Future of TV Briefing: Trump’s tariffs are making flexibility an upfront focal point yet again

This week’s Future of TV Briefing looks at how the mounting economic uncertainty has started to color considerations heading into this year’s TV and streaming upfront negotiations.

• The F-word
Is the currency changeover over?
Tariffs and Hollywood, tariffs and TikTok, TikTok and Amazon and more

The F-word

I get that the advertising market is cyclical. But could it not have taken a little longer until the economic uncertainty narrative came back around to cloud the annual upfront negotiations? Alas, here we are.

President Donald Trump’s tariffs have begun to cast a pall over this year’s upfront, as they have over the ad market more broadly.

“In January-February, it felt a lot hotter in terms of the upfront and how much people were going to spend. All the numbers and projections were very healthy and strong. I think since a lot of the tariff stuff has hit, people are a little more cautious now,” said one agency executive.

While upfront ad buyers and sellers alike still said they expect advertisers to commit more money with TV network and streaming services in this year’s upfront market than they did a year ago, they couched their expectations by saying how things could change. And they almost universally uttered that term that has become an upfront fixture since 2020.

“I do think fluidity of budget is going to be more important this year,” said a second agency executive.

“‘Flexibility’ is the word we like to say,” said a third agency executive.

“We expect to have a lot of conversations about flexibility given the current economic climate,” said Kym Frank, svp of ad sales research and data at Fox, in an on-stage session during the Coalition for Innovative Media Measurement’s CIMM East event, which was streamed live on April 8.

Yup. Flexibility seems primed to be a focal point of the upfront. As it was in 2020. And 2021. And 2022. And 2023. In fact, flexibility is already popping up in pre-upfront conversations.

“We’re getting more and more [advertiser] categories asking for flexibility, led by pharma because of the uncertainty related to the [Trump] administration,” said one TV network executive, referring to the potential for Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to ban pharmaceutical advertising on TV.

As in recent years, the flexibility conversations are fixating around advertisers’ upfront cancelations. 

Tl;dr the upfront hinges on advertisers and agencies committing to spend [insert big number] dollars with a given TV network over the coming year, with the option of canceling some percentage of that spending on a per-quarter basis so long as the cancelation is requested by a certain time before the quarter begins. The cancelation options range from the more rigid – no more than 15% cancelable with requests required at least 60 days before a quarter begins – to the more flexible – 50% cancelable with 30 days notice. The options vary by ad buyer and seller, but on the whole, they have been bending toward more flexibility since 2020. 

Two TV network executives said they expect advertisers and agencies to seek the option to cancel 100% of an upfront commitment up to 30 days before a quarter begins. The sellers don’t expect to agree to that extreme level of flexibility, but that’s the initial volley they’re anticipating. 

In response, the sellers plan to pivot the demand for flexibility toward fluidity of spending. In other words, companies that own traditional TV networks and streaming services being more willing to allow ad dollars to float between the two property types if it means keeping that money within their coffers. And, it means programmatic being even more of a path for how upfront dollars get spent, as covered in last week’s Future of TV Briefing.

All of this may sound familiar. More flexible cancelation options, inventory fluidity, programmatic acceptance – these were hallmarks of pre-upfront conversations in 2023when the clouds of economic uncertainty hovered around the marketplace. Again, the ad market is cyclical.

What we’ve heard

“Basically, nothing is really changing about anything, other than that I can just say I have more views now.”

— YouTube creator Bennett “Money Mind” Santora on the platform’s new view threshold for Shorts

Is the currency changeover over?

Speaking of cycles, the measurement currency conversation seems to be cycling back to the status quo. At least that was the vibe I got from a CIMM East session on Tuesday titled “The Big Debate: Making Sense of the Multicurrency Market Ahead of the Upfronts.”

Despite the presence of executives from Comscore and VideoAmp on the panel, there didn’t seem to be much of a debate: Nielsen remains the currency of choice heading into this year’s upfront negotiations.

“We have to admit that going into the upfront, this upfront, they are going to be the dominant currency with big data,” said Nicolas Grand, executive director of research and value analytics at GroupM.

“We are primarily a Nielsen shop at Fox,” said Fox svp of ad sales research and data Kym Frank. “Nielsen is our first language. We’re happy to order off-menu in VideoAmp; we’re proficient in all of these other currencies. But Nielsen is our first language.”

Helping matters is the fact that Nielsen recently received accreditation from the Media Rating Council for its big data plus panel measurement system.

Of course, Comscore has similarly received MRC accreditation for its big data-based measurement system. Meanwhile, VideoAmp is entering an MRC audit “very soon,” said Aaron Lilly, evp of client success and growth at VideoAmp, during the panel. And this MRC accreditation seems to be the real measure of who’s legitimately a currency contender in the long run.

“I’m a big proponent of the MRC. And yes, we’ve seen Nielsen has won part of that race, but all of these partners are actively engaged with the MRC, so it gives us a bit of confidence in the data,” said Celeste Castle, evp and head of research and measurement at Dentsu.

So for as much as Nielsen seems secure in its position at present as the predominant measurement currency, it is not the only measurement option. Which, I admit, is a weird-sounding distinction to make, but one that ad buyers and sellers seem to be making.

“We need to look beyond currency and look at measurement with a big M…. Measurement will allow us to measure more important, more relevant things to clients [beyond a campaign’s basic audience reach], and in that space, there’s going to be a lot of room for other players as well,” said Grand.

So is the currency changeover over? Maybe, maybe not. But the measurement overhaul is certainly still underway.

Numbers to know

75: Number of days in the latest extension President Donald Trump gave ByteDance (and himself) to secure a sale of TikTok.

9.4 million: Estimated number of subscribers to YouTube’s streaming pay-TV service.

63%: Average percentage use of Los Angeles-area sound stages in 2024, compared to the typical 90% in 2016 through 2022.

What we’ve covered

YouTube Shorts view count update wins over brands — but creators aren’t sold:

• YouTube now counts views for Shorts as soon as a video starts playing.
• The change affects public view counts but not how revenue share payouts are calculated.

Read more about YouTube Shorts here.

Amid ban uncertainty, TikTok’s role in brands’ social presences has decreased:

• TikTok’s share of scheduled posts for some brands declined in the lead up to the April 5 deadline.
• While advertisers’ spending on TikTok has increased this year, their spending on other platforms like Instagram has grown at a greater clip.

Read more about brands’ TikTok presences here.

With TikTok deadline, agencies are ‘staying the course’ but prepared to respond this weekend:

• Agencies were ready for the TikTok shutdown that never came.
• Now they can repurpose their playbooks ahead of the next deadline.

Read more about agencies’ TikTok contingencies here.

What we’re reading

Tariffs and Hollywood:

2025 is unlikely to be the bounce-back year that the entertainment industry had hoped for, with Trump’s tariffs adding to a weak production market, according to Business Insider.

Tariffs and TikTok:

Trump’s tariffs also reportedly hurt his own odds of securing a deal for ByteDance to sell — and China to agree to the sale of — a majority stake in TikTok ahead of the president’s self-imposed April 5 deadline, according to Reuters.

TikTok and Amazon (or AppLovin):

The TikTok extension could give more time for Amazon and/or AppLovin to seal deals for the platform, with the e-commerce giant and ad tech firm each emerging as last-second suitors ahead of last week’s deadline, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Nielsen vs. VideoAmp, take two:

Days after a judge dismissed Nielsen’s patent suit against VideoAmp, the measurement company filed another patent suit — this one related to using mobile devices for audience measurement — against its rival, according to Ad Age.