The Unruly Blog

We’ve all seen the headlines stating that CTV (Connected TV) viewership is on the rise. However, most of us knew that even before the trade press began reporting on it, just from the amount of time we’ve spent in front of our TV sets over the past year. Many of us initially saw lockdown as an opportunity to read through all those books we’ve been putting off, to finally learn how to play an instrument, or to fix all those half-finished DIY projects around the house. However, for most of us, the reality was that rather than funnelling our spare time into new ventures, we sought comfort from things that had previously brought us joy. For many Brits, this was scrolling social media feeds, playing video games and

Supply and demand path optimization (SPO/DPO) are not exactly the latest or the sexiest topics. They seem to have taken a back seat recently, being overshadowed by the death of the cookie, privacy concerns and the rise of CTV. Yet, the importance of these initiatives can’t be overlooked for both the buy and the sell sides of the industry. During a recent panel discussion at the Programmatic Summit in Sydney, I sat down with Jason Denny, GM Commercial Operations at NewsCorp, and Flaminia Sapori, Head of Partnerships at Matterkind, to dig into how they are embracing these initiatives and what they are looking for from partners to drive value for their businesses. Historically, demand or supply-side optimization have been about shedding light on the ‘black box’, focusing on

With more than 240 million Muslims living across South-East Asia, Ramadan is one of the biggest advertising events of the calendar year. But what is the best way for brands to engage consumers during this month-long festival? Well, to help advertisers ahead of this year’s celebration, leading ad platform Unruly has analysed some Ramadan campaigns from last year using its content testing tool UnrulyEQ to examine what worked – and what didn’t. The results were then compared to Unruly’s database of thousands of ads to examine viewers’ emotional responses and their impact on various brand and business metrics. Here are the five important takeaways:   1.Tap into emotional trends Ramadan creatives certainly pack an emotional punch – and are considerably more likely to make people feel emotional than

Global ad fraud intelligence and marketing compliance platform Pixalate has named Unruly as the number 1 direct CTV supply partner among Roku’s key app categories in the ad industry’s first-ever CTV app-ads.txt report.  Importance of direct relationships  Connected TV (CTV) consumption has been growing at an exceptional rate, leading to CTV apps battling it out for consumers’ attention.   The battle, however, not only lies between the CTV apps themselves but between advertisers who are competing to get their products and services in front of the right consumers.  As a result, direct relationships with major CTV apps have never been more important.   Advertisers, CTV apps and consumers all benefit from direct integrations, and ultimately these relationships create a better online advertising experience and environment.  They are also an important building block in fostering greater trust and transparency within this fast-growing area of the ad tech ecosystem.  With direct relationships with some of the world’s fastest-growing CTV apps, including Xumo, Pluto TV, Newsy, and FuboTV, it’s something we’ve always prided ourselves on at Unruly.  So we’re delighted to be named the number 1 direct CTV supply partner among Roku’s key apps in Pixalate’s report.    What finishing number one means  Pixalate’s CTV App Ads.txt Report analyzes the state

If the past 12 months have done anything it’s reminded us just how human we are. Stripped of human to human interaction, the global pandemic has brought us more in touch with our own humanity, whether it’s through the desire to perform random acts of kindness, reaching out to people, or embracing technology to help us cope with the challenges that the ‘new normal’ brings. Yet, this new connected world is by no means equal. Dr. Bridgette Bewick, Associate Professor in Psychological Health and Wellbeing at the University of Leeds (UK) School of Medicine, recently stated “The digital world is pervasive but most of us have not been trained in how to manage the digital environment”. As human beings, we thrive on meaningful interactions, and during these prolonged

We laughed, we cried…a lot of beer and chips were consumed.  Super Bowl LV may be done and dusted, but apart from Tom Brady winning his seventh ring after inspiring the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to victory against the Kansas City Chiefs, what else did we learn from the strangest Super Bowl Sunday in history?  Traditionally the Super Bowl is the biggest advertising event in the US and global calendar.   But Super Bowl LV generated as many headlines for those who chose not to be at the Big Game as those who decided to be there, with the likes of Coca-Cola, Ford and Budweiser all taking a back seat this year.  So, what did they miss? Well, Unruly tested the big ads from Super Bowl LV using our content testing tool, UnrulyEQ.   Here are our key takeaways:  Brand performance was higher than any other Super Bowl in recent memory While some of the traditional big names chose to skip this year’s Super Bowl, there was a welcome surprise for those first-time advertisers who decided to step into the big, empty football boots.  That’s because the 2021 crop of Super Bowl ads generally fared much better than any in the last five years (at least since Unruly has been testing the

It’s the Year of the Ox and emotions are running high. Which New Year’s ads generated the most smiles, laughs, and tears? In the run-up to the Lunar New Year, we used our emotional content testing tool, UnrulyEQ, to discover how festive ads were being received by audiences across Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong and Vietnam.  The results were then compared to our database of thousands of ads to examine viewers’ emotional responses and the impact they had on various brand and business metrics.  Head over to our Lunar New Year Ad Hub to check out the results for all the ads we tested.  As the number 8 is recognised as an auspicious number in modern Chinese culture, we’ve put together a quick read of our Top 8 Lunar New Year Ads of 2021!  We’ve ranked them by their EQ Score — a composite score based on the intensity of emotions viewers felt while watching, plus a campaign’s ability to drive brand metrics such as brand favorability and purchase

As connected TV (CTV) advertising continues to grow, so do the terms associated with it. Ad podding is one such term that has begun to attract a lot of attention recently. But what exactly does it mean? We teamed up with CTV platform Publica to bring you this overview of ad podding, including what it is, why it’s become so popular and how both publishers and advertisers are using it to their advantage. What are ad pods? Ad pod is a term used in connection with CTV advertising to specify multiple ads sequenced together and played back-to-back within a single ad break, like traditional linear TV. They allow publishers to return multiple ads from a single ad request, and then those ads are played in sequence. Say you’re

With 80% of the stands empty, some of the world’s biggest brands including Budweiser, Hyundai and Coca-Cola not taking part in the commercial breaks, and parties not able to go ahead, this year’s Super Bowl is going to feel vastly different to anything that has come before. One thing that may be familiar, though, is the tone that advertisers will take. In times of economic uncertainty and political/ social turbulence, we often look to brands to cheer us up. Our research on changing consumer habits during COVID-19 found that 37% of Americans want ads to make them feel warm and happy. This is particularly true when it comes to the Super Bowl, with funny, celeb-heavy ads as much a part of the Big Game as touchdowns and Hail