If you work in media and don’t come across at least one “Streaming Wars” article each week, you are either doing something very right or very wrong. Since Disney+ was announced, there’s been great fanfare as to how it will affect the streaming landscape. Whether or not you believe it will steal share from Netflix, Amazon and Hulu or force them into adopting new business models, it’s been excellent fodder for media reporters.

It also brought back one of my all-time favorite headlines: “The Death of TV.” Oh, that old chestnut.

The Business of TV & Video Advertising, Explained

TV advertising once represented a world unto itself, distinct from other media channels. Audiences sat in front of their TV sets and watched programming at scheduled times. Commercials were sold by national broadcasters, local affiliates, cable networks, and distributors, usually on a GRP basis. Advertisers were content to leverage TV for reach — without drilling down into who exactly they were reaching. The vocabulary of TV advertising was insular and consistent.

As you know, that train has left the station.

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Between 1950 and 1970, the Big Three networks (namely CBS, NBC and ABC) accounted for 95% of primetime viewing, and the transaction layer of TV advertising was relatively simple. For the most part, you had only networks, agencies and brand marketers in the mix, not layer upon layer of intermediaries as we have now.

It might surprise you to hear that most linear TV sellers are still driving 80% to 90% of their topline revenue from traditional, Nielsen-measured TV. While the future of TV is surely audience-driven, data-heavy and technology-enabled, it’s coming at us in slow motion. Rome is falling but only one brick at a time.

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Transformed by changing audience behaviors and the proliferation of data on both sides of the value chain, the TV advertising industry is in flux. As a result of increasing complexity, television has gotten harder to buy and harder to sell.

I spent last week in London at the Future of TV Advertising Forum. These were the final days leading up to the election to determine the future of Brexit, and in speaking to British colleagues, I noticed a similar sentiment to what I hear in the U.S. about politics: fatigue. They had lost interest in the outcome and just wanted it to be over. 

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As the media landscape expands and the technical needs of organizations grow, partnering with highly specialized experts is increasingly necessary to succeed. The amount asked of individuals today is so much greater than it was in the past that having true domain expertise in every facet of your role is nearly impossible. But how do you ensure you’re working with the right people? With so much on the line, what steps can you take to set yourself up for success?

Below is a list of questions to ask yourself while engaging with outside resources to set your team up for success.

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Anyone who lived through the boom of digital video is sure to have opinions, memories, and potentially some nightmares of the creation, growth and eventual adoption of viewability. It was a necessary step but one that was wrought with loosely defined and adopted standards, competing “definitions” and, ultimately, heavy lift for operators and publishers.

And still, to this day, as Open Measurement comes to fruition with an ever-expanding set of delivery standards, there will be challenges ahead.

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The most important asset to any sales organization is talented salespeople. What’s their most important asset? Time.

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We all know that TV has gotten more complex—or, from my perspective, ripe with more opportunity. There are more commercial and distribution models than ever for TV (hello content!), which, in other industries, would spell opportunity to most incumbents with a strong portfolio of assets.