TV Sell-Side Lags Marketers in Adapting to Accelerated Consumer Journey, Says MiQ's Chughtai
MiQ's Moe Chughtai highlights that the TV industry's sell-side lags marketers in adapting to accelerated consumer purchase decisions. He suggests leveraging cross-platform signals, including ACR and set-top box data, combined with AI, to create comprehensive consumer insights for improved ad effectiveness beyond traditional impression currencies. The article emphasizes the underutilized potential of location intelligence and AI's role in empowering campaign managers to analyze data directly.
Key Takeaways
- Marketers have adapted faster than the TV sell-side to consumers moving from awareness to purchase in seconds.
- Cross-platform signals, including ACR and set-top box data, offer undervalued insights beyond walled gardens.
- Measurement discussions over-focus on impression currency, missing brand priorities and actual business problems.
- Location intelligence remains an underutilized signal, representing over 50% of consumers' daily activities away from screens.
- AI-powered platforms allow campaign managers to directly analyze diverse signal types, reducing reliance on data scientists.
Why It Matters
The gap between rapid consumer purchase decisions and the TV industry's slower-evolving ad infrastructure creates both a challenge and an opportunity. By integrating diverse data signals—from cross-platform viewing to location intelligence—and using AI to democratize analysis, TV players can offer more effective, outcome-driven advertising. This shift moves beyond mere impression metrics to provide actionable insights that directly address brand challenges. Watch for greater investment in AI tools and data integration platforms as the industry attempts to close this growing gap between advertiser need and current capabilities.
Additional Context
MiQ's perspective on the 'dead funnel' aligns with their recent "From Funnel to Flexibility" report, released in April 2026. This report, based on 53 million households and surveys of 4,000 consumers and 600 marketers, highlights that 87% of consumers switch digital activities at least once per hour, and 42% describe their path to purchase as random (MiQ, April 2026). The study found 91% of consumers use a second device while watching TV, with 45% already using AI chatbots for shopping. Moe Chughtai noted in the report that a full customer journey can now take place in minutes instead of weeks. This environment makes traditional measurement challenging; only 43% of marketers are confident in their current measurement capabilities, citing fragmented screens and supply paths as key blockers. MiQ's Sigma platform, an AI-powered advertising operating system, aims to address these issues by providing a single intelligence layer across screens and platforms. In January 2026, MiQ's Sigma trading agent was integrated with PubMatic's AgenticOS, an operating system for agentic advertising (Beet.TV, January 2026). Acquisitions like Rocket Lab (April 2026), a mobile app growth company, and Adsmovil (March 2026), a Latin American ad provider, also demonstrate MiQ's strategy to expand signal coverage and omnichannel offerings (Business Wire, April 2026).
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