Sneak Preview: Will Programmatic Advertising Overtake Brand Advertising in 2025?
On Thursday, February 27, Alan Wolk, one of the industry's most influential thought leaders, will moderate the Streaming Media Connect debate "Will Programmatic Advertising Overtake Brand Advertising in 2025?"
The ability of digital media advertisers to deliver targeted messages through automated platforms—aka programmatic advertising—has enabled them to buy audiences, rather than space or time as in traditional brand advertising. In streaming and CTV, this creates the potential for substantially lower CPMs. But such a hands-off approach also raises considerable brand safety concerns, and its effectiveness remains comparatively untested. So, is the programmatic ad revolution really upon us?
Confirmed debate panelists include:
Alan Wolk, a much sought-after writer, speaker, and consultant, has established himself as one of the industry's most influential thought leaders. By focusing on the intersection of streaming and advertising, Wolk—who coined the acronym FAST (free ad-supported streaming TV) and his TVREV colleagues have helped make the firm one of the media industry’s go-to resources as it attempts to process the changes brought about by the shift to streaming.
"The move to contextual targeting will solve a world of hurt around programmatic ad buying on CTV, which is why we are so bullish on it," Wolk says. "By putting in contextual keywords, you can avoid everything from brand inappropriate content to your funny ad showing up during the break-up scene."
Charlie Goodman is the Head of Supply Side Ad Platform at Roku. "At Roku (and through Roku Exchange), we are a huge believer in programmatic-led CTV advertising," he says. "Most advertisers should be planning and executing multi-channel campaigns, and the best way to bid on the right user, in the right moment, holistically is through programmatic capabilities. It’s our job to surface these opportunities in such a way that it drives a meaningful connection in the moment. In 2025, programmatic will continue to overtake managed campaigns, and it’s for the betterment of advertiser campaigns.”
As VP, US Sales for Vevo, Melissa Sofo leads the network's direct sales team in the U.S., with a focus on CTV strategy, partnerships, and revenue. Melissa is a media industry leader in linear and digital advertising, experienced in leveraging a large portfolio of media properties, data-driven audiences, the streaming ecosystem and branded content deals to address changing consumer behaviors and technology shifts in the marketplace. Prior to Vevo, Melissa held sales roles at Warner Bros. Discovery, WarnerMedia, and Turner.
"At Vevo, we offer advertisers every possibility to seamlessly transact, and we believe there is space for both programmatic and direct deals on CTV," Sofo says. "There’s no denying the continued growth in programmatic – the ability to gain greater flexibility and transparency in advertising investments has proven incredibly valuable, especially as campaign optimization technologies continue to evolve. Simultaneously, we’re still seeing sustained confidence in direct deals as well – underscoring the importance of trusted, one-to-one partner relationships with premium media owners. Our network allows buyers to choose the way they invest, prioritizing what matters most – the content.
"We’ve seen the definition of premium content evolve over the past few years, exacerbated by the growth in streaming and digital video. Take YouTube, for example, which has seen significant growth across critical aspects of its business – from increased transparency to its sheer volume of premium content available today. There’s a desire from marketers to tie these two aspects together – and it’s become a vital component of full-funnel advertising strategies. The next phase here will come down to measurement standardization across the entire digital advertising ecosystem. At the end of the day, advertisers want to create meaningful, long-lasting connections with their audiences based on the KPIs that work for their businesses."
Aulden Kaye Yi is Head of Advertising Partnerships at Philo, contributing to Philo's current and future advertising strategy. She works closely with Philo's top-tier demand partners to drive innovation and visibility for Philo's advertising capabilities, with a focus on delivering best-in-class programmatic solutions within Philo's premium OTT environment.
"From our perspective, programmatic is an automated activation method, but it does not define the marketing goal," Yi says. "In CTV, where inventory is fragmented across many publishers and platforms, programmatic streamlines the buying process and provides tools to scale across the ecosystem in a way that is not possible through traditional buying methodologies. Brand and performance campaigns can and should both be executed programmatically leveraging different setups and KPIs, whether optimizing for incremental reach and awareness or lower-funnel action."
Laura Florence brings nearly 20 years of experience in the entertainment industry to her current position as SVP, Global Channels at Fremantle. In this role, Laura oversees the Fremantle flagship U.S. game show network BUZZR, in addition to all channel offerings across major streaming platforms globally featuring classic Fremantle series such as The Price Is Right, Family Feud, Baywatch, Jamie Oliver and more.
Register now for Streaming Media Connect 2025!
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