TWX Time Warner Inc. New

   (FROM THE WALL STREET JOURNAL 3/2/16) 
   By Steven Perlberg 

As traditional TV networks race to show off their big data chops to advertisers, Turner Broadcasting has signed a deal with IBM to incorporate Watson, the data-crunching powerhouse, into its ad sales efforts.

Turner is hoping that Watson, famous for beating top human competitors on "Jeopardy," will give it a leg up against its competitors as they battle for ad dollars in the coming months.

The technology will parse through information such as Turner's in-house data on its advertisers, publicly available and purchased data sets, news and analyst reports, social media posts and other sources. The idea is to then be able to tell an advertiser something they don't know about their business or the larger market. And how advertising on Turner can help in all that, of course.

"Over time we are looking to turn ourselves more into a marketing services group than just an advertising sales team," said Michael Strober, executive vice president of client strategy and ad innovation at Turner. "This is about empowering our sales force to have more meaningful conversations with today's marketers."

Turner, a unit of Time Warner Inc., owns networks such as TBS, TNT, CNN and HLN.

As part of the announcement, Turner named James Russo, formerly a consumer insights executive at ratings firm Nielsen, as senior vice president of client strategy and development.

The deal comes as more media and marketing companies experiment with Watson, which boasts that it can reveal patterns and relationships that humans miss. The artificial intelligence platform recently selected social media influencers to be used in a Super Bowl ad campaign for Kia Motors, for example.

About 550 companies have struck deals with IBM to use Watson to develop commercial products, apps and services, according to Steve Gold, chief marketing officer of IBM's Watson Group.

Watson has been used to help doctors diagnose medical conditions, track fan sentiment at sporting events and underpin online-shopping apps.

By enlisting Watson, Turner is "using a capability to pull together disparate forms of data," Mr. Gold said. "As obviously simple as that sounds, it isn't. Most organizations struggle with getting information beyond what resides in the conventional legacy and large-scale systems."

In some cases, IBM signs a revenue-sharing agreement with the companies using Watson. Instead, Turner is licensing the technology, which can give ad sellers "a full, 360-view of their advertising customers," said Adam Steinberg, vice president of cognitive business solutions at IBM.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

March 02, 2016 02:47 ET (07:47 GMT)

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