Programmatic TV means different things: it refers to the fact of targeting an audience (even one TV viewer) with a personalised message (what we call "adressable TV"), but also to the automatisation of TV purchases (without the same RTB as in digital).
Those generalities actually all mean that TV is evolving, and everybody should adjust to the situation!
2014. That's the year when, in the UK, Sky launched AdSmart, which allowed advertisers to buy spots in real-time via their application, SkyGo. 3 years later, Sky said they'd love to make all their TV inventory available to programmatic, asap. Programmatic TV is definitively up and running in the UK!
So, what's exactly is the programmatic TV, according to Sky? Concretely, AdSmart allows advertisers to chose a particular audience, based on hundreds of criterias, so they can reach the best audience possible - it is even possible to personalise those segments and ask AdSmart to create a new one, just for you.
Today, SkyAdsmart is the most advanced and important adressable TV platform in Europe (Programmatic TV’s European Evolution – Enders Analysis). Seems legitimate then that it is being deployed in Italy, Ireland, Austria and Germany!
Germany. That's where another actor plays an important role in programmatic TV: SmartClip. It's one of the very first adressable TV platforms, created in 2014.
Thanks to their technology, only available on connected TV so far, a small personalised ad banner appears on the TV screen, in a sidebar. The TV-viewers are targeted thanks to a cuttind edge technology and anonymised data. The TV viewer is free to click on it if interested, or not, and the ad will disappear.
MCN (Multi Channel Network) launched a one of kind service in 2015, called MCN Programmatic TV. This platform allows advertisers to directly buy linear TV spots, exactly like they would buy in digital, from a special platform. It is even possible to buy a campaign targeting a specific audience, and touch a very precise public.
Moreover, MCN announced in November 2017 that it would launch SIA, which could be integrated to MCN in 2018 (TV, online, mobile, OOH) and the data of advertisers and agencies. This data management solution will deliver unique data, allowing advertisers to obtain a global view of their cross-canal strategies, and deliver the right message at the right audience, at the right moment.