Route, the UK’s OOH joint industry currency, has appointed Ipsos and Adwanted UK, parent company of The Media Leader, to collect, process and output audience data for OOH.
Nine bidding parties were involved in the 24-month tender process. The Media Leader understands that bidders included AllUnite and a number of smaller companies.
The new contract begins in April and runs for up to seven years.
Ipsos will undertake primary data collection, data modelling and processing, while Adwanted will handle a new API design and data delivery tools.
Synthetic dataset
Using proprietary generative AI and machine learning, the solution will produce a synthetic dataset that represents the travel habits of the population.
It will utilise an “activity-based model” that simulates all journeys the population makes over every day of the year, categorising them into activity types such as commuting and leisure. It will model people’s movement to and from specific points of interest.
This synthetic dataset, described by Route as “the world’s most advanced”, will be grounded in real-world behaviours. It will also be more comprehensive than the current dataset at about 82 times bigger.
In addition, Route will build a centralised API and data tool that will offer a “single source of truth” for OOH audiences and provide users with greater nuance and granularity in campaign planning.
The data tool will report audiences for new inventory within a month of being built.
Route expects the build to take two years.
Understanding travel habits
Speaking to The Media Leader, Denise Turner, CEO of Route, said the new contract is about “new technologies” and “new ways of collecting data”.
“It’s not just looking at when people pass posters or screens — we’re understanding people’s travel habits much more than ever before,” she explained.
“We want to make sure we are understanding people’s journeys, when they’re travelling. That is the question I get asked more than anything else [at Route].”
The previous five-year contract, signed in 2017, was held by Ipsos and later Adwanted. It was later extended for two years to 2025 following Covid-19 disruptions.
Kelly Beaver, CEO at Ipsos UK and Ireland, said of the win: “Ipsos has been involved in OOH audience measurement since 2006, when we first worked with Route. For the past 40 years, we have designed audience measurement solutions across many media sectors. We are delighted to work with the Route team and look forward to collaborating with Adwanted to further enhance the gold standard of OOH audience data in Great Britain.”
Adwanted UK CEO Greg Grimmer added the company is “excited to work with Route and Ipsos on this innovative development and cement our position in OOH tech solutions.”
He noted that “while the new dataset(s) pose significant technical challenges, the team is already working with new technologies to build tools to ensure this important data gets used by more people, more often.”
The Media Leader understands that, with the Route solution changing, conversations will continue with Isba’s cross-media measurement project Origin about how OOH data is integrated.
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Adwanted UK is the trusted delivery partner for three essential services which deliver accountability, standardisation, and audience data for the out-of-home industry.
Playout is Outsmart’s new system to centralise and standardise playout reporting data across all outdoor media owners in the UK.
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