CTV & Streaming

Connected TV strategy is maturing into a genuinely complex discipline, and this week's commentary from two prominent industry voices illustrated why. WPP's Puma argued that CTV demands a dual strategy — one that respects the scarcity and brand-safety premium of top-tier streaming inventory while also maintaining the programmatic agility to respond to shifting audience behavior. It's a both/and argument that pushes back against the tendency to treat CTV as either a pure brand medium or a pure performance channel.

IAB's Jamie Finstein went further, making the case that CTV and commerce are now inseparable conversations. As shoppable ad formats proliferate on streaming platforms and retail media networks extend into video, the line between a brand awareness impression and a commerce touchpoint is dissolving. For buyers navigating upfront negotiations, this convergence is both an opportunity and a complication — it demands new measurement frameworks, new creative formats, and new conversations with publishers who are themselves still figuring out how to package and price these hybrid units.