Comcast plans to launch a brand new promoting platform that may make it easier for smaller businesses to purchase promoting time — and, the corporate hopes, will lure some advertisers away from social media and digital channels and toward traditional television's streaming businesses.
On Monday, Comcast announced the launch of Universal Ads, a brand new platform for advertisers to buy spots for premium video content on traditional media corporations' streaming properties. The announcement comes ahead of the annual CES technology conference in Las Vegas.
Comcast has partnered with other media corporations that give advertisers the chance to purchase spots on different networks. So far, Comcast-owned NBCUniversal and ad-supported streamer Xumo are a part of the platform, as is A+E, AMC NetworksDirecTV, Fox Corp., Paramount, YearTelevisionUnivision and Warner Bros. Discovery. More are expected to be added in the approaching months.
“Universal Ads is designed to create new demand from advertisers who have not traditionally worked with us,” said Mark Marshall, chairman of world promoting and partnerships at NBCUniversal, CNBC’s parent company. “And as we start streaming and [small- and medium-sized businesses]in a future state this may apply to both linear and agency.”
Universal Ads, launching in the primary quarter, is designed to make it easier for advertisers of all sizes and shapes to purchase promoting time, in comparison with buying ads for platforms resembling: B. generally is a notoriously complicated process Meta, YouTube and TikTok, said James Rooke, president of Comcast Advertising. It is designed to mimic the technique of buying ads on social media content and technology platforms.
“It's concerning that there are a large number of advertisers who have built or started their business based on social video,” Rooke said. “But as you talk to these advertisers, there is a growing desire to diversify away from a very limited number of large technology companies.”
Rooke said the challenge is that these big tech corporations “make transactions on their platforms very easy,” while this just isn’t the case with traditional media or so-called premium content.
Marshall said he and Rooke had been in discussions in recent months about learn how to create “new demand opportunities” for non-traditional advertisers.
Comcast developed the free self-service platform with the assistance of its ad tech company FreeWheel. Many of the partners already registered are FreeWheel customers.
There are also plans to supply free, automated artificial intelligence tools to assist create the ads, which may pose one other problem for smaller businesses.
“Universal Ads has a tremendous opportunity to take market share from our competitors in a unique and collaborative way that will fundamentally change the advertising landscape,” Marshall said.
Go on the offensive
The media industry goes through a time of turmoil as consumers have increasingly gravitated toward streaming services and turned away from traditional television.
However, this content is much more dwarfed by time spent on social media and technology platforms. Accordingly, YouTube continues to take up a big portion of television time Nielsen. Younger generations are increasingly using social media like TikTok.
Streaming services, from Netflix According to NBCUniversal's Peacock, they’re placing increasing emphasis on promoting to realize profitability. Streamers have captured a bigger share of ad dollars in recent quarters, but that pales as compared to the tech giants' ad revenue.
Marshall noted that social media has “taken on immense proportions” in the case of the variety of advertisers interested in the technology platforms.
“Take Meta for example. They have over 10 million advertisers spending on search and social, whereas NBCUniversal only has it in the thousands,” Marshall said.
While GroupM, WPP's media investment group, described television as “the most effective form of advertising”. Current reportThe company expects the segment to grow lower than 2% in 2025 to total $169.1 billion in global promoting revenue.
Advertising revenue for “Pure Play Digital,” which excludes the streaming arms of traditional media but includes platforms like YouTube and TikTok, is predicted to grow 10% globally to $813.3 billion in 2025, based on GroupM estimates.
According to eMarketer, U.S. social media promoting spending is estimated to be $90.35 billion in 2024, up about 19% year-over-year, and is predicted to succeed in $90.35 billion in 2025 rising one other 13.6% to $102.66 billion.
While industry executives expect the promoting marketplace for traditional media corporations to stabilize in 2025, trends from previous years are also expected to proceed – meaning digital media promoting budgets will proceed to dwarf traditional media.
“You can continue to compete in a shrinking market, or you can go on the offensive and go where the growth is,” Rooke said. “We need to fish in the ponds where there is growth.”
Major advertisers and types still spend heavily on traditional media in the case of live sports and events. Fox executives said the corporate has already sold out February's Super Bowl ads allegedly cost about $7 million each. The college football season, particularly with the expanded College Football Playoff format, has also brought significant promoting revenue.
The key to the Universal Ads platform has been working with other media corporations, Rooke said, to present a unified front in an try and attract more promoting dollars from digital platforms.
“In recent years, single advertising platforms and walled gardens have created barriers for small and medium-sized businesses that lack the resources needed to effectively manage multiple platforms,” said Amy Leifer, chief promoting sales officer at DirecTV.
Leifer, together with executives from NBCUniversal, Warner Bros. Discovery and Fox, emphasized the importance of reaching small and medium-sized businesses as advertisers.
“The idea of empowering small and medium-sized businesses to engage with audiences through premium content, particularly on connected TV, fits perfectly with the growing demand for flexibility and efficiency in ad buying,” said Ryan Gould, Executive Vice of Warner Bros. Discovery President of Streaming, Digital and Advanced Advertising Sales.
Media executives recently told CNBC that traditional linear television remains to be a very important channel for advertisers since it reaches more demographics than social media. They also noted that linear and streaming are not any longer viewed in numerous contexts and grouped together in conversation.
Advertisers searching for platforms outside of social media are “looking for a new product because they're finding that the returns from the existing channels are kind of diminishing,” Rooke said.
“They don’t have a new audience anymore,” he said.
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