How Can a Small Sales Org Make a BIG Splash? New York Interconnect Has the Answer

Can one place Amazon, Google and New York Interconnect in the same group? The answer is yes, according to Ed Renicker, CEO, NYI. New York Interconnect (NYI) was named the #3 Overall Sales Organization alongside these nationwide heavy hitters.

“This is the story of the little New York TV Media Buying Corporation that could - and did - not only land on a list that included national and global household names, but also managed to keep their clients happy and profitable in the middle of a tumultuous year in a market that was initially the epicenter of the pandemic,” explained Renicker. “This was all happening while placing #1 in categories like Proactive Impact, Innovation, and Communicate Value.”

MediaVillage sat down with Renicker, to find out exactly what NYI does to pull ahead of the pack and its future plans to insure they stay there.

New York Interconnect’s Audience One

“New York Interconnect (NYI) has been an industry leader for over three decades,” he began. In fact, the company is a joint venture between three impressive media firms - Altice USA, Charter Communications and Comcast. For Renicker, “NYI continues to pave the way for the future of TV media buying across all screens in the nation’s largest, most diverse, and most affluent market.”

It is a time of great transformation in the media space with more platforms and quality content than ever before. “In this revolutionary ecosystem, NYI continues to navigate the ever-evolving TV landscape through its ground-breaking Audience One platform,” Renicker explained and added, “Audience One is a multiscreen approach that integrates TV content into one holistic marketing platform that incorporates TV, digital, video on demand, live streaming, OTT, and exclusive network sponsorships, for an end-to-end media plan that connects advertisers to the right consumers.”

NYI Sales Organization Kudos

NYI was recently named #3 Overall Sales Organization in the Myers Report alongside corporations that include Google and Amazon. For Renicker, that success is no surprise. “NYI has that rare advantage of being a corporation that operates like a small business, as far as our ability to maintain close personal relationships with all our clients and first-hand knowledge of the brands they represent, yet NYI has the power, influence and reach of a large, powerful organization,” he shared.

“We’ve been at this for thirty years and NYI is always on the cutting edge of the next technology and at the forefront of the TV media evolution. So that combination has allowed us to be in the unique position of ranking up there with household names like Google and Amazon,” he added.

NYI also was the recognized leader in such attributes as Proactive Impact, Innovation, and Communicate Value. “Being proactive and innovative has always been part of the fabric with NYI,” he explained, “Whether finding the next great opportunity for our clients or recognizing an industry trend that we think our clients need to be aware of, the sales team at NYI never stops looking for the next great move for our clients.”

NYI makes it a point to communicate value across a range of messaging from trade publications and industry events. “We also pride ourselves for always moving the conversation forward when it comes to our industry. We’re always eager to share our latest research and findings with not only clients, but with colleagues because we believe that anything that advances our industry is good for everyone,” he noted.

Marketing During the Pandemic

The Myers Study client satisfaction study was fielded during the pandemic in 2020. In such an unusual and difficult year, the question is, how did NYI manage to steer their clients’ strategies to success, especially when New York, in particular, was initially the epicenter of the pandemic in the US?

Renicker and his team met the challenge. “When the pandemic hit New York, our teams were forced to chart a new course for each of our existing clients (as well as some new ones), all without ever even being able to step foot back in the office. Our sales and support teams all quickly recalibrated, reallocated, and rebounded from this setback in a way that not only left the company reaching its 2020 sales goals, but also helped to ensure the continued success of its clients, their brands, and their verticals.”

NYI’s Multi-Pronged Approach During the Pandemic

Renicker was quick to take the necessary actions during the pandemic to insure success for both his clients and his team. The areas of concentration were:

Messaging: The NYI sales team saw that the environment had changed and advised their clients of the new tonality. In fact, he noted, “Many business verticals had to pull their current creative to revise messaging to be more mindful of the current climate. In addition to pulling creative to protect their clients’ brands with acceptable tonality and re-allocating dollars because of pulled and revised programming, the team reconfigured schedules for the betterment of their clients and to accommodate the changes in programming.”

Following the Data: Data became especially important to guide the decision making process. “Our teams followed the data to find the desired audience of their clients now that so many cancellations were coming into play, especially when it came to live sports,” he said and added, “Audiences were migrating to news and entertainment programming; our data allowed brands to actually follow and continue to connect to their target consumers wherever and whenever they were watching.”

Business Verticals: During the pandemic there was a notable and not unexpected shift in advertiser categories. And NYI was ready. “For every vertical that pulled back on their TV media schedules in 2020, there were more that came to the forefront,” Renicker explained, “All matters of healthcare and hospitals found themselves wanting to get important information out. New verticals like online gaming and food delivery services found themselves in great demand. The sales team of NYI fought to keep their struggling verticals visible so they would be strongly positioned when the market rebounded. They also sought the right opportunities for the verticals that were now in high demand by creating effective media plans to maximize their exposure and profitability.”

News, Sponsorships and Political: Programming and advertising categories shifted in importance. He explained that, “All eyes were on the news in 2020. Daytime viewership skyrocketed and prime-time was now around-the-clock. Local cable news networks including News 12 and Spectrum NY1 found loyal viewers tuning in for hours at a time daily as their coverage spanned everything from updates on the pandemic, new healthcare protocols and news on protests taking place around their local neighborhoods. We placed important healthcare ads during peak viewership hours and created sponsorship opportunities that would align with the new programming being implemented by the cable networks.” He added that, “Political was also huge in 2020. A holistic advertising approach was the key to getting the word out in 2020 which is just want our teams did. The campaigns benefited from a more-targeted, audience-based approach in addition to their standard linear buys.”

