• by Wayne Friedman , June 18, 2019

Looking to access more granular audience targeting, NCC Media -- the locally based cable TV advertising sales group -- has announced a partnership with OpenAP, the national consortium of TV networks.

The groups say the deal “simplifies and improves advertisers' ability to reach unified audiences across broadcast, cable and digital TV” by getting access to OpenAP's advanced audience segments.

Executives believe going beyond broad-based age and gender demographics to more granular audience targets will increase marketers’ media efficiencies and improve business outcomes.

NCC Media’s footprint now totals 85 million households -- when looking at a combination of linear, VOD and addressable inventory.

NCC Media is owned by Comcast Corp., Charter, and Cox Communications.

OpenAP partners include NBCUniversal, Viacom, Fox Corp, and Univision.

BIA Advisory Services estimates total U.S. local cable advertising revenues grew slightly last year -- from $6.8 billion (2017) to $6.9 billion (2018). In 2018, advertisers placed more than $2 billion in revenue on NCC.

Buying through NCC Media, advertisers can access up to 60 networks where marketers' campaigns can target local markets. NCC’s digital media partners include Verizon FiOS, Dish Network, Sling TV, DirecTV, DirectTV Now, Sony Playstation Vue, Tubi and Pluto TV.

NCC Media and OpenAP say this is the first of several new data and measurement programs the two are developing.