Looper Insights partners with State of Streaming to deliver data‑backed CTV merchandising analytics, a collaboration that promises to reshape how advertisers, studios and rights‑holders negotiate visibility on the connected‑TV home screen.
The Deal and Its Mechanics
The London‑based Looper Insights, known for its proprietary Media Placement Value (MPV™) framework, has inked a content partnership with State of Streaming, the industry‑focused intelligence platform. Under the agreement, Looper will supply recurring, data‑driven analysis for State of Streaming’s editorial suite. The partnership debuted with a joint deep‑dive into Looper’s quarterly “Streaming Shelf” report, which quantifies how sports titles, FAST channels and premium originals occupy prime real‑estate on major CTV platforms. By embedding MPV™ and its dollar‑valued counterpart $MPV™ into State of Streaming’s stories, the two firms aim to turn raw placement data into actionable insight for senior marketing and media executives.
Why CTV Merchandising Matters Now
Connected‑TV has become the dominant gateway for video consumption. IDC forecasts a 25 % year‑over‑year increase in CTV usage across North America and Europe through 2027, while Gartner predicts that by 2025 more than 70 % of all digital ad spend will be programmatic, with a growing share allocated to CTV inventory. In this environment, the “shelf” – the row of thumbnails that greets viewers when they power on a TV – is a high‑stakes battleground. Brands that secure prominent placement can capture consumer attention before any search or recommendation algorithm intervenes. Looper’s data shows that top‑slot placements can lift view‑through rates by up to 45 % compared with baseline rows, a margin that translates directly into incremental revenue for advertisers and higher ROI for content owners.
How Looper’s MPV Framework Stands Out
Looper’s MPV™ framework goes beyond simple impression counts. MPV™ measures the visual prominence of a title across multiple device interfaces, while $MPV™ assigns a monetary value based on slot size, platform premium and audience composition. A third metric, pMPV™ (Performance MPV), projects the number of impressions that a given placement is likely to generate. This three‑tiered approach gives marketers a transparent, comparable unit of “visibility value” that can be benchmarked against competitors. For example, a prime‑time slot on a leading OTT service may register an $MPV™ of $0.12 per impression, whereas a peripheral shelf slot might only be worth $0.03. The granularity allows media buyers to allocate budget with the same rigor they apply to CPM or CPC metrics.
Competitive Landscape: How This Stacks Up
Several players are attempting to quantify CTV shelf value. Adobe’s Advertising Cloud recently introduced “Home‑Screen Insights,” a proprietary model that blends first‑party data with AI‑driven forecasts. However, Adobe’s solution is bundled within a broader ad‑tech stack and requires extensive integration with Adobe Experience Cloud. In contrast, Looper’s MPV™ is platform‑agnostic and can be layered onto any DSP or SSP workflow, making it attractive to enterprises that already operate multi‑vendor ecosystems. Microsoft’s Azure Media Services offers analytics on content performance but lacks a dedicated shelf‑valuation metric. By partnering with State of Streaming, Looper sidesteps the need for a standalone product launch and instead leverages an established editorial channel to reach decision‑makers at agencies, studios and brands.
Implications for Enterprise Marketing Teams
For enterprise marketers, the partnership signals a shift from intuition‑driven placement decisions to data‑backed strategies. The ability to quantify the dollar impact of a shelf slot means that media planners can now run “visibility ROI” simulations alongside traditional media mix models. This is especially relevant for retailers building Media‑First commerce experiences on CTV, where the line between advertising and shopping is blurring. Moreover, the partnership aligns with growing privacy constraints; because MPV™ is derived from aggregated placement data rather than user‑level identifiers, it complies with GDPR and CCPA while still delivering actionable insight.
Francesca Pezzoli, VP of Marketing at Looper, emphasizes that the collaboration “gives us a powerful editorial platform to turn that intelligence into actionable insight for the industry.” Tim Rowe, President of State of Streaming, adds that the joint effort “creates the confidence needed to drive increased investment in streaming media more broadly.” Together, they are positioning the MPV™ framework as the de‑facto yardstick for CTV shelf economics, a move that could standardize pricing and benchmarking across the fragmented OTT ecosystem.
Market Landscape
- Growth Trajectory: CTV ad spend is projected to exceed $30 bn globally by 2025 (Statista).
- Data‑Driven Demand: Forrester reports that 62 % of senior marketers consider real‑time placement analytics a top priority.
- Competitive Pressure: Amazon Prime Video, Disney+ and Hulu are all testing AI‑generated shelf recommendations, intensifying the need for transparent, third‑party metrics.
- Regulatory Climate: With privacy regulations tightening, solutions that rely on aggregated, non‑PII data—like MPV™—are gaining favor over cookie‑based models.
Top Insights
- Looper’s MPV™ framework quantifies CTV shelf value in three tiers (visibility, dollar value, performance), enabling precise ROI calculations.
- State of Streaming’s editorial reach amplifies the data’s impact, delivering insights directly to the senior executives who control ad budgets.
- The partnership fills a market gap left by broader ad‑tech suites, offering a lightweight, platform‑agnostic metric that can be plugged into any DSP or media‑planning workflow.
- Enterprise marketers can now model “visibility spend” alongside traditional CPM/CPC metrics, aligning CTV shelf strategy with overall media mix optimization.
- Compliance‑first methodology ensures MPV™ remains viable under GDPR, CCPA and emerging privacy frameworks, future‑proofing investment decisions.
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