Unruly Brings “Emotional Programmatic” To US Advertisers

If you had tracked two trillion video views since 2006, you would probably know quite a lot about how people respond to video ads. Sarah Wood has, and her video ad tech firm, Unruly, is helping brands understand.

“What are the drivers of shareability?,” she says. “Some people think it’s cats, some people think it’s babies. It’s neither of those – it’s about making a really strong emotional connection. The intensity of the emotional connection is key.”

Wood is co-Founder and COO & CMO of Unruly.

Unruly, which publishes the Viral Video Chart, helps advertisers understand how viral video ads are likely to be by using its ShareRank algorithm to predict ideas’ resonance amongst target audiences.

Its programmatic platform, UnrulyX, combines bits of technology from across the ad tech “stack” to help deliver messages.

London-based but now in 15 countries, Unruly expects, in June, to turn on its emotional programmatic targeting capability in the US.

We interviewed Wood last week in Manhattan at the LUMA Partners ad-tech CEO conference.