Laurel Rossi, CRO and CMO at Infillion chats about the latest trends in video campaigns while taking us through the benefits of Linear TV and it’s impact on modern marketers and advertisers in this martech catch-up:

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Hi Laurel, welcome to our martech interview series. Tell us about yourself and your role at Infillion

Thanks for your interest in Infillion. In my dual role as CMO and CRO at Infillion, I oversee both our marketing strategies and revenue growth initiatives, working closely with our teams to ensure we’re delivering impactful solutions that meet the evolving needs of our clients.

Before Infillion, I was at Omnicom, where I transformed business development practices and built high-performing teams. I also founded and sold my own digital consulting practice to Havas, where I managed their largest healthcare company post-acquisition. Outside of work, I’m passionate about advocating for people with disabilities through Creative Spirit and mentoring women through The ADVERTISING Club of New York’s Women’s Masterclass and Fellowship program.

We’d love to hear about Infillion’s new IDVx solution and how it enables end users?

Infillion’s new IDVx solution empowers end users by delivering premium interactive video ads that are both scalable and measurable – and actually interactive. If you’re buying digital video, you’ve probably noticed that a lot of solutions billed as “interactive” basically just involve a button to click out. Marketers aren’t really reaping the benefits of interactivity with ads like that. At Infillion, our TrueX ads have been on the cutting edge of interactivity for over a decade, and with IDVx we blend that creative expertise with MediaMath’s programmatic technology. This ensures advertisers no longer have to choose between high-impact creativity and broad reach. IDVx can also enable shoppable ads across CTV, desktop, and mobile, achieving impressive engagement rates and driving higher brand lift and purchase intent. It’s a game-changer for digital and video buyers looking to optimize their campaigns and reach the right audience with precision.

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What would you say about the state of today’s video marketing and video advertising space and the biggest challenges that plague brands that heavily use videos in digital campaigns today?

Today’s video marketing and advertising space is at an exciting yet challenging juncture. While the potential for audience engagement is higher than ever, brands are often stuck balancing creativity with scalability. How many times have you seen an incredible ad campaign win a big industry award and thought to yourself, “Wow, I’ve never seen that before?”

Scaling really meaningful, immersive experiences across devices and platforms—without losing efficiency—is a persistent struggle. Solutions like Infillion’s IDVx are stepping in to bridge this gap, enabling brands to deliver high-impact, interactive videos that keep viewers engaged while providing the scalability and measurable outcomes digital campaigns demand.

How can modern marketers and advertisers use Linear TV as a channel more effectively to drive growth goals? 

While linear TV still holds value, especially in reaching broad audiences and achieving brand visibility, it needs to be part of a more integrated, multi-channel strategy. Linear TV viewership has waned significantly and with the rise of CTV, marketers no longer have to sacrifice driving performance for awareness, as advertisers can take a data-driven approach that ensures they’re reaching the right audience, with the right message.

Five thoughts or tips you’d share on media buying in today’s crowded market before we wrap up.

• Not All Attention is Equal: Focusing on attention metrics is crucial in today’s crowded landscape, but as the industry works to establish standardized measurement attention, there are many different attention scores and methodologies out there – and they’re not all created equal. I see “experiential attention,” which is earned, active and engaged attention, as the gold standard. That’s a big change from the unwanted attention that has characterized many loud and flashy ads over the course of digital advertising’s history – grabbing a consumer’s focus whether they want to focus on it or not.
• Embrace the Era of Constant Consideration:The consumer journey is no longer a linear progression from awareness to purchase. Traditionally, the “awareness” stage was considered the broadest section of the funnel, representing consumers who are on the brink of discovering new products or services. Today shopping is a consistent aspect of daily life, rather than a sporadic or intentional act. Marketers must adapt their strategies to this new reality of consumer behavior to remain top of mind during the consideration phase.
• Double Down on Women’s Sports: Make sure women’s sports are on your calendar of major sporting events! The boost in perception that Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese gave to women’s sports this year is likely to continue growing and expanding. We’ve done extensive research at Infillion on sports fans, and we’ve found that not only are sports fans split down the middle between male and female fans, but even most men’s pro sports have a substantial female audience.
• Think Beyond Live Sports: Gen-Z in particular, are extremely interested not just in the live sports themselves but in commentary, recaps, podcasts, and athlete-powered content and storytelling. A strategy around reaching fans of a major sporting event should consider these platforms as part of an omnichannel digital strategy.
• Know the Difference Between CTV and Social Video Advertising: While some marketers may think all video advertising is all the same, they’re actually very different. Many brands believe they can emulate direct-to-consumer models on social media: place ads within TikTok or Instagram and watch sales take off. While this works for brands in certain verticals, the sweet spot for most brands is finding the perfect balance between driving performance and awareness through cross-channel strategies.

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