• by Wayne Friedman , 8 hours ago

In what the companies say gives brands access to the “largest authenticated CTV footprint in the U.S.,” Roku and Amazon Ads have announced a major premium streaming ad-inventory integration exclusively through the Amazon DSP.

The two streaming businesses say this will allow advertisers to reach more than 80% of U.S. connected TV (CTV) households -- the companies' Roku and Amazon streaming advertising inventory as well as other top streamers -- via Amazon's in-house demand-side platform.

This includes not only the companies' respective Roku Channel and Prime Video, but other premium CTV services on the Roku and Amazon Fire TV streaming distributors’ operating systems: streamers owned by Walt Disney, Paramount Global, Warner Bros. Discovery, Fox Corp.'s Tubi, and many other premium publishers.

The actual launch of the effort will begin in the fourth quarter of this year.

According to initial tests from the businesses' new advertising effort, the combination of Roku and Amazon data helped brands increase their return on media investment by three times -- as well as reaching 40% more unique viewers with the same budget.

The claim is that the partnership can achieve reach with more precision that is measurable at “every stage of the customer journey” and offers better control of advertising frequency.

Over the past two years, Roku has been focused on expanding its partnerships with third-party DSP platforms -- including The Trade Desk, Google’s Display & Video 360, and Yahoo.

The Amazon DSP itself has been aggressive with expanding its ability to give advertisers much more CTV inventory access outside Amazon-owned streaming video platforms.

Analysts say growth of the Amazon DSP means increased competition for demand-side platform The Trade Desk, which has seen its business soar in recent years partly as a result of strong CTV advertising business.

With regard to specific details of a deal, the companies say the integration uses a “custom identity resolution service” that allows Amazon DSP to recognize logged-in viewers across the Roku operating services and its devices in the U.S.