Kantar Media said it named Nicole Gileadi chief strategy officer and managing director, North America, a new position at the company.

Gileadi had been with Google, where whe was global product lead for cross media measurement and industry advocacy.

At Kantar Media, she will report to Global CEO Patrick Béhar and will lead the company’s innovation and growth strategy.

“This new role is a clear sign of our commitment to be at the forefront of innovation in measurement and our ambition to serve the content and advertising ecosystems, deepening our partnerships with broadcasters, digital platforms, advertisers and agencies, Béhar said. 

“Our clients and partners are central to everything we do – Nicole is perfectly placed to take our relationships to the next level. I am hugely excited Nicole is joining our global team, both to strengthen our partnerships globally and as our ambassador in the North American market,” Béhar said.

Gileadi joined Google in 2015. . She spearheaded Google’s involvement in advertiser-led cross-media measurement initiatives including those led by ISBA (UK), the ANA (USA) and the WFA.

“This is truly a unique moment in time to be joining Kantar Media as measurement systems evolve to capture a complete view of consumer behavior, leveraging the best of panels and big data for more accurate, privacy safe, cross-media measurement,” said Gileadi.  “I am most looking forward to leveraging my experience with Google, in conjunction with Kantar Media’s global leadership in audience measurement, to deliver trusted solutions that ultimately help Marketers and Agencies achieve their business objectives, both in North America and beyond.”

Kantar Media said it appointed Patrick Béhar as global CEO, effective September 2023.

Béhar is currently chief business officer for Comcast’s Sky Group. He succeeds Chris Allen, who has been leading the company since 2022 and will now focus on his role as CFO for Kantar Media.

“Patrick brings a unique combination of first-hand client experience in equipping media companies to grow in a cross-media age and deep global advertising expertise. His appointment will strengthen the Kantar Media leadership team,” said Adam Crozier, chairman of Kantar Media. “As we continue to drive our innovation agenda forward, I am confident he will fulfil the ambition we have for the business to cement its position, unlocking insight opportunities for our clients.”

Before Sky, Béhar led McKinsey’s European Consumer Tech and Media proactive.

“Media markets are undergoing unprecedented transformation, accelerated by new technologies and changing audience behaviors,” Béhar  said. “With the widest and most rapidly expanding cross-media audience measurement footprint, Kantar Media is at the forefront of this transformation, uniquely positioned to unlock audiences and drive growth and value for clients.  I’m looking forward to leading this amazingly talented team.”

RELATED:Campaign 2016’s Early Winner: Cable | Election 2016: The Apps Campaign

Next year is shaping up to set records for local cable political advertising, just as this year has been about presidential candidates drawing historic TV audiences to their debates.

The debate-viewing phenomenon started with interest in Donald Trump and has maintained momentum for both Republican and Democratic clashes. On the ad-sales side, the growth is driven by data, data and more data.

Kantar Media has estimated political candidates will spend about $4.4 billion on TV ads in 2016, with about $3.3 billion going to cable networks and $800 million of that earmarked for local cable ads, a 23% increase from the $650 million spent on local cable in 2012.

It seems that almost every candidate, regardless of political affiliation, is recognizing the value of local cable as a vehicle to get their message out to precisely those they want to hear it. President Obama’s campaign successfully tapped Rentrak set-top box data in 2008 and 2012 to figure out which shows and networks its voters were watching.

Now, according to Rentrak president of national television Chris Wilson, there is even more data to exploit.

Some candidates buy ads during the 4:30 a.m. local news, rather than in primetime, because the earlier broadcast has a higher concentration of the voters they want to reach, Wilson said.

Obama also taught campaigns to buy ads on multiple networks and in markets and on channels where no other spots from competing candidates are running. His 2012 campaign bought ad time on more than 100 networks, while other candidates averaged about 20 to 25.

“He went so much deeper,” Wilson said. “And he had 100% of the noise in areas where [Republican candidate Mitt] Romney didn’t run ads. Voters weren’t getting a counterpoint.”

At cable operator-owned NCC Media, director of political strategy Tim Kay said current campaigns so far are using, on average, 35 more networks than in 2011, including Food Network, HGTV, AMC and sports outlets.

In the past, local newscasts were a top priority. That isn’t necessarily the case anymore.

