The TV industry is moving—albeit slowly—into national addressable TV advertising, with AMC Networks announcing it will open up several commercial pods to be sold addressably. 

Addressable advertising is the ability to deliver different ads to different households and has been the holy grail of TV advertising as brands look to be able to target viewers as they do in digital advertising. 

To this end, AMC will open up no less than three commercial slots to be sold addressably in every hour of original programming on both AMC and We TV. This will start with Sunday night’s premiere of the second half of Season 11 of “The Walking Dead.”

Amazon will be the first client to take advantage of the new addressable offering, committing to a year-long buy that will place its messages in a suite of AMC Networks’ originals, including the final seasons of both “The Walking Dead” and “Better Call Saul.”

“Addressable has been something that the TV industry has been trying to figure out for quite a long time,” said Evan Adlman, AMC Networks’ senior VP of advanced advertising and digital partnerships. “It’s not a target of ours anymore to make it happen. We’ve done it, and it works, and it’s here to stay for us.”

The highly specialized distribution method is often preferred by brands with robust first-party datasets, which can be easily translated to the individual ad buying process on a brand-by-brand basis.

The capability allows marketers to include up to four different pieces of creative in any given commercial break with a process known as SASO, or “single advertiser slot optimization.” In other words, when every U.S. household tuned into “The Walking Dead” this weekend is served the first of many 30-second commercials, the advertiser who has purchased that slot will be able to swap in different spots. So while households in Salt Lake City, New Orleans and Pittsburgh might all see a message from a single automaker, for example, the actual on-screen ad may be for one of many distinct vehicles in its lineup.

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The targeting capability involved with AMC’s new inventory will be based on different household-level data segments specified by the advertisers, zeroing in on audiences based on information like their content preferences and what they’re currently watching.

Offered in partnership with Vizio and Canoe Ventures, a broadcast industry ad tech provider, the spots will run on three major cable systems—Comcast, Charter and Cox—which collectively reach more than 35 million American homes. Data company 605 will track and measure the results as clients’ addressable campaigns move forward.

Cable providers and smart TV manufacturers have been championing addressable advertising with initiatives like the “Go Addressable” consortium, among other efforts. 

Last year, AMC struck a deal with ad tech firm The Trade Desk and sell-side platform Magnite to test out addressable programmatic buying for advertisers including Securian Financial, Best Western and Smithfield Foods, all of which signed on to extend their partnerships with AMC past their third-quarter trials.

And in February 2021, AMC Networks announced it worked with Omnicom Media Group to complete what the two companies said were the first-ever addressable, nationwide linear TV campaigns, enabling the advanced targeting capabilities for Volkswagen and another unnamed brand’s campaigns, which started airing on TV in late 2020.

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