• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, March 27, 2025

Dealer Stream, a streaming ad company for the automotive industry, announced Thursday an exclusive partnership with Blockboard, a programmatic advertising platform, to eliminate streaming advertising waste for franchise automotive dealerships.

Fractured platforms and siloed data have left dealerships unsure whether anyone is seeing their ads on different streaming platforms, Owen Moon, chief executive officer and co-founder of Dealer Stream, told MediaPost. The idea is to move outdated over-the-top (OTT) streaming strategies to the next generation.

“I grew up in this space, with 25 years in automotive,” Moon said, “I’m an ad guy. I came into this space before the internet with television, newspapers and radio. The only thing we had was an emotional connection.”

He said the partnership combines the emotional impact that comes from television with digital targeting, such as with paid search and Facebook

Early tests of this partnership showed a 30% lift in result compared with using older platforms, he said, because it can see real traffic, not fraud.

“We were not able to account for all of the results and know the ads were reaching real people,” Moon said.

Franchise dealerships through Dealer Stream can now use Blockboard’s blockchain technology to verify every connected television (CTV) and online video (OLV) ad buy is served to an actual human within the hyper-targeted geographical zip code required for effective dealership marketing and advertising.

Dealer Stream is changing how franchise dealerships and groups buy streaming advertising. Blockboard, as the underlying demand side platform (DSP), lets Dealer Stream offer clients media waste detection, log-level reporting, and essential capabilities, such as audience-targeted programmatic ad buying, is unparalleled in the advertising industry.

Transparency improves with this partnership. Dealer Stream's Blueprint Reporting Platform lets dealerships delve into the data in campaigns via Blockboard's log-event reporting. It offers pre- and post-campaign verification using blockchain technology that allows advertisers to track campaign performance in real-time. Initial tests lowered CPMs while doubling qualified website visits and increasing household reach.

And, as artificial intelligence becomes more prevalent in automotive, “fraud will get a lot worse,” added Matt Wasserlauf, chief executive officer and co-founder of Blockboard.