Video Age International October 2015

46 and personalization that they can get on the web. And, rest assured, this expectationwill increase exponentially by 2030. As we wrote in the White Paper, seismic changes are significantly affecting brands as they move through the retail system. We observed that some progress is being made by store and network operators to help brands engage with consumers but more needs to be done to make the consumer experience relevant, personal, measured and secure — and in essentially real time. Of course, IOT (The Internet of Things) also will be part of our lives, connecting humans, wearables, stores, brands and the whole shopping experience. The capability already exists to target shoppers with addressable ads and alert consumers of relevant sales. That’s where we are seeing major change in the retail business, and it’s what will cause the face of retail to look quite different in 2030 than it does today. As important as advertising is for retailers — and will continue to be in 15 years — it’s the technology element that will cause the biggest changes, by far. [The full white paper can be found at http://www.dp-aa.org/ ResourcesWPPIntelDPAAWhitePaper.php]. Do you predict unforeseen events in advertising? By definition, “unforeseen” means something no one sees coming, so I suppose if I successfully predict something here and it comes to pass, then it wasn’t unforeseen. Quite the conundrum! One thing I know for sure is that as much as technology advances, it will always be the ingenuity and creativity driven by human beings that will change the paradigms. Visionary leaders in media, tech and advertising will drive new and exciting paths forward. Q &A with Barry Frey , president and CEO of the New York City-based Digital Place Based Advertising Association. Will TV advertising fully migrate to online video? The likely term won’t be “online” or “TV;” it will be “video.”Viewerswon’t distinguishor carewho is providing the content. It’ll just be “video.” So with regard to the question of whether TV advertising will fully migrate to online video, in 2030 we will be looking at the more agnostic descriptor “video advertising,” which will have various sub-sets, i.e., home video screen, mobile devices, tablets, digital place based, laptops, and so on. The ad agencieswill be all-inon a video agnostic world. The issue of video agnostic planning will be the subject of a prominent debate at the Digital Place Based Advertising Association’s (DPAA) annual Video Everywhere Summit in New York City on November 3. Will the critical mass be obtained only by aggregating web media? There is no question that audiences will continue to become more diffused between now and 2030. And with more types of viewing devices will come more audience diffusion. So, there’s no question that advertisers will need to aggregate various types of video media to attain something close to critical mass. But I wouldn’t use the phrase “aggregating webmedia” because it’ll be more an issue of aggregating video platforms. Will advertisers still need the critical mass? By 2030, it’s likely that advertisers will have the type of targeting capabilities they can only dream of today. With technology, data and targeting ability gaining such great ground, advertisers will achieve “mass viewership” from only their intended targeted audience. But, at the same time, there will always be some marketers — consumer packaged goods companies (e.g., breakfast cereals) among others —who need to reach large scaled audiences, or whatever will constitute critical mass in 2030 (everything is relative, so the bar for critical mass likely will be lower in 2030 than it is now, given the greater fragmentation of audiences). The challenge will be to successfully aggregate various video platforms. What will the role of ad agencies be? This is an important question for today, 2030 and beyond. Will advertising agencies look more like consulting firms, since their role as “agent” is decreasing? Will media companies like Google take on more of the planning, buying and data functions held by the agencies today? We may see media companies taking on more of the creative and production of advertising as native advertising blends into the fabric. “Math Men” will probably displace Mad Men in the short term but in the future we may see a closer melding of disciplines as data will inform creative strategy more aggressively. Whatwill happenwhenmedia inventory greatly surpasses demand? The fundamental nature of supply and demand will be exactly the same as it is today. It’s difficult to imagine that media inventory will ever “greatly” surpass demand because the marketplace will keep it in check. In other words, if I were to launch what we would now call a website or TV network in 2030 and my business model was dependent on generating ad revenue, my inventory would either be desirable or it wouldn’t, and my ad rates and revenue would either be high enough to sustain my business or they wouldn’t. So it will be survival of the inventory fittest, which is really no different than it is today. Supply and demand dynamics really won’t allow for an extreme volume of excess media inventory. The only other factor is that technology will continue to develop a wide range of consumer services attached to media. These envisaged products and services will drive subscription service fees that could complement or supplant ad revenues in some cases. Will media advertising change the retail business? It’s not so much media advertising that will change the retail business as much as it is technology that will—and already is—changing it. Earlier this year, DPAA, The Store WPP (a leader in advertising and marketing services with offices in Chicago and London) and Intel teamed up to publish a White Paper on this very subject. We called it “Connecting Media, Technology and Brands To Tomorrow’s Consumer,” because it examined the critical importance of retailers using technology to connect with consumers, who now demand the same type of relationships October 2015 V I D E O A G E Ten Steps to 2030 Advertising, Ad Agencies In Search Of The Critical Mass Barry Frey is president and CEO of the New York City-based Digital Place Based Advertising Association (DPAA) since May 2013. DPAA provides industry leadership to networks, technology, content and research companies, and connects the ecosystem to the advertising marketplace. DPAA’s annual Video Everywhere Summit is the premier conference dedicated to videomediaplanningandmarketer’suseofmulti- screen strategies. Before joining DPAA, Frey was chief revenue officer for Cablevision’s Digital and Advanced Bdvertising business. He was senior advisor for the Investment Bank, Sonenshine Partners and, earlier, he was managing director International Sales and Business Development, USANetworks and, previously, SVPMedia for the National Basketball Association, reporting to the NBA Commissioner. Barry Frey