“They were looking for frequency and saturation in the marketplace,” Kay said. “Now, they’re looking for these nuggets of individual voters across the television networks. They’re finding they’re not watching the local news.”

Sports is a draw, especially for the live-viewing factor. Strong prospects include the NCAA men’s basketball tournament in March, typically followed in states with heated primaries, and Big Ten Network and SEC Network football in key states like Florida or Ohio ahead of the general election.

Comcast is continuing to offer household-addressable ads (currently within on-demand programs) and satellite-TV providers DirecTV and Dish Network are in the second year of D2, the household-addressable election ad program reaching into more than 20 million homes.

The 2014 races brought in ads from more than 175 campaigns, mostly in statewide races, while the two satellite-TV providers were focused on getting systems in place and raising interest, “which was easy,” Joe Hockenjos, vice president at AT&T AdWorks, said. (AT&T now owns DirecTV.)

Popular targets now include party-affiliated voters in Iowa and New Hampshire, he said. Some candidates weeks ago booked ad time via D2 in the two states right up to the New Hampshire Primary and Iowa Caucuses. Business is expected to be good at least through Super Tuesday on March 1, Hockenjos said. “For our product, it’s high, high demand,” he said.

Whereas candidates used to hold off until the primaries were coming up soon, they are booking well earlier, Kay said. During the 2014 midterm elections, some Republican candidates bought ads a year in advance.

“They’re trying to build up a message earlier to try to persuade the audiences,” Kay said of early ad buyers. “Those last few weeks that used to be about persuasion are now are about [voter] turnout.”

Kent Gibbons contributed to this story.

New figures from Kantar Media reinforce the notion that spending on television ads slowed during the third quarter.

Kantar says expenditures on TV ads rose 6.5% in the third quarter, reducing the rate of growth for 2014 to date to 7.1%.

Growth earlier in the year was boosted by big events including the Olympics and World Cup. 

Network TV was up just 0.2% in the quarter, dropping its year-to-date growth to 3%. Spending on cable ads was up 7.9% in the quarter, mirroring its growth for the full year. National syndication was up 1.6% in the quarter and 2% for the year.

Read more at B&C here. 

Cable saw strong a turnout among political campaign-ad buyers this midterm election season, helped by numerous close races for governor and senator and by candidates using selected cable networks, rather than just by buying ads on local newscasts, industry ad sellers said.

While total political-ad spending is lower when there’s no presidential election, cable is likely to bank as much in 2014 in ads as it did during the 2012 season, Dan Sinagoga, vice president of political advertising at Comcast Spotlight, the top cable company’s ad-sales division, said.

That’s been largely at the expense of local broadcasters, according to Sinagoga. He said the cable industry’s share of dollars spent on political ads will hit about 30% this cycle, continuing a trend that saw it take more than 20% in 2012.

Comcast also added more possible commercial minutes to the mix this time around by freeing up some of the “avails” — the 2 minutes per hour typically allotted to local ads — that would normally go to promoting its triple play, high-speed Internet or other services. “It will help us keep easily five to eight million additional dollars that we probably wouldn’t have been able to fit traditionally,” Sinagoga said.

Headed into this non-presidential election cycle, advertising tracker Borrell Associates had predicted cable networks would do $719.3 million in political ads. That would be 46% more than in the last midterm races, in 2010 ($492.7 million).

Tim Kay, director of political strategy at cable operator-owned NCC Media, cited Kantar Media’s forecast of $600 million to $800 million in local cable ad sales and said, “We’re definitely on the latter part of that number,” or above $700 million, headed into Election Day on Tuesday (Nov 4).

“What’s interesting is, we’ve run more commercials, as of two weeks ago, than in all of 2012,” he said.

Kay said most ads are still flowing to the big three favorites of Fox News Channel, CNN and ESPN. “But we’re seeing a lot of non-traditional networks pop up, such as TV Land and Bravo,” he added.

NCC bought a schedule of ads from CNN in October, which helped expand the inventory beyond the local-avail minutes. Kay would not reveal sales specifics but he said the number of political ads NCC placed on CNN were up from both 2012 and 2010.

Sports events have been big among political buyers, Kay said, especially National Football League games.

Sinagoga said Comcast saw gains on non-traditional political-ad outlets such as Animal Planet and Oxygen. “One of our hottest networks this year has been Hallmark [Channel], and that was never the case leading into 2012.”

