The thorny issues of reach, audience verification and siloed measurement were top of mind as Samsung Ads launched its new integrated reporting system that brings its connected TV (CTV) and mobile data together for the first time.
Samsung is the world’s largest TV manufacturer with 70m devices in Europe alone. Samsung Ads already utilises automatic content recognition (ACR) to analyse household viewing habits and now they have access to a smartphone behavioural data set (fully consented) for about 20 million phones across Europe.
As part of the launch, Samsung Ads hosted a roundtable at Campaign’s Media360 in Brighton to canvass opinion from a range of UK marketers on the challenges they face and how these new data sets could add value.
The cross-media measurement challenge
Reckitt is the parent company of many everyday health and hygiene products and Sameer Amin, its VP of data-driven marketing and media, explained that much of its TV spend is moving from linear towards CTV. “But we're losing an element of reach,” he said. “If I'm taking money from TV into a streaming service I want to know that I’m getting the same level of reach on my target audience. I actually like the free wastage that I get on linear TV, because I don’t pay for it [whereas in CTV every impression is paid for].”
Rachel Moss, head of marketing strategy at Allwyn UK, who took over running the National Lottery in 2024, highlighted the promise of Origin, the developing cross-media measurement programme. “When I watch streaming services, I’m amazed that I see the same ad over and over again. Excessive frequency is a problem for us because we sit in that gambling space.”
Others on the panel had high hopes for Origin, too. Sergi Calvo Soler, global media and digital director at Nomad Foods, said: “I don't think there's any other technology that could get as close to this measurement of reach and frequency as Origin is intended to be. Measurement is very siloed at the moment so there are lots of eyes on Origin. It’s been quite delayed, but it is promising.”
How multiple measurement programmes can help
Amin wanted to see improved audience verification. “Nielsen says that anywhere between 40-50% of your digital assets are targeting the wrong people,” he said.
Lisa Boyles is head of go-to-market and media at giffgaff, the mobile network that also sells devices. She hoped to target Android phone users because they tend to be more open to change than Apple iPhone users. “Having mobile data plugged into TV is quite exciting for us,” she said, “because it means we can actually make sure we’re reaching Samsung users in that CTV plan.”
Timur Cetin, product marketing lead for data at Samsung Ads, added: “Roughly 10% of Samsung’s addressable Smart TVs have consented mobile behavioural data mapped against them, which gives us the vast directional panel of mobile usage insight. The combined TV and mobile data sets are the largest deterministic behavioural data sets of their kind in the world, making them incredibly rich for qualitative consumer insights.”
Piers Langendoen, head of digital media at Post Office, hoped to improve the tracking of the PO travel money card. “We're not massive media spenders in this space but we will potentially be in the coming year and we will probably change tack a little bit in terms of measurement. It would be really interesting to see if we could see the direct impact of downloads [of the travel money card].”
When brands like to measure their campaign success
For Boyles, it's “post campaign, because that's when you can really see if there’s a lift in awareness, consideration and purchase intent”.
For Bridget Hirst, head of brand at DASH drinks, the start of a campaign was the sweet spot. “Understanding the audience at the start is the most valuable,” she said. “And one of the big inputs is having post-campaign measurement from the past.”
Calvo Soler preferred before and after but was sceptical of in-campaign measurement. “As a food manufacturer, we have some credentials that we want to make our consumers aware of, whether that’s taste or sustainability,” he said. “It takes a long time to make a significant move, so for us, before and after are much more crucial than in-flight measurement.”
To learn more about Samsung’s new mobile date offering, click here.