speaker 1: obstacles that are preventing this from happening? Why in really
Speaker 1: isn't this already happening? Well, I think part of it
Speaker 1: is just legacy. You know, I don't know what else
Speaker 1: to call it. UM. I think it was something as
Speaker 1: a marketer we we were challenged with, is how can
Speaker 1: we get a unified number? And at the end of
Speaker 1: the day, as a marketer, we said, okay, we'll take
Speaker 1: what every media company gives us as their number, but
Speaker 1: we're going to add our own lens. And being at Comcast,
Speaker 1: you know, we had a lot of insight into our
Speaker 1: consumer into our consumer behavior, what people are watching. So
Speaker 1: that was a you know, that's the benefit we had.
Speaker 1: But we said, here's what we're investing, here's the media mix,
Speaker 1: and we applied very sophisticated models to understand what's the
Speaker 1: role of that mix in driving our results subscriber results.
Speaker 1: So we went, you know, we said, okay, what's the
Speaker 1: outcome that we're trying to accomplish. And that's you know,
Speaker 1: that's part of the rest of the continuum of measurement,
Speaker 1: counting to assigning credit, to measuring our O So let's
Speaker 1: go to assigning credit. What's the problem there and how
Speaker 1: are you personally affective? Well, I, you know, I think
Speaker 1: this is something that TV has to solve. UM from
Speaker 1: a campaign measurement standpoint. You know, for the digital players,
Speaker 1: it's really really easy in terms of you see an ad,
Speaker 1: you're right at you know, whether your device or your computer,
Speaker 1: and you can click and you can take an action
Speaker 1: and that action gets recorded and there you have it.
Speaker 1: For a medium like television, it doesn't work as seamlessly.
Speaker 1: And when you're engaged in a one hour content that's
Speaker 1: emotional and connecting with you, you may not be as
Speaker 1: likely so that consumer behavior is not as likely to
Speaker 1: pick up the phone or go to a site right away. Um,
Speaker 1: Whereas if you're watching a ten minute video of putting
Speaker 1: me how to put Makeup on and you see a
Speaker 1: makeup ad, you might be likely to click. So the
Speaker 1: experiences are different. And um, we have to figure out
Speaker 1: how do we how do we capture the true power
Speaker 1: of television And it has to start with that closed loop.
Speaker 1: What does that closed loop look like for television? But
Speaker 1: what we don't want to do is tie it just
Speaker 1: to the moment the ad ran because television works differently.
Speaker 1: We want to be able to see the short term
Speaker 1: impact as well as the long term impact of that
Speaker 1: ad exposure that runs on television. So what I'm trying
Speaker 1: to build across the organization is a full funnel measurement
Speaker 1: solution which consists of the stuff that we are doing
Speaker 1: in terms of measuring brand impacts. So whether you work
Speaker 1: with a Millward Brown or other partners are working directly
Speaker 1: with the advertisers to measure the brand impact in terms
Speaker 1: of consideration, purchase intent, and those metrics. But then to
Speaker 1: take it down a level deeper and say, okay, now
Speaker 1: how do I connect the dots of advertising running and
Speaker 1: moving it to the next step? Is that demand generation
Speaker 1: in terms of site visits or or store traffic or
Speaker 1: just searches, you know, what does that look like? And
Speaker 1: then at the very end is the sales or people
Speaker 1: actually really transacting and buying a product once they get there.
Speaker 1: So in order to do that, there are third party
Speaker 1: partnerships we can have where we can get third party
Speaker 1: sales data. You can do that for some categories, you
Speaker 1: can't do that for all categories. So this is where
Speaker 1: the partnership with the client and the advertiser becomes super
Speaker 1: critical to build that full funnel for that campaign, and
Speaker 1: that gives us a pulse of okay, how did the
Speaker 1: campaign perform? But then to get to the next step,
Speaker 1: which is the harder work that we're doing, and it
Speaker 1: is literally in a proof of concept and building stage,
Speaker 1: is if an advertiser is spending ten million dollars with us,
Speaker 1: and they've been doing that for several years, how do
Speaker 1: we demonstrate that that that investment is working for them
Speaker 1: in terms of their business outcomes as well as give
Speaker 1: them insight into how it could work better? Are they
Speaker 1: investing in the right areas of the platform? And can
Speaker 1: we can we start to shift to a different conversation
Speaker 1: and saying we're not going to We believe in our
Speaker 1: models so strongly and we're building enough confidence and predictive
Speaker 1: power on that in those models that we're actually willing
Speaker 1: to transact on outcomes versus age, gender, And do marketers
Speaker 1: have a say in your approach? Here? Are you sort
Speaker 1: of opening the tent to them to get their input
Speaker 1: as to I mean, because they're ultimately the people you're
Speaker 1: trying to please. Correct. So for the proof of concept,
Speaker 1: we're building it and we're you know, my goal is
Speaker 1: to be completely transparent around that because I think you know,
Speaker 1: as a marketer, that was my pet peeve is I
Speaker 1: don't want a black box if you're doing analytics about
Speaker 1: my business. I want to understand how you're doing it
Speaker 1: to make sure you have the right context, so the
Speaker 1: same I I think our approach is going to be
Speaker 1: the same. And at the end of the day, we're
Speaker 1: gonna need them to partner with us on providing their
Speaker 1: business outcomes. And what are those business outcomes? Are those sales?
