As CMOs face increasing pressure to justify every dollar spent, premium video is being asked to deliver performance without sacrificing what makes TV powerful. At OpenAP’s Audience Summit at CES, OpenAP CMO Brittany Slattery sat down with Warner Bros. Discovery’s Ryan Gould, TelevisaUnivision’s Tim Natividad, Fox’s Jeff Collins, and NBCUniversal’s Alison Levin to examine how standardized identity and measurement can better connect exposure to outcomes, and allow TV to function like a true performance channel without becoming commoditized.
“The problem has never been performance. It’s been the ability to quickly prove that performance.” - Alison Levin
While TV continues to deliver engagement at scale, proving its performance quickly, and in ways that map to real business outcomes, remains a challenge. The issue isn’t effectiveness, but fragmentation: inconsistent measurement, limited cross-platform visibility, and layers of cost that make optimization harder than it needs to be.
“The expectation for video publishers is to be more performant today than it was yesterday… the unlock for CMOs is standardization in audiences and stripping out unnecessary fees.” - Ryan Gould
As AI reshapes media buying, our panelists cautioned against importing opaque, closed-loop models into premium video. While automation can reduce friction, transparency and control remain critical differentiators for TV. As WBD’s Gould put it, premium video doesn’t hijack attention as social media companies do, it earns it. Performance models need to reflect that distinction.
“Identity isn’t a product, it’s foundational. Everything we do, from targeting to attribution, ties back to it.” - Jeff Collins
Standardized identity emerged as the foundation that makes all of this possible: enabling reach and frequency, attribution and cross-platform optimization. From reaching underrepresented audiences to balancing scale and quality, our panelists emphasized that the goal isn’t choosing between scale and quality, but building media plans that reflect how brands actually grow.
“When all video becomes performance, getting TV measurement right is the prerequisite.” - Tim Natividad