Political campaigns helped pioneer data-infused TV audience buying across the last Presidential cycle. But now the actual TV buying platforms are starting to catch up with the analytics. Both programmatic and addressable TV are emerging opportunities for campaigns to minimize waste and hyper-target their media buys this year. But what really is available in given markets? How should buyers apportion their spend? How do each of these advanced TV buying approaches map against specific audiences, messaging, and goals? The TV landscape suddenly has become as promising as it is complicated.

Google’s got its Customer Match. Facebook’s selling political “influencer targeting.” BuzzFeed will build native video ads for you. Twitter’s #cashtag tweets for contributions. And Snapchat has – well - whatever the heck those press-and-play spots are. The big digital guns have taken aim at your campaign coffers this season with a new crop of political marketing products that claim to reach the unreachable, awake the apathetic, keep the base energized. We ask our panel of media buyers for their snap judgments. Which of these bright shiny objects is proving effective, scalable, manageable? Or are they just distractions from the digital tactics that are worth your time, or from other new tools you may not have heard about yet?

Political ad spending in 2016. Billions of dollars will be poured into different media outlets both big and small, national and local – but where can we expect the money to be going specifically? Does it take more or less ad money to run for Governor or for the U.S. Senate? And what media outlets are going to grab big shares of these dollars? By tracking ad dollars and evaluating projection models, we can get a close look at where all this money is going – and who stands to benefit. Furthermore, we will take a glimpse at 2020 to see how the landscape will change – and if the titans of political advertising will fall.