Foxtel Media has announced it will increase investment in its FoxTest ad experimentation initiative to $5 million, following positive results since FoxTest was rolled out last year. Announced at Foxtel Media’s 2023 Upfront event, Game Changed, the additional investment will allow Foxtel Media and its advertising partners to harness existing attention data and incorporate it into planning and buying tools across the agency landscape. It will also refine the number of tests being conducted while speeding up experimentation.
Originally announced at the 2021 Foxtel Media Showcase, FoxTest helps brands run experiments across advertising content, experience, and data. In the first stage of the roll out, Foxtel Media partnered with clients such as Westpac, Suncorp, NAB, Uber, KFC, IPG, OMD, Spark, and GroupM to test ad formats, duration, delivery, and more to find the best way to retain audience attention for each brand.
In total, Foxtel Media has worked with 25 clients since the launch of FoxTest and conducted tests across ten projects, covering the power of women in sport, trading to high value audiences, and testing new ad formats.
One FoxTest conducted with Amplified Intelligence helped to prove higher levels of attention of ads across Foxtel audiences, based on higher consumption and considerably less advertising per hour than other broadcasters. In particular, the strength of Kayo was highlighted in this test, delivering 30% greater engagement when compared to free-to-air channels. The output of this test with Amplified Intelligence will see the Foxtel audience and program data ingested into Amplified Intelligence’s Attention Plan tool, enabling agencies to further optimise their media investment across Foxtel’s audiences.
Another test for Spark Foundry saw a brand optimise creative executions for a campaign that ran across linear TV, BVOD, and social video. This FoxTest leveraged audio content recognition technology provided by Beatgrid to identify cross-media campaign exposure, alongside survey data and modelling from Nature to determine impact on brand and ROI. This test allowed Foxtel Media to better understand their role in future media planning across elements such as channel, frequency, and ad length.
Foxtel Media CEO, Mark Frain, said that the decision to increase investment in the initiative came after the increasing appetite from clients and agencies to test and learn.
“We have been blown away by the demand and feedback for FoxTest. This initiative was the first of its kind and while it has certainly been a challenge, the support from our agency partners and the revealing insights we have been able to uncover has spurred us on. The additional capital we are investing solidifies our commitment to this path of collaboration and evolution as we venture into new frontiers of advertising.
“The results have been disruptive at times, but necessary for us to continue to lead video advertising as the media industry evolves. The learnings from FoxTest are changing our way of working. For example, a test run with a popular auto brand earlier this year prompted us to modify our workflows and adopt an agnostic screens approach.”
Toby Dewar, director of customer engagement at Foxtel Media, said, “ FoxTest has proven itself beyond any doubt as something the market can leverage and use to evolve media planning. The experiments we are running are having tangible outcomes, driving industry rhetoric and further proving the distinct advantages clients have in advertising across our platforms. The results are contributing towards Foxtel’s journey to be the most watchable TV and streaming partner in the market and the most impactful and effective platform for advertisers.”
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Top Image: Toby Dewar