As for hot markets, NCC’s Kay said noticeable spikes have come in Omaha, Neb., due to the state’s race for governor; in Colorado, with close contests for governor and U.S. senator; and in North Carolina, which has a tightly-contested U.S. Senate race.

Colorado, Texas (especially during this year’s primary elections), Illinois, Michigan, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Arkansas were all significant for Comcast this year, Sinagoga said.

Comcast also added an element to the on-demand programming mix this time by dynamically inserting advertising into programs addressed to individual households, Sinagoga said. That was a first step toward what the company expects will be household address-ability across its national footprint by the time the 2016 campaigns roll around. That “niche” product did well in Virginia, Florida, New Hampshire and Colorado, he said, and “is going to be a seven-figure addition to our overall pie.”

Just hours before it was scheduled to ring the opening bell at the NASDAQ Exchange today, measurement company Rentrak rang a few bells of its own, announcing that it has acquired the U.S. Television measurement business from Kantar Media for $98 million in stock and signing an exclusive deal with ad buyer Group M to become the local currency for its TV clients.

Both deals help solidify Rentrak as a solid player in the TV measurement business, a segment that has grown exponentially for the company since CEO Bill Livek joined the Portland, Ore., firm in 2009. The news also comes as Rentrak prepares for its annual Investor Day at NASDAQ headquarters in New York, beginning at 1 pm.

The Kantar transaction will only include the company's U.S. TV measurement business. As part of the deal, Rentrak will also integrate its national and local TV measurement with a number of Kantar’s U.S.-based services that focus on digital media, advertising expenditure and purchase data. The integration will provide advertisers, agencies, TV networks, multichannel video program distributors (MVPDs) and local television stations throughout the U.S. with tools to understand consumers’ purchasing habits and the ability to link TV viewing habits with purchase and other behavior in the United States.

“The combined expertise of Kantar and Rentrak will enable clients to better comprehend and leverage the relationship between United States TV viewing and brands,” said Kantar CEO Eric Salama in a statement. “We are excited about the future products that we can develop with Rentrak for the U.S. television industry.  Clients will benefit from our focus on respondent-level media and purchase data.”

The deal terms involve about 1.53 million Rentrak shares, or 12.4% of Rentrak’s total shares outstanding.  As part of the agreement, Kantar parent WPP will also purchase shares directly from the company for $56 million in cash, giving WPP a final ownership stake of 16.7% of Rentrak’s stock. WPP may also purchase Rentrak shares on the open market so long as its total ownership of Rentrak stock does not exceed 20%.

“This agreement is designed to help all of our U.S. agency and TV advertiser clients with new services in television measurement and consumer insights,” said Rentrak’s Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Bill Livek in a statement. “We are thrilled to be working with WPP and look forward to partnering with Kantar to provide the marketplace with the best next generation of services.”
Goldman, Sachs & Co. served as financial advisor to Rentrak.

With Group M, Rentrak adds its second top ad agency in a week -- it announced a deal with Zenith Media earlier -- to utilize its set-top box-based data.

GroupM manages $105 billion in media billings globally and serves as parent company to Mindshare, MEC, MediaCom and Maxus.  With this deal. Rentrak claims it has contracts with all of the largest agency holding companies.

“Rentrak is thrilled to work with GroupM and its agencies, and that they will use our services for the benefit of their clients,” Livek said in a statement. “This partnership will help our customers achieve maximum profitability.”

GroupM and its agencies will have full access to Rentrak’s TV viewing information and will, over time, use the data broadly. The agency will utilize the measurement company's advanced analytics in automotive and other categories on a local and national basis. On Demand and multi-platform data will be used to provide a more complete picture of television viewing patterns. In addition, Rentrak’s data will be used to quantify viewing levels in more than 200 networks that are not currently measured by the legacy sample currency, as well as in local markets.

“The proliferation of channels has so significantly fragmented audiences that legacy sample methodology simply can’t keep up,” said Irwin Gotlieb, global chairman of GroupM in a statement. “Television measurement needs to move toward census-based methodology. Our agencies are doing such refined targeting and segmentation, and that work can only be supported by census data. It is our hope that we can act as catalysts in moving the industry toward greater data reliability and accountability.”