tvScientific by Pinterest launches third-party certified CTV measurement program

This launch signals Pinterest's push to transform CTV from a branding vehicle into a verifiable performance channel. By onboarding third-party validators, tvScientific addresses the long-standing skepticism regarding 'walled garden' reporting, specifically targeting advertisers who move budgets between social, search, and streaming. Success hinges on whether these independent models can accurately credit CTV for conversions that traditionally appear as direct or organic search traffic. As CTV inventory programmatically scales, expect similar certification programs from rival platforms attempting to capture lower-funnel budgets. Market participants should monitor whether this leads to a standardized 'cost-per-outcome' metric across the streaming ecosystem.

The rollout of the measurement program follows Pinterest’s formal integration of tvScientific assets into its broader ad stack. Per Digiday (April 2026), the social platform recently launched 'audience extension' capabilities, allowing advertisers to target Pinterest’s 631 million monthly active users on third-party CTV properties for the first time. Early testing of this cross-screen data integration reportedly yielded a 27% increase in advertiser outcomes and a 159% lift in incremental sales for specific retail partners, as noted during Pinterest’s Q1 2026 earnings call.

Pinterest's strategy mirrors a broader industry shift toward democratizing CTV for small-to-midsize businesses (SMBs). In October 2025, PubMatic and MNTN partnered to provide performance-focused marketers direct access to premium inventory on Paramount and NBCUniversal, reporting that 97% of those advertisers were net-new to the CTV space. This competition for SMB performance budgets is driving a technical arms race in attribution; for instance, Pinterest’s Performance+ suite now accounts for 30% of its lower-funnel revenue, per CEO Bill Ready’s May 2026 briefing.

The focus on incrementality also addresses structural issues in media buying. Historically, legacy measurement biased toward the 'last click,' often disadvantageous to high-reach channels like CTV. By partnering with INCRMNTAL and Measured, tvScientific is leaning into causal modeling to prove that streaming ads drive genuine business lift rather than just capturing existing demand—a critical distinction as US CTV ad spend is projected to surpass $36 billion by early 2026 according to eMarketer estimates.