Google TV Moves Into Direct Response

(MoneyWatch)  In yet another move shoring up its nascent television advertising initiative, Google TV has signed a deal with CoreDirect, the leading transaction agent for the direct response industry. The move will allow Google to burrow much deeper into the ecosytem of agency media buyers, and shows yet again that Google is very serious about making television part of its overall ad offerings.

CoreDirect already works with some major firms, including A. Eicoff, Carat, Halogen, Mindshare, OMG Direct, Quigley Simpson and Zenith Direct. This move will significantly lower the barrier-to-entry for many firms leery of Google TV's offerings. From a MediaPost write-up of the deal:

The deal is significant, because it will make it far easier for agencies and direct response marketers to plan, buy and evaluate the performance of TV ads purchased through the Google TV Ads system, creating the kind of seamless flow of so-called "performance" data that to date has only been available via search ads through systems like Google's AdSense system. [...]

For the past several years, COREMedia has been developing systems that integrate the flow of performance data for both direct response TV ads and online search and display advertising to make their results and ROI more comparable.

As a result of the new deal, data from Google TV Ads campaigns will be downloaded directly into CoreDirect's media processing and analytic systems, enabling each TV spot to be matched with response and sales data from an advertiser's call centers and/or Web servers alongside other media buys and results.

Add this to the increasing number of deals Google has struck as of late. Three weeks ago, the Mountain View search giant penned an agreement with Bloomberg, allowing it to access the financial services broadcaster's inventory in exchange for the detailed metrics Google has been pulling from its deal with DirectTV. Google also signed a similar deal with NBC Universal at the beginning of September, a similar deal with NBC Universal was announced, allowing Google access to inventory of Sci Fi, Oxygen, MSNBC, CNBC, Sleuth and Chiller.