Horizon Media, a leader in delivering data-driven business outcomes for some of the most innovative and ambitious brands, announced a data partnership with iHeartMedia, the No. 1 audio platform in America, to integrate their respective data platforms for audio targeting to provide greater visibility into total audience impressions for Horizon clients and to be able offer brands data-based audience planning optimization across iHeartMedia’s broadcast and digital platform, including its more than 270 million monthly consumers on its broadcast platform alone.

This level of data integration will provide Horizon Media and their clients with unique insight into audience targeting and propensity and have a significant impact on campaign effectiveness and the ability to drive better business outcomes for Horizon clients.

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“Leveraging data to inform and enhance our negotiations will contribute to growth in the audio sector and more importantly increase ROI while providing attribution solutions for our clients,” said Lauren Russo, EVP Managing Partner, Audio Investment.

“Horizon continues to be ahead of the curve with their programmatic audio offerings and we are excited to partner with them on this innovative integration,” said Justin Nesci, Executive Vice President of Advanced Audio & Data Revenue for iHeartMedia. “This partnership allows them to continue to advance their capabilities for data-driven planning, activation, and measurement for broadcast campaigns – and this data integration will be the first time iHeart has mapped an agency’s full identity graph within our SmartAudio platform.”

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The integration partnership combines iHeartMedia’s SmartAudio platform that has mapped first-party listening data across its more than 270 million listeners by market, station, and daypart, with Horizon’s connected marketing platform, blu., that is used to identify high-value targets at an individual level and where to best reach them. blu. (branded with a lower case ‘b’ and period) has access to 283MM+ individuals in the U.S., a 90% household penetration, which are licensed directly from TransUnion. Horizon uses blu. to build audiences and pinpoint those individuals (blu.IDs) that present the highest potential value for clients. The combined data from these two platforms will provide Horizon Media with greater visibility into total audience impressions for audiences built within the blu. platform. and the opportunity to optimize broadcast radio plans with those audiences.

This is another in a long list of industry firsts for Horizon Media and their audio teams. In 2015, Horizon Media made history with a pilot test of the first-ever live programmatic transaction for spot radio with Jelli, the largest technology platform for the global radio market. Horizon Media then partnered with Jelli’s demand-side platform SpotPlan® as the first media agency to power all of its programmatic radio ad buying operations for several of its clients agency-wide. The blu. SmartAudio Audiences will be available for buyers within Jelli’s demand-side platform for planning purposes.  Continuing as a pioneer in the audio marketplace, Horizon Media also extended its use of SpotPlan to activate audio upfronts on behalf of clients.

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