Future of TV Briefing: Netflix’s in-house ad platform launch has led some advertisers to double spend

Netflix’s move to take its ad platform in-house last year is paying off.

Nearly a year after introducing its in-house ad platform called Netflix Ads Suite (NAS), the expanded targeting and measurement capabilities have led to increases in advertisers’ spending on the streaming service, according to agency executives.

Multiple agency execs, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that in some cases advertisers’ spending amounts on Netflix have doubled and that NAS has led some advertisers to start buying ads on Netflix.

“Our two largest brands each increased by 50% or more year over year in spend there,” said one agency executive.

Other agency executives declined to discuss specific figures but acknowledged increases in spending since Netflix rolled out NAS last April.

“Investment is definitely going up, especially in Q4 and Q1. We’re starting to see more investment in Netflix than we were earlier last year,” said Harry Browne, vp of TV, audio and display innovation at Tinuiti.

“As we integrate [Netflix] with our data stack, I think it naturally will just create growth. I don’t think [the introduction of NAS] was like a ‘go’ button. I think it was opening a larger stream,” said Carrie Drinkwater, chief investment officer at Dentsu’s Carat.

“Unlocking measurement has unlocked confidence in [Netflix],” said Doug Paladino, senior director of CTV and programmatic strategy at PMG. He added, “As they’ve opened up more measurement partners and they’re adopting our preferred sources of truth, then we can see how they’re performing relative to other partners, and have data to prove that you should increase investment there. That’s been happening.”

The successful transition from relying on Microsoft’s ad tech to Netflix’s own in-house ad platform has coincided with the growth of Netflix’s ad-supported audience as well as a pruning of its ad prices. Netflix’s ad-supported audience in the U.S. totals 57 million monthly active viewers, the company has told agency executives this year. And CPMs for non-targeted in-stream ads has dropped to the low-$20s, sometimes even going sub-$20, said the execs who asked to remain anonymous.

A Netflix spokesperson said the 57 million U.S. ad-supported viewer stat comes from Nielsen and that the company’s ad prices have changed over the years and the recent change is not attributable to NAS.

NAS is having a clear positive impact on Netflix’s ad business, nonetheless. And the reasons why are pretty clear.

“The full targeting-measurement integration really was the gateway to help create more revenue for them and more opportunities for us,” Drinkwater said.

“I wouldn’t call what they were running before ‘programmatic.’ It executed through [demand-side platforms], but it didn’t bring the promise of programmatic: targeting, measurement capabilities,” said Paladino.

For example, advertisers can buy Netflix’s inventory through third-party demand-side platforms like The Trade Desk and Yahoo DSP, and they can target those ads based on standard parameters, like geography, as well as proprietary segments based on people’s viewing behaviors, such as the programming genres they watch.

“The main unlock that I want from them they [now] have, which is: ‘Let me send you an audience and tell me everything that you know about them. What are they watching? What genres do they over-index for? What interests do they over-index for? Which upcoming shows that have season 2 coming out do they over-index for that I might want to sponsor?’ They’ve giving me all that now, plus lookalikes,” said Paladino, referring to lookalike targeting, or the ability to take a defined target audience and find audiences that share similar characteristics for expanded reach.

More recently Netflix has been testing with advertisers its data clean room, which the company announced last spring during its upfront presentation.

Tinuiti has been testing Netflix’s clean room via clean room provider Snowflake since last year “to bring deterministic, one-to-one attribution to Netflix, which previously was not possible,” Browne said, noting the testing has resulted in “really promising outcomes.”

“We’ve seen some really strong cost-per-visit, cost-per-acquisition throughout the funnel for a number of advertisers that have actually been beating some of the performance metrics that we see for those industries,” Browne said.

For as much progress as Netflix has made in the past year, though, it’s still got some work to do. The clean room option, for example, remains in a testing phase. And while Netflix has expanded its roster of measurement vendors to include the likes of iSpot.tv, the list does not encompass each and every vendor an agency may employ. 

