Amazon, Roku Strike Deal to Pool Streaming Audiences for Advertisers
Amazon and Roku are joining forces in an effort to boost digital ad sales by combining their addressable audiences. The collaboration between the two streaming giants will allow marketers to purchase impressions tied to Amazon’s Prime Video, Roku Channel, and other streaming services available on Roku and Fire TV operating systems through Amazon’s demand-side platform.
According to Kelly MacLean, a vice president at Amazon’s ad unit, the alliance aims to provide seamless access to logged-in users across major streaming apps. Early tests of the technology have shown that advertisers can reach 40% more unique viewers while reducing the frequency of a specific ad appearing in front of the same users by nearly 30%.
Roku and Amazon estimate that their partnership will make a pool of 80 million connected TV households in the U.S. accessible to advertisers. This collaboration comes at a time when Madison Avenue is facing an abundance of broadband TV inventory, largely due to the entry of Amazon and Netflix into ad-supported streaming. The focus of the partnership will be on programmatic advertising, which involves buying digital inventory based on algorithms that target specific consumer groups.
The combination of Roku and Amazon’s user bases in this deal is expected to increase the scale advertisers can achieve in a landscape where audiences are spread across various platforms. Jay Askinasi, Roku’s senior vice president of global media revenue and growth, believes that the partnership will lead to a better experience for marketers, consumers, and programmers on their platforms, offering more relevant ads, improved frequency management, increased addressability, and better measurement for programmer partners.
The integration of technology will allow Amazon’s DSP to identify logged-in viewers across the Roku operating system and devices in the U.S., enabling advertisers to target audiences more precisely. The new service is set to be available to all advertisers using Amazon DSP in the U.S. by the fourth quarter of 2025.
This strategic partnership between Amazon and Roku signifies a significant step in the evolution of digital advertising, offering advertisers enhanced targeting capabilities and a more seamless experience for consumers and programmers alike. The collaboration aims to streamline the ad buying process and maximize the impact of digital advertising campaigns across the rapidly expanding streaming landscape.