Speaker 1: Are those brand health? You know, help define what that
Speaker 1: is so that when we build models that are going
Speaker 1: to have that predictive power, we're measuring the right things
Speaker 1: and it's going to vary advertiser by advertisers, So you know,
Speaker 1: the solution that we're looking to build UM, we're talking
Speaker 1: about how can that be scaled because we don't want
Speaker 1: to apply what works for one advertiser in the AUTO
Speaker 1: category to all advertisers and multiple categories, because that's that's
Speaker 1: not a UM sustainable UM and a accurate view of
Speaker 1: you know, let's say the CpG category. So and different
Speaker 1: factors affect those businesses. So in auto you might see
Speaker 1: gas prices affecting sales. In CpG, that's not as much
Speaker 1: of a factor. So we want to make sure that
Speaker 1: we build it in such a way that it is
Speaker 1: relevant to the advertiser. This all sounds horrifyingly complex and nuanced,
Speaker 1: and frankly has me asking like, are you almost chasing
Speaker 1: some sort of brass ring that can't be reached? The mirage?
Speaker 1: In other words, are you're trying to give marketers everything
Speaker 1: they could possibly dream of wanting. Maybe there's a reason
Speaker 1: they don't have it it's impossible to get. Yeah, well
Speaker 1: you know it is. I will say it hasn't been
Speaker 1: an easy task, you know, doing you know, at at
Speaker 1: Comcast as a marketer, I had all of my data
Speaker 1: in front of me. So whether that was my sales
Speaker 1: data or how much I spent in every single tactic,
Speaker 1: all of that was available to us. On the NBC side,
Speaker 1: we don't have everything we but we do know what
Speaker 1: we have across our portfolio, what an advertiser spends across
Speaker 1: our portfolio. So that is the starting point, um most
Speaker 1: you know, and I've I've been doing MMM models for
Speaker 1: a long time, and I want to be clear, this
Speaker 1: is not that because nothing media mixed modeling media mixed models.
Speaker 1: A lot of advertisers have their own what I call
Speaker 1: method to madness of allocating spend two different tactics and
Speaker 1: then measuring the effectiveness of those tactics. UM. Some use MMM,
Speaker 1: some use just a Okay, last year, I spend X.
Speaker 1: This year, I'm going to spend X plus three percent
Speaker 1: UM and you know everyone has that. So it's not
Speaker 1: meant to replace that, but it is meant to help
Speaker 1: provide more insight into those UM and a lot of
Speaker 1: MMM medium mixed models don't UM go down to a
Speaker 1: very tactical level like to NBC. They may go down
Speaker 1: to a television level and a digital level, but not
Speaker 1: television and then NBC, ABC, CBS and so on and
Speaker 1: so forth. So we're trying to create value and UM.
Speaker 1: Ultimately the proof of this is going to come from
Speaker 1: the advertisers that, Okay, if they're seeing results within their
Speaker 1: analytics in a certain way, this should be close to it, right,
Speaker 1: And that's why they're They're going to be a key
Speaker 1: part of this. What about the advertising experience in and
Speaker 1: of itself? You know, I know NBC for instances experimented
Speaker 1: with these prime pods making a little more selective. I mean,
Speaker 1: are we going to see much more evolution on that front?
Speaker 1: How much is needed? Yes? UM, So I think that's
Speaker 1: also an industry industry problem, right, clutter exists. I mean,
Speaker 1: if you look at the digital ecosystem, there's a lot
Speaker 1: of clutter um with with what our attempt with prime
Speaker 1: pods was to really create an environment that was good
Speaker 1: for consumers right in a way that they would stay
Speaker 1: engaged with the content longer. And we're seeing that, right.
Speaker 1: It's early, it's about it's been about six weeks of
Speaker 1: data that we're looking at, but we're seeing promising results
Speaker 1: from that. But because a consumer is more engaged, then
Speaker 1: an add that runs within that is going to perform better.
Speaker 1: And that's the hypothesis, right, that's the hypothesis, and so
Speaker 1: far we're seeing positive results in terms of how ads
Speaker 1: are performing. What we want to continue to do is
Speaker 1: understand what is the role of the creative of an
Speaker 1: advertisers creative within that prime pod. If it is just
Speaker 1: the same old creative that they've been using for a
Speaker 1: year or so, does that have an impact on performance?
