Last week, ViacomCBS released its virtual upfront presentation. The series of videos, which included guest appearances from James Corden, JoJo Siwa, and Bill Whitaker, showcased its commitment to creativity in getting a message across.

ViacomCBS also revealed its pitch to advertisers: a streamlined sales operation that gives buyers a single source for purchasing inventory across its video footprint, including linear, digital, and AVOD, which reaches more than 90% of the U.S. population. It also promoted its ability to create custom activations—such as branded content, influencer campaigns, and shopper marketing—that leverage ViacomCBS’ cultural influence and expertise to deepen the connection to audiences.

“There are multiple ways to access our scale,” says John Halley, COO of ad revenue and EVP of advanced marketing solutions. “You can buy content segments, including sports, entertainment, news, and kids. You can buy broad demos. You can buy advanced targeting through Vantage. You can also leverage creative and customize immersive brand experiences for greater impact.”

Halley’s summary of the core capabilities of ViacomCBS’ unified sales organization emphasizes the power of the offering that the newly combined sales team will bring to market, exemplifying its message of being “simply stronger.”

“Our investments in our capabilities ensure we can provide maximum effectiveness with all of our campaigns,” says Steven Ellis, EVP of ad strategy and business development at ViacomCBS. “Clients realize that consumers demand more effective messaging because they can avoid advertising more easily than ever. We can provide maximum effectiveness with all our campaigns using advanced advertising and multiple creative solutions across influence and branded programming and live activations.”

A Premium Content Core

At the heart of ViacomCBS’ value proposition to advertisers is content. Its portfolio of brands produces every category of programming—including news, sports, comedy, kids, music, pop culture, and films. It’s committed to maximizing the value of its library, which includes more than 140,000 premium TV episodes and 3,600 film titles.

The company is also home to late-night stalwarts Trevor Noah, James Corden, and Stephen Colbert, and it produces some of the largest television events, from The Grammys and the BET Awards to Nickelodeon’s Kids’ Choice Awards and the MTV’s Video Music Awards. CBS also has a leading sports presence with the broadcast rights to the PGA tour, March Madness, and the NFL—including the 2021 Super Bowl.

Linear and Network TV: Stability and Scale

With a portfolio that includes America's most-watched broadcast network and the youngest and most diverse cable network group, ViacomCBS has the largest share of linear TV in the U.S. That means Americans spend more time watching linear programming on ViacomCBS networks than on any other network group.

ViacomCBS’ lead spans across all audience demos, including kids (age 2-11), adults (age 18-49 and 25-54), African-American, and Hispanic. Globally, it reaches more than 4.3 billion cumulative TV subscribers in 180+ countries.

Digital Video: Premium, Brand-Safe Content and Incremental Reach

ViacomCBS’ premium digital audience is one of the largest in the industry, with more than 50 million users watching full episode content each month across Pluto TV, CBS All Access, and its skinny bundle and native app distribution of the network portfolio. When accounting for social media, its monthly total video audience climbs to over 150 million.

Beyond scale, ViacomCBS’ digital video ecosystem offers a valuable connected audience, that is younger and incremental, in a high engagement format that is brand safe and non-skippable, with ad completion rates approaching 100%. ViacomCBS will also provide frequency management across its portfolio of digital video assets to ensure that audiences have the best possible viewing experience, and that its advertisers are maximizing their reach across total audience.

Advanced Advertising: Efficient Spend, Targeted Audiences

ViacomCBS operates Vantage, one of the most sophisticated data-targeting platforms in the industry, which helps advertisers plan, deliver, and optimize their targets. Launched by Viacom in 2015, the platform uses predictive analytics to deliver more relevant ads to specific audiences. It benefits marketers, ensuring their ads are seen by the right audiences at the right time. It’s also better for audiences since they see ads for products or services that they’re interested in.

Thanks to the addition of the CBS broadcast network to Vantage’s footprint, ViacomCBS can activate target audiences across the largest portfolio of multi-platform inventory in television.

“Vantage is a home run,” Jo Ann Ross, ViacomCBS’ president and chief ad revenue officer, told Multichannel News.

Creative: Custom Campaigns

ViacomCBS works with advertisers to create custom creative solutions through branded content, influencer campaigns, and shopper marketing. The company’s strategic creative service divisions include Viacom Velocity, its creative content studio, Eye Max, its branded entertainment unit, and the CBS Interactive Integrated Marketing team.

The teams are built to super-serve clients, offering talent resources, creative guidance, and competitive insights, among other support. They create campaigns that can live across all ViacomCBS platforms and experiences, which allows for maximum reach and consumer engagement. The combined power of Velocity, Eye Max, and CBSi Integrated Marketing means advertisers can build fan loyalty and ensure a return on their investment.

Experiential: Immersive Impact

Advertisers who want to activate outside of traditional ad buys can work with ViacomCBS to integrate their brands within immersive fan experiences. The company has an unparalleled portfolio of experiential and live tentpole events. Its lineup of tentpoles touches sports, arts, entertainment, and music, among others.

Its televised events include The Grammys, the Tony Awards, the VMAs, the BET Experience and Awards, college football, the NFL, March Madness, and the PGA Tour and PGA Championship, as well as on-the-ground activations, such as VidCon, Slimefest, and MTV’s SnowGlobe Music Festival. In 2021, the country’s biggest unofficial national holiday, Super Bowl LV, will be televised by CBS and live-streamed on the CBS All Access app. To broaden the audience in the lead-up to the event, Nickelodeon will broadcast a kid-friendly NFL Wild Card game thanks to ViacomCBS’ expanded partnership with the NFL—another example that shows how partners can benefit from the power and reach of ViacomCBS’ combined portfolio.

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