Digital & Multiscreen: Through all of this, a multi-platform approach was pivotal to establish one-on-one connections with customers. “Brands need to reach them across devices at-home and beyond,” he shared, “Digital targeted advertising acts as a primary touchpoint for smaller brands and a bolster to video advertising across platforms for larger ones. The digital arm of a holistic marketing strategy is particularly crucial to attribution. Brands can see the conversion rate of households exposed to its commercial on multiple platforms, as well as metrics like website visitation, location data, or tune-in conversion after being exposed to an ad.”

The Beauty of the New York Market and NYI for Advertisers

When you are representing the biggest, most diverse global market as New York, you can’t help but see the great importance the market has for advertiser brand’s TV media strategy. It is a must-buy. “It all happens in New York!” Renicker exclaimed. “We are the #1 market in the country. We have the most affluent, diversified consumers and now, thanks to data and reporting, we have the ability to target like never before and prove a brand’s ROI.”

NYI should be the centerpiece of any marketing effort. In addition to the accolades NYI has received with the Myers Report rankings, their Marketing Team was recognized as Marketing Team of the year by the Faxies- and NYI was a runner up for Best Sales Organization. “NYI has always strived to maintain a great blend of talent that includes Sales personnel, Operational personnel, Marketing personnel, Business/Financial Planning personnel, HR personnel, and overall sales support personnel,” he explained, “We truly work as a team with the objective of servicing our clients at the very highest level. We do this by having homegrown talent combined with bringing in talented subject-matter experts when required.”

When asked to summarize what the secret sauce is to NYI’s success, Renicker didn’t hesitate in his answer.  “1. Client service, 2. Client service and 3. Client service. Our technology is always the most current, but our philosophy is always the most tried and true. Our clients come first in everything we do and keeping the best interest of our clients as our driving force has never steered us wrong.” The proof is in the Myers’ ranking.

This article first appeared in www.MediaVillage.com

 

 

Putting all the Data Pieces Together to Follow the Consumer Journey. Interview with NYI’s Betsy Rella.

Disconnected data means the consumer journey is all too often a mystery. Advertisers that gain an understanding of that journey can also gain a competitive edge. That’s where New York Interconnect (NYI) comes in. NYI is arguably number one in reaching the full New York DMA because of its integrated data solutions. 

“We are in an interesting position,” said Betsy Rella, vice president, research and data. “We are a joint venture between Altice, Comcast, and Charter and their affiliates underneath them.” Because of this unique set of partners, NYI reaches 6.5 million television households in the New York area and boasts the ability to go multiplatform with a range of granular data available to measure, track, and target viewers, as well as attribute some consumers’ transactions.

Targeting Both Nationally and Locally

In my opinion, one of the most interesting datasets that Rella has at her disposal is from Cablevision (now Altice). I can speak to the richness of this data, having worked with it during my time at Rainbow Media (now AMC Networks) leveraging the range of county sizes, as well as capturing the most diverse and concentrated populations in America.

NYI is, at once, both hyper-local and vastly national. “We are able to find a range of audiences for auto intenders, quick-service restaurants to content preferences and beyond. We then link it on the backend to ROI,” she explained. “We are selling within the NY DMA, as well as partnering with [Ampersand] to layer in our NY campaigns with their national campaigns.”

But NYI also targets by zone. “If our advertiser only has stores on Long Island, we can cover that, too.”

Merging Disparate Datasets

NYI, with all of its available datasets, has the ability to combine data from many different sources.  “With set-top-box data, we have access to Altice,” Rella said, “which is highly granular.” 

NYI receives data from other MVPDs via safe-haven matching partners such as LiveRamp and Experian, “so we can do the attribution across Altice, Comcast, and Charter for exposed ads,” she added. “And, we have multiple partners in terms of third-party data such as IRI and Polk and work with companies for brand studies that match exposure ads to campaigns.”

Rella noted that NYI is bringing Comcast and Charter aboard for addressable for linear. This creates the need to artfully and accurately, “pull the data sources together in one place,” she said. “How does it come in, what does the format look like, how do we store it, and how does that funnel into one report?” This functionality is currently in development and will also include attribution, all in a privacy-compliant manner.

Going Forward

The biggest challenge, according to Rella, is pulling all of the disparate datasets into one platform. “There are organizations and platforms out there that have that ability to tie everything together from start to finish,” [GC1] she explained, “but we have to get all of our partners onboard for that co-mingling of the data.” In some cases, the systems are there; in others, NYI still has to address specific needs with its adtech partners.

“It’s putting together platforms, exposures and impressions, and ad serving,” she explained. “The goal is to have the linear, digital, VOD, and OTT all in one place from start to finish.”

Through all of this, Rella has a wise take on both the opportunities and challenges of shepherding an ad-driven, data-centric business in today’s media marketplace. “We are building the plane as we fly it,” she observed. And, right now, maybe that is the best way to manage ad flights.

This article first appeared in www.MediaVillage.com