Speaker 1: And if it is a highly um emotional ad in
Speaker 1: a non emotional show, what impact does that have. So
Speaker 1: we're really trying to elevate the conversation to be not
Speaker 1: just about the prime pods itself, but also what's the
Speaker 1: advertiser message that runs within the prime pod. Um. And
Speaker 1: so we're looking at, Okay, what shows perform better? Is
Speaker 1: it better to have it in the front of the
Speaker 1: show at the back of the show? Um? And so
Speaker 1: we're going through just digging into the deep. The data
Speaker 1: in six weeks is not enough to you know, I say,
Speaker 1: to make a trend. Um. But yeah, we are definitely
Speaker 1: exploring on ways to just improve the consumer experience. I mean,
Speaker 1: we have a great experience on our FVP, but VP
Speaker 1: is a full episode player which is on our digital
Speaker 1: Sorry all of the internal terms, um, but you know
Speaker 1: it's a better ad experience than television. But um. But
Speaker 1: when you think about the entire ecosystem of media and fragmentation,
Speaker 1: there is clutter and it's getting harder and harder for
Speaker 1: advertisers to really stand out. And so they're trying to
Speaker 1: invest in how do you connect on a more relevant basis,
Speaker 1: how do you, um create experiences that go beyond you know,
Speaker 1: a thirty second spot. So we're trying to just test
Speaker 1: out and expand some of those capabilities. The flip side
Speaker 1: of this is wondering about is for advertisers just the
Speaker 1: process of buying the ads, placing the ads. I assume
Speaker 1: there's plenty of innovation to be done. There plenty of innovation,
Speaker 1: but I think, you know, the if you if you
Speaker 1: build that continuum of measurement in the right way, a
Speaker 1: lot of that could happen ahead of time in terms
Speaker 1: of planning the most optimal media by across our portfolio.
Speaker 1: And then it is a matter of just sitting down
Speaker 1: with advertisers and yes, there's a little bit of you know,
Speaker 1: the work that advertisers have to do to retool how
Speaker 1: they think about creative and there's a lot of work
Speaker 1: that we have to do on our end to make
Speaker 1: sure that we have the right data capabilities, the AI
Speaker 1: to help with those well with those processes and making
Speaker 1: them making them easier. So there's a lot of big plans,
Speaker 1: a lot of big changes. I'm just curious how concrete
Speaker 1: they are. In other words, do you have some sort
Speaker 1: of roadmap of here's what the next ten years of
Speaker 1: change looks like? I do in my head almost soon enough.
Speaker 1: But you know, I think we'll be coming out with
Speaker 1: more of that in the next next few months. I mean,
Speaker 1: I think part of the problem we're sorry the opportunity,
Speaker 1: the challenge is that you're trying to reform something that
Speaker 1: from a broad business perspective is still in such a
Speaker 1: state of flux. You're it's like changing the tires while
Speaker 1: the car is being modeled beyond running. It's like like
Speaker 1: the pit crew at NASCAR. Yes, yes, so, and apologies
Speaker 1: if you guys don't have rights to Nascar. But has
Speaker 1: that been something that has figured into the challenge here
Speaker 1: where it's like you think you've got something figured out,
Speaker 1: it's like, oh wait, that's that already just changed? Yeah? Um,
Speaker 1: you know that's the innovator's dilemma, right, you have to
Speaker 1: keep the current machine running because you we all have
Speaker 1: revenue to targets to hit. But how do we continue
Speaker 1: to focus on innovation and pushing that agenda? Um, I
Speaker 1: think we have no choice but to push that agenda
Speaker 1: because marketers are demanding so much more from us in
Speaker 1: terms of you know, yes, we know you have great shows,
Speaker 1: but what is it doing to deliver on results for me?
Speaker 1: So well? Have we have to do it? We just
Speaker 1: I think as an industry, we just have to do it.
Speaker 1: And we're bringing agencies along in that process because I
Speaker 1: think agencies are also under the same pressure that UM
Speaker 1: that marketers are under to drive impact, and so we
Speaker 1: keep you know, the internal mantra is around. We want
Speaker 1: to shift from counting impressions to delivering impact, and so
Speaker 1: we just keep saying that. When there's a roadblock in
Speaker 1: a measurement solution or technology, or we can't get resources,
Speaker 1: we just keep saying, this is our this is our vision.
Speaker 1: We've got to get there. Well, it sounds like you've
Speaker 1: got a very busy ahead of you. We'll have to
Speaker 1: check back in at the end of the year then,
Speaker 1: and and and see how far you've come. Thanks for you,
Speaker 1: Thank you for having me. It was really fun. This
Speaker 1: has been another episode of Strictly Business. Tune in next
Speaker 1: week for another helping a scintillating conversation with media movers
Speaker 1: and shakers, and please make sure you subscribe to the
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