GroupM Australia Launches Finecast, A New Addressable TV Business Where Data Meets TV

Finecast combines the power of TV with the precision of Digital, connecting brands with targeted consumers on the big screen.

Sydney, Monday 15 October 2018 – GroupM, the media investment group of WPP, today announced the Australian launch of its new Addressable TV business, Finecast. Finecast offers the power of television with the precision of digital, allowing advertisers to target viewers across multiple on demand, set top box and live streaming TV environments.

Australia is the second market launch for Finecast, following its successful UK debut a year ago. In the UK, Finecast has attracted advertisers across categories including automotive, retail, banking, FMCG and beyond, with close to 100% of clients pleased with their measured results and return on investment.

“Watching TV has never been as good as it is now, but as viewing behaviours evolve and audiences fragment across platforms, advertisers are grappling with how to continue making the best use of one of their most trusted mediums. The collaboration between Finecast and broadcasters uses data to provide more relevant ads within professionally created content. It’s a win for everyone – advertisers, media owners and consumers,” said Jakob Nielsen, Global CEO, Finecast.

Launch partners

A recent research report Finecast conducted with 3rd party provider IHS Markit projected that 14 million addressable-capable TV devices will be in Australian homes within 2 years, setting the stage for industry momentum with addressable TV. To seize the opportunity, Finecast is facilitating collaboration across the TV ecosystem.

With broadcast partners Seven, Nine, Ten, SBS and Foxtel via Multi Channel Network (MCN), Finecast built a targeted TV inventory pool reaching Australian households at scale – across TV channel brands, Pay-TV platforms and digital media players, a range of broadcast video on demand (BVOD) services, over-the-top providers, and games consoles. Finecast is live and already running campaigns as part of a pre-launch pilot programme. From today it is open to all advertisers large and small.

GroupM Australia CEO, Mark Lollback, said: “Marketers are asking how to increase efficiency while also maintaining mass brand awareness and long-term brand health. Finecast solves this by allowing them to use television in new ways. It also paves the way for new, smaller advertisers to cost efficiently use the medium. Together, this strengthens the Australian TV market, ushering a new golden age of television. And our clients will be there first.”

Finecast’s benefits

Finecast’s planning tool is powered by data from Australia’s most trusted household data sets: ABS Census, GeoEmma, Experian and RDA Research, as well as GroupM’s propriety audience segment database. Finecast offers access to over 1200 data variables such as socio-economic, life stage, financial, purchase data, and more. Additional benefits:

• Broadest access to addressable TV supply across all major platforms
• Exclusively premium, 100% viewable brand safe TV content, with no ad blocking
• Holistic optimisation to manage reach and frequency across platforms
• Dynamic end frame versioning for different geographies/target audiences
• Delivery of affluent audiences and the ability to use first party data in targeting custom segments

In conjunction with the launch, Brett Poole is named Finecast’s Managing Director in Australia. Poole was previously [m]PLATFORM’s VP of Media and Activation and previously the General Manager of Plista, GroupM’s native advertising business.

Poole commented: “What we’re offering is the power of television, with the precision of digital and we’ve been working closely with all corners of the TV community to comprehensively understand the opportunity for Addressable TV. With on demand audiences growing rapidly and advertiser appetite for holistic, targeted access at scale, now the time is right to deliver our comprehensive solution.”

GroupM is pleased to be working with major Australian broadcast partners Seven, Nine, Ten, SBS and Foxtel via Multi Channel Network (MCN) to enable the launch of Finecast in Australia.

Seven Network : James Bayes Seven Network Head of Digital Sales, said: “2018 has seen an explosion in Connected TV with streaming up over 120% YoY. Connected TV brings together the best of TV and the best of digital. Seven is a clear market leader in Live Streaming with Connected TV now contributing more than 60% of our 7plus consumption from week to week. With login being rolled out to our @7plus CTV products this month, the launch of Finecast comes at a great time to leverage the potential for Addressable TV at scale on the largest and most effective screen in driving brand outcomes. We’re pleased to see GroupM and Finecast lean in on this significant opportunity and look forward to delivering outstanding results for their clients.”

Nine Entertainment Co. : Michael Stephenson, Nine Chief Sales Officer, said: “Television has always operated at the top of the marketing funnel, creating mass awareness and an emotional connection to your brand but addressability on TV is a gamechanger. It brings together the best of television and digital, helping to create people-based marketing solutions that link brand building together with activation and conversion. We welcome the launch of Finecast, as it will help marketers navigate this new important frontier and will help grow the Australian broadcast video on demand (BVOD) market, as more marketers move to capitalise on the power of this important medium.”

Network Ten : Rod Prosser Network Ten Chief Sales Officer, said: “The introduction of Finecast into Australia opens up many more ways advertisers and broadcasters can collaborate together. Finecast will reshape the benefits of advertising on TV, not just as a high-impact, mass reaching medium, but now with the added benefits of better audience targeting and accountability. It’s great to be part of this industry-defining solution.”

MCN/Foxtel : Nev Hasan MCN National Digital Sales Director, said: “Over the years, MCN has experienced a strong legacy in data-led TV buying, with our Programmatic TV solution being a core part of our innovation roadmap. Addressable TV is the next evolution in our journey and in collaboration with Foxtel’s asset base, industry partners like GroupM and MCN’s rich data stack, Multiview, we are creating a slate of addressable products. Our addressable TV product will further help build upon how we can link the world of TV and digital with on demand linear TV services to give advertisers reach, coupled with the power of advanced audience targeting capability. Our partnership with Finecast will support this offering, so we’re thrilled to be working with GroupM to better understand and ultimately target consumers to drive business results for Television.”

SBS : Adam Sadler Director SBS Media, said: “SBS On Demand is Australia’s most diverse and popular commercial streaming service*. With more than 5.4m registered users, we are excited to be working with Finecast to help advertisers reach more targeted consumers, as consumption on Connected TVs continues to grow.” (*Roy Morgan Research, Sep 2018)