Blockboard: Allowing Marketers to Capture the Potential of Streaming Video

Today, the power and potential of CTV and blockchain technology are more critical than ever before to deliver innovative, effective, and transparent branding messages. With digital advertising on the verge of collapse, CTV and blockchain can be the way forward.

The acclaimed author of the book ‘Subprime Attention Crisis,’ Tim Hwang, says that advertising numbers and widespread fraud occur within the advertising markets. This happens primarily because of the simple fact that online ads mostly fail to work.

Blockboard burst onto the scene in 2019 to solve the $20 Billion Fraud problem in Digital Video Advertising. The company’s Video Accountability Platform utilizes a blockchain framework to validate impressions by ensuring delivery and distribution within buy parameters. All the data collected by the company is processed and transacted using blockchain and written to immutable blocks, which provides full transparency on the delivery.

Matt Wasserlauf, Founder and CEO of Blockboard, says that billions of fraudulent impressions are traded, and most of these impressions are being made possible by the programmatic platforms that dominate the media industry today. He believes that these impressions and clicks are not what we seem to think and present the wrong impression.

“This has to and must change,” said Wasserlauf. “And I have now staked my career on creating the solution to this problem.” Blockboard’s Video distribution platform is on the blockchain technology, and presents everything on a ledger to allow marketers to gain the confidence they need to invest in the space. With this, Blockboard can validate every single impression administered, and the results have been unbelievable.

Blockboard existed as a proof-of-concept model during the pandemic, and the results for the company and its clients have been stellar. The company operates a three-tiered model: Create (original content with Blockboard Studios); Motivate (distribute content and targeted ads over OTT/CTV platforms through Blockboard Media) and Validate (through MyBlockboard.com using Blockchain technology).

“Branding is critical for any business because sales are made with brands people recall and trust. The impact that comes from the establishment of a strong brand is powerful, and Blockboard is proving that with its marketers every day,” stated Wasserlauf.

Having debuted just a few years ago, Blockboard has delivered comprehensive results and has competed with the best of programmatic platforms like The Trade Desk. What stands out for Blockboard is its firm belief that the prevalence of fraud stunts the growth of the overall digital space – yet, there is a whole swath of companies that exist because of the problem – and their very existence perpetuates the problem. So, Blockboard developed the technology to cut through fraud and focused on supporting marketers who demand business results in the CTV/OTT space.

Based out of New York, the company exists to help marketers harness emerging video capabilities as CTV combines the best of linear TV (create awareness) with the best of digital (motivate action). The combination of CTV exposure and OTT calls-to-action create a highly effective, brand-safe, transparent, and measurable video campaign. Blockboard can manage reach and frequency across all devices and platforms without relying on a single cookie. The soft launch of Blockboard achieved concrete business results for clients in the retail, CPG, media, travel, pharma, and political categories. “The company is proud that its churn rate is less than 10% and considers its customers’ loyalty to Blockboard’s consistent performance a validation of its strategy, execution, and timing,” commented Blockboard’s Founder and CEO.

Accountability the Key

The programmatic video market is full of operational friction. This is no surprise when you consider that one CTV/OTT campaign can have a dozen or more tech/vendor intermediaries: DSP, SSP, Ad Server, Validation/ Verification, Data providers, a media agency, a creative agency, a digital agency, plus pervasive ad fraud, black box margin builders, and a hard-to-resist tendency to fall back on a default “set it & forget it” operating philosophy.

Blockboard significantly reduces costly operational friction through its proprietary digital video distribution platform, MyBlockboard.com, which relies on blockchain technology to create trust, full transparency, and verification for the ad spender. The same benefits of blockchain that underpin the crypto-currency market are the foundation of Blockboard’s operational confidence, enough to insert the word accountability into its mission. The end result is maximum ROI. “We are rolling out myblockboard.com as a self-service platform this year, an exciting and revolutionary development for marketers,” revealed Wasserlauf.

About the Leader

Matt Wasserlauf, Founder and CEO

Matt was the first person to put video ads on the web in the late ‘90s at CBS.com and has since then, helped build the Video industry into what is today a $50 Billion market. In 2004, Matt founded Broadband Enterprises (BBE) and built the very first video-ad serving system VINDICO. In 2013, he co-founded Torrential to do the same for mobile video apps that the company did for the web at BBE. He is passionate about fixing the ecosystem from systemic issues related to black boxes and a lack of transparency. This lack of accountability has led Matt to found Blockboard in 2019 and he feels strongly that this company will be his most important contribution to the Video Advertising Industry.

“Blockboard burst into the scene in 2019 to solve the $20 Billion Fraud problem in Digital Video Advertising.”

“Based out of New York, the company exists to help marketers exploit emerging video capabilities as CTV combines the best of linear TV (create awareness) with the best of digital (motivate action).”