“They have a vendor in each category, but it might not be my vendor in each category. For example, some of our [quick-service restaurant] brands have a particular vendor that we’re using to [de-duplicate] store visits across every platform that we’re running across. Netflix integrated with a different one. They can report store visits, but it’s not de-duped alongside the rest of our media,” Paladino said.

Having said that, a year ago Paladino wouldn’t necessarily have been able to say that much. And Netflix has been working to fill any remaining gaps in its platform, and agency execs are taking note.

“They’ve checked the box with something in each category and now are going back and adding numbers two and three in each category. So they’re getting there,” he said.

“Having their new ad tech in place has allowed us to have greater not only insight but also collect better data to help us be smarter and help us grow our business. So we’ll take as much data as we can get, especially in premium content. There’s nothing better,” Drinkwater said.

What we’ve heard

“I ultimately decided to sever my relationship with Hootsuite as well, because I just couldn’t find any reason why I would continue to support a brand that I personally could not connect.”

— B2B creator Tameka Bazile on the Digiday Podcast

Numbers to know

54%: Percentage share of U.K. viewers who watch YouTube on a TV screen.

25 million: Number of paid subscribers that Snapchat has.

23.5 million: Average number of people who tuned into NBCUniversal’s Winter Olympics live coverage during the afternoon and primetime programming blocks.

125.6 million: Final number of people who watched this year’s Super Bowl after an earlier error by one of Nielsen’s big data measurement vendors.

-11%: Percentage year-over-year decline in TelevisaUnivision’s U.S. ad revenue in the fourth quarter of 2025.

What we’ve covered

What’s behind Netflix’s CTV market share jump?:

• According to WARC, the streamer’s share of the global CTV ad market is set to more than double in size this year, rising from 3.7% at the end of 2025 to 9.2% by 2027.
• Three years on, Netflix’s ad business accounts for 3.3% of its total revenue and brought in $1.5 billion last year.

Read more about Netflix’s CTV ad growth here.

Why some creators are re-auditing their brand deals after Hootsuite-ICE controversy:

• B2B creator Tameka Bazile joined the Digiday Podcast to discuss how she handles situations when a brand she has worked with runs afoul of her own ethics.
• Bazile has implemented a brand audit, going through brand deals from the year to ensure she isn’t inadvertently associated with companies that conflict with her values or audience expectations.

Listen to the latest Digiday Podcast episode here.

Why Amazon believes its premium streaming inventory is worth the money:

• The latest pitch deck for Amazon’s DSP talks up its more than 800 free ad-supported streaming television (FAST) channels and notes that advertisers can reach more than 55 million monthly viewers.
• Netflix partnered with Amazon last September to make its ads more accessible via the platform’s DSP.

Read more about Amazon’s streaming pitch here.

WTF is a creator capital market?:

• A creator capital market is a way for creators to engage with and monetize their fans through crypto tokens or meme coins.
• Given the track record of cryptocurrency and NFTs, the ethics around creator capital markets seem murky.

Read more about creator capital markets here.

Creators eye Snapchat as a reliable income alternative to TikTok and YouTube:

• For some creators, Snapchat has become a bigger and more consistent revenue source compared to larger platforms like YouTube.
• The platform paid out half a billion dollars to its creators last year.

Read more about creators on Snapchat here.

What we’re reading

WBD’s competing takeover bids:

Paramount Skydance has upped the ante in its latest bid for WBD, topping Netflix’s $27.75 deal and potentially triggering a four-day window for Netflix to improve its bid if WBD decides Paramount’s is the better offer, according to CNBC.

Paramount’s WBD bid legal tactics:

Paramount appears to be trying to exploit a regulatory loophole to snatch up WBD before regulators can issue a challenge, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

OpenAI’s Hollywood envoy:

OpenAI has hired former Instagram exec Charles Porch to lead its efforts to cozy up to entertainment companies, according to Vanity Fair.

Netflix’s video podcast ultimatum:

In licensing video podcasts, Netflix has been forbidding podcasters to upload new episodes to YouTube, according to Deadline.

Peacock’s subscription resale play:

NBCUniversal is planning to sell add-on subscriptions to specialty streamers through Peacock, a la Amazon’s Prime Video Channels program, according to Business Insider.