US measurement provider VideoAmp has announced an extension of its long-term partnership with Paramount Global, in a deal which will see Paramount continue to use VideoAmp’s data to measure viewing across its media properties, while also offering VideoAmp as an alternative currency to its advertising partners.
“We’re proactive in measurement and currency as an investment in our future,” said John Halley, president of Paramount Advertising. “Through our long-standing partnership with VideoAmp, we’re able to collectively drive innovation and accelerate progress by delivering advertisers and agencies the tools to make smarter, data-driven decisions.”
Paramount (then called ViacomCBS) partnered with VideoAmp back in 2021, announcing it would use the tech company’s viewing data as a currency. This included viewing data based on age and gender, as well as more advanced audience segments, powered by VideoAmp’s commingled automatic content recognition (ACR) and set-top box based dataset. The deal was a big one for VideoAmp – Bryan Goski, EVP of Revenue, says that Paramount was one of the first media companies to transact on VideoAmp at scale.
Thus this new deal, maintaining VideoAmp as an alternative currency offered by Paramount, is very significant for the measurement business as it pushes to grow adoption as a currency – a role usually played by Nielsen in the US. On this front VideoAmp says it’s continuing to make significant progress. VideoAmp had guaranteed $3 billion in currency by the close of 2024, representing 880 percent year-on-year growth. And the company says it’s seen “major momentum” in the advertising industry for the uptake of advanced measurement solutions.
Steady progress
A period of turbulence for Nielsen a few years back, when its ratings came under fire from advertisers and it lost accreditation from the Media Ratings Council, opened up an opportunity for competitors to take ground. And there was plenty of talk in 2022 about broadcasters and agencies switching to alternative currencies.
The major shift which some had predicted didn’t transpire – despite its troubles, Nielsen remained well entrenched and thus hard to displace. But as VideoAmp’s data shows, it had continued to gain traction since then, both on the buy-side and the sell-side. In 2023, the company announced that agency group Omnicom was running tests of buying Paramount linear inventory using VideoAmp’s data. The measurement company now claims it covers 98 percent of the TV publisher ecosystem, and has adoption across over 50 agencies, all the major holding groups, and more than 1000 advertisers.
VideoAmp has spied an opportunity for further growth in a recent spat between Paramount and Nielsen. The two failed to reach an agreement to renew their contract last year, resulting in Paramount losing access to Nielsen’s data. Nielsen, seemingly in an effort to pressure Paramount into a new deal, has reportedly started making it harder for advertisers to analyse Paramount viewing.
In this context, VideoAmp has started giving agencies and advertisers free access to its national linear ratings for a limited window, according to Ad Age, giving buyers an easy way to trial VideoAmp’s data as an alternative to Nielsen’s.
