Commentary

Media Insights Q&A With Mark Lieberman, CEO Of TRA

by Charlene Weisler , Op-Ed Contributor, March 17, 2010

Mark Lieberman, Chairman and CEO of TRA, is acutely aware of how the market valuates media and how advances in technology can help advertisers get more information about their media effectiveness. In my interview with him, Mark discusses TRA and how it provides greater insight into viewer behavior, how the TV currency is changing, the targeting of swing purchasers and the use of set top box data in measurement

Below is a short excerpt from the interview. Direct links to the full interview videos can be found at the WeislerMedia blog.

CW: What do you think the future is for television -- for broadcast and for cable?

ML: You know, I've been in this business for over 20 years and I have never seen a more exciting time with all of the disruptive technologies and disruptive business models. The Internet is now a stable platform. And certainly the change continues when it comes to advertising, with Over The Top Television and TV Everywhere. I think that the media companies are being smarter and not making the same mistakes as their brethren in the music industry made in terms of how one can create new business models around such things as TV Everywhere.

But we need to remember at the end of the day that the screen that is in your living room, which is getting larger and larger, is just a screen -- and the consumer really doesn't care how they get their content delivered. There is always going to be the need for compelling content such as the Olympics. People are always going to want to watch the Olympics on a big screen. How they got it, whether or not it was over the Internet and onto the big screen, remains to be seen.

I think the small screen is a lot different in terms of viewing experience. You don't want to watch a hockey game on the small screen, but you may want to watch some clips. You may want to watch some news broadcasts.

But at the end of the day, they all need to be measured, because if it is a free to the consumer service, it's got to be ad-supported. If it has to be advertising-supported, the advertiser wants to be comfortable and confident that the metrics can provide accountability for the ad dollars being spent and if they are reaching the right eyeballs.

CW: Mark, what are you working on now?

ML: For the past two-and-a-half years since we started the company and made it operational, we have been building our system from the ground up to be as flexible as possible. So one of the things that we have done is to create a system that not only has the ability to run ratings, audience measurement, but also enables you to understand ratings by network, ratings nationally, ratings locally and by stations.

However, we have always believed that ratings are necessary but not sufficient. When you can also match up to purchase data that provides the key differentiation to what makes the advertisers and the networks want, it can bring more accountability and stability to television advertising.

We designed the system to be massively scalable because as we add more data, we want to be able to scale quickly, to not have to change the software architecture. What we have done in the system is to also open up the application programming interfaces -- the APIs -- to the system to be integratable into third-party legacy systems: the media optimizer at an agency, an ad network that is built by some large advertising network. Because we have many active customers, we are working on a new set of features in the system around the ROI capability. We are also adding more databases to the system, other purchasing categories beyond CPG.

5 comments about "Media Insights Q&A With Mark Lieberman, CEO Of TRA".

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Mike Einstein from the Brothers Einstein, March 17, 2010 at 4:26 p.m.
That's quite a large rear-view mirror you've got there, Mark.
By the way, targeting, by design, sacrifices the opportunity to reach audience in scale. In fact, I defy you to cite one example of a targeted ad campaign that was "massively scalable" for anything other than Google's bottom line. Go ahead, name one...
There's nothing insightful about this insipid drivel. And who edited this thing?
Reply

Charlene Weisler from Writer, Media Consultant: WeislerMedia.blogspot.com, March 17, 2010 at 9:09 p.m.

Hi Mike,
In my opinion, your comment appears to be focused more of digital campaign targeting. What I have found in my years in television research is that "targeting" is relative.

On the internet it is possible to target one to one with some scalability. In television, targeting is a more generic term and can simply be a buy on several cable networks based on a demographic profile.

What we have lacked in television measurement in the past were systems that could easily combine currency ratings information with consumer usage data. That is being addressed now. I believe Nielsen has just made an announcement about merging consumer and ratings data. And there are other firms like TRA, TNS, Rentrak etc who are also involved in this effort.

Mike Einstein from the Brothers Einstein, March 18, 2010 at 9:43 a.m.

Hi Charlene,

My opinion is focused on and formed by an industry that keeps asking the wrong questions and getting the wrong answers as a result.

How many times have we heard this from the digerati: "Given the choiice, consumers prefer relevant ads over irrelevant ads."

But if we ask the right question first: "What kind of ads do consumers prefer?" any talk of ad relevance is rendered irrelevant, because in an on-demand world, no one demands more advertising, relevant or otherwise.

Companies like Mark's keep drilling down hoping to find some oil until they realize that there is none to be found and the only thing in sight that's scalable is the rest of the desert.

Charlene Weisler from Writer, Media Consultant: WeislerMedia.blogspot.com, March 18, 2010 at 7:22 p.m.

Hi Mike,
Good point. But it is irrelevant if consumers don't want to see advertising. Advertising funds the content and until we find another revenue model we will continue to drill down even if it doesn't always result in oil.

Mike Einstein from the Brothers Einstein, March 19, 2010 at 10:44 a.m.

Charlene,

I beg to differ. You're putting the cart before the horse again. Look at the assets involved and you will realize that for all business intents and purposes, it is not commercials between programs, but programs between commercials.

And I'll prove it right here and now by asking you two simple questions: 1) Have you seen a commercial for McDonald's or WalMart recently? 2) What program did you see it in?

See what I mean?

I used to handle local TV advertising for a big furniture store in Hawaii. Every day people would come into the store asking to see the item featured in our commercial the night before. As often as not, those folks were referring to an item they'd seen in a competitor's commercial. The bottom line is they didn't even know what store they were in, let alone what program they were watching when they decided to check out that cool loveseat.

Remember, Starkist doesn't want tunas with good taste, they want tunas that taste good.