Financial services and food delivery advertisers are adapting their approach to programmatic sports buys using tech built for betting brands.
Genius Sports launched partnerships with DirecTV Advertising, Equativ, FreeWheel, Index Exchange, Magnite, OpenX, PubMatic and The Weather Company at the IAB NewFronts this week, allowing advertisers to use its ‘Moment Engine’ to direct advertising spend through their inventory and publisher networks.
The system pulls live sports data such as player-specific stats or scorelines from sports leagues like the NFL or NASCAR, and matches it with addressable live sports inventory – essentially enabling brands to target their CTV and display ads to specific in-game moments, such as following a touchdown, on the fly.
Tests first run with Magnite in February marked the first time the tech has been made available to brand advertisers.
Suzy Deering, CEO, Publicis Sports, said the service could provide clients with “unduplicated fan targeting when the fan is most engaged.”
The idea behind the tool isn’t just precision, but the use of emotional context. Combined with a “Fan Graph” assembled using data from sports venues, as well as transaction, search and media engagement signals, Genius claims the system can match ads to the emotional states of sports fans.
“We’re basically able to infer what fans care about and what the emotional state is of the fan at any given time,” said Josh Linforth, chief revenue officer of Genius Sports. He said it was too early to provide performance data from test campaigns.
Brands can set up automatic triggers that will bid for slots when certain conditions are met, meaning they can quickly take advantage of coverage likely to garner high attention from viewers. Genius already offers an AI-enabled dynamic content optimization (DCO) tool called Genius Creative, which can make context-appropriate edits to creative assets — allowing them to further capitalize on moments of high drama.
“By integrating these signals into our inventory we’re unlocking greater demand for our sports offerings, while delivering performance for brands and marketers,” said Drew Groner, svp, head of sales and marketing for DirecTV Advertising, in an email.
EMarketer analyst Marisa Jones said the system could provide advertisers with more certainty around live sports buys, which provide rare mass audiences – but carry the risk they’ll fail to spark viewers’ imagination.
“Live events have long been difficult to advertise around in the moments when fan engagement is highest because the action is inherently unpredictable,” she said in an email. “This announcement could move the needle for marketers who want to capitalize on the vast audience live sports offers but have struggled to turn real-time events into reliable, scalable opportunities.”
Brands using Moment Engine for targeting will be utilizing data and tech infrastructure originally built for sportsbooks and betting brands.
Linforth argued it had real applications for brands in other sectors. He said financial services, food delivery and consumer electronics brands had already begun testing the tech against streaming coverage of college basketball’s March Madness tournament, though he declined to name the clients and share pricing data for the tool.
As well as enabling brands to target high-attention moments, Linforth said the tool could help redirect spend to better options during boring patches of play. “If the pace of play is slow, I know that fans’ attentions are probably not on the screen – it’s probably on their phone,” he said.
Advertisers can currently use the targeting on display, online video and CTV inventory. Linforth said the tool would be available to use across Meta inventory by the second quarter of the year, pending an agreement with the social giant.
“Hopefully in Q2 we’ll be extending it out into social [and] we’ll have our first social campaigns running as well,” he said.
Genius said the tech would be available for use against coverage of the NBA Finals and the FIFA World Cup later this summer.
Joseph Dressler, svp of advertising solutions at PubMatic, suggested the targeting method could take the uncertainty out of tactical live sports buys. Advertisers are currently able to purchase specific ad slots or pods in the hope they can ride the coat-tails of the most exciting moments in a game, but typically do so through direct deals with media owners and far in advance of the game itself.
“That game could be a blowout, right? That game could be tied, that game could be canceled, you don’t know,” argued Dressler. Moment Engine, he said, allows buyers to push for those moments as they happened.
Though it was originally co-founded by Betgenius, a tech company supplying the gambling sector, Genius has been making inroads with brands beyond that industry for several years. It struck agreements with PMG and Publicis Groupe last year, and another with WPP Media in February.
“We are fortunate to have been early partners with Genius Sports, giving our clients first looks and access to breakthrough formats and live sports surfaces like this,” said Deering.