• by Tyler Loechner , Staff Writer @mp_tyler, May 14, 2015

With news yesterday that Turner Broadcasting is launching a data management platform (DMP), dubbed the Turner Data Cloud, the ad industry was once again reminded that data-driven buying and selling is knocking on television’s worn doors.

In fact, data-driven chatter has seeped through the cracks and made its way to one of TV’s most traditional events: the upfronts.

“As we have taken in several TV companies’ Upfront presentations this week, there has been one resounding theme across the board: data-driven selling and programmatic tools are coming quickly to linear TV,” writes BMO Capital Marketers in a note about TubeMogul, saying that the programmatic video ad tech firm is “well-positioned” for the coming programmatic TV storm.

In fact, BMO went so far as to call programmatic TV the “dominant theme” of the upfronts.

Turner’s DMP -- which will “become Turner’s central repository of data, spanning digital and linear,” per Stephano Kim, the company’s chief data strategist -- will help marketers buy and sell based on precise Turner audiences across television, digital and mobile.

The Verizon-AOL deal has a lot of components to it, including mobile, video, programatic, audience data and targeting, but some in the industry believe the deal is an addressable TV play at heart. AOL, too, has a DMP that spans across screens (including TV) and TV targeting technology.

Major broadcasters such as Turner and ESPN are taking a more data-driven approach to TV selling by launching DMPs, and even Nielsen got into the game when it acquired eXelate, which Forrester analyst Jim Nail thinks indicates “TV’s impending addressable future.”

The role of data-driven marketing is a conversation that’s “dominating” at TV’s biggest event, and some large TV players are taking steps to be prepared for it. How long until it’s more than just a conversation?