Kroger Precision Marketing enters CTV advertising partnership

The Kroger Co.’s retail media business is teaming up with sell-side advertising platform Magnite to bring connected TV (CTV) streaming video advertising to its CPG partners.

New York-based Magnite said its platform will enable Kroger Precision Marketing (KPM) to package first-party data with premium omnichannel inventory, primarily with CTV but also display and online video formats. Advertisers can buy CTV and video inventory enriched with KPM first-party data through the buy-side tools of their choosing.

“With people consuming more TV hours through connected devices, brands need access to retail sales data in the programmatic CTV environment,” Michael Schuh, vice president of media strategy and program development at Kroger Precision Marketing, said in a statement. “We’re excited to be working with Magnite to provide brands with a centralized access point to video and CTV inventory. We expect this collaboration will help solve for supply fragmentation and bring scale for CPG advertisers who are looking to activate on CTV.”

And that KPM data is valuable for CPG brands. The nation’s largest supermarket operator, Cincinnati-based Kroger serves more than 60 million households annually through its 2,700-plus stores, digital properties and brands. Eighty-two percent of Kroger’s customers live within five miles of one of its stores, with most living within two miles, and the retailer covers 98% of the households in its market area with e-commerce services. 

Related:Kroger gives boost to CPG online ad campaigns

Magnite said it reaches 80 million CTV households in the United States and nine out of 10 viewers of ad-supported TV.

“The rapid growth of Kroger Precision Marketing speaks to the incredibly valuable position they occupy in the market and the opportunity ahead for retail media,” coimmented Sean Buckley, chief revenue officer at Magnite. “We are excited to be working closely with the Kroger retail media team to help enable their rich first-party data and unlock new opportunities to provide in-market audiences at scale across ad formats for brands.”

KPM applies data science to connect CPG brands with targeted households. The retail media network sells self-service advertising on Kroger digital properties, managed-service advertising through publisher collaborations, and programmatic advertising through its private marketplace. KPM was formed by Kroger data analytics subsidiary 84.51° in October 2017 as a way to develop more relevant customer campaigns across Kroger’s digital ecosystem. 

Magnite also recently announced an agreement with LG Ads Solutions to bring automatic content recognition (ACR) and inventory from LG smart TVs together with Magnite's offering.

Related:Kroger debuts private ad marketplace for CPGs

"Infusing premium CTV inventory with Kroger’s first-party retail data will be a huge opportunity for advertisers and we’re supportive of this trend across the retail media landscape,” stated Raghu Kodige, CEO of LG Ads Solutions, based in Mountain View, Calif. “Expanding access to CTV audience data and unifying it with purchase data in privacy-compliant ways will support improved planning, activation and measurement.”