Welcome to the tvScientist Spotlight, our blog series focused on the brilliant minds driving innovation at tvScientific.
The sales leader helping brands unlock TV's full potential
Television advertising has always lived in two worlds: the glossy realm of brand awareness and the measurable universe of performance marketing. For decades, brands were told they had to choose. Build your brand or drive conversions. Awareness or action.
That's the myth David Katz is determined to bust. And he’s got the track record to prove it.
As Senior Director of Sales for the brand team at tvScientific, David leads a national sales team helping brands discover what most marketers still don't believe is possible: TV that builds your brand and delivers measurable ROI.
After years working across the advertising landscape, from traditional TV to the emergence of Connected TV (CTV), David has seen firsthand the challenges brands face. The pressure to prove outcomes. The frustration of opaque reporting. The outdated assumption that television can only do one thing. And now, he's on a mission to change the conversation entirely.
Why live sports is the perfect metaphor for CTV advertising
David's path to Performance TV started with an opportunity that changed everything: the Posse scholarship. This merit-based program connects students with transformative early-career opportunities, and for David, it sparked a lifelong passion for advertising and media. "It's a great program that helps reinforce kids from diverse backgrounds. It was very life-changing," David shared.
That foundation launched a career that would take him through every evolution of television advertising, understanding both where brands have been and where they're heading.
When asked what streaming genre matches his work style, David doesn't hesitate: live sports. "It's organized chaos." It's an apt metaphor for anyone leading a sales team, where no two days look the same. That's because every brand and every company brings different goals and opportunities.
But there's another connection here too: live sports represents one of the most powerful opportunities in Performance TV today – getting your brand’s ads in front of an attentive, engaged audience gathered around the biggest screen in the house.
The "brandformance" revolution and the full-funnel awakening
The advertising industry has operated under a fundamental misconception for decades: TV is for branding, digital is for performance. That artificial divide has held brands back from unlocking television's true potential.
"The biggest piece holding the industry back is that brands purely look at TV as top of the funnel," David observes. "They think it's more of a brand awareness play." But that thinking ignores a seismic shift that's already happened. With Performance TV, brands now have the tools to understand exactly who saw their ad, who took action, and how it impacted sales.
This is where David and his team at tvScientific come in, introducing brands to what he calls "brandformance". It's not brand awareness or performance. It's both, working together as a full-funnel strategy.
"You're getting all the elements of branding from the television screen. TV inherently builds awareness, introducing your brand to new audiences," David explains. "But realistically, you can also drive performance now with CTV because we have the tech and the data and the ability to target on a one-to-one household basis."
What tvScientific AI really does behind the scenes
When asked about the tvScientific feature he wishes more marketers knew about, David points to something that happens completely behind the scenes: tvScientific AI.
Most brands think of Performance TV as simply getting their commercials onto streaming platforms. But tvScientific AI is doing something far more sophisticated, using machine learning and proprietary technology to bid on specific impressions that are most likely to drive a desired outcome, whether that's a purchase, a sign-up, or any other action that matters to the brand.
This is what makes Performance TV fundamentally different from traditional television buying. It's precision-targeted delivery designed to drive measurable results, making CTV "the third leg of the performance stool with search and social," David explains.
The sophistication happens in the background, but the impact shows up where it matters: in the bottom line. Unlike traditional TV buying where you're paying for estimated reach with limited visibility, Performance TV lets you see exactly which impressions drove which outcomes: every ad that runs, every household reached, every action taken.
Of course, not everything in life is as effortlessly optimized as a tvScientific ad campaign. When asked if AI could optimize anything in his personal life, David shares that he'd use it to streamline his morning routine with his two young kids: packing lunches, organizing school gear, and tying shoes, all while trying to finish his first cup of coffee. It’s a scene every parent can relate to.
The two things every marketer desperately needs
After thousands of conversations with brands, David has identified exactly what keeps modern marketers up at night. The answer comes down to two words: accountability and transparency.
"Marketers want a data-driven approach. They want to reach the right audiences at the right time on premium TV, and they want to make sure their media is contributing to their bottom line," David says.
But it goes deeper than just ROI. Marketers are tired of not knowing where their advertising dollars actually go. Which networks? Which audiences? Which tactics are really driving results?
For brands working with tvScientific, that transparency comes standard. Brands see exactly where every impression runs and what it delivers – complete visibility into which networks, which shows, which audiences, and how each impression contributes to outcomes. Clear data on what's working and why. No smoke and mirrors. Just measurable results tied directly to media spend.
The one metric that cuts through the noise
In an industry drowning in marketing metrics (ROAS, CTR, CPA, CAC), David has one clear north star: incrementality.
"When you're thinking about tracking conversions or ROAS, there's a lot of noise," David observes. "But incrementality really cuts through that noise and tells you: is CTV truly incremental to what you're already doing from a media buying perspective?"
Incrementality answers the most important question a performance marketer can ask: Is this channel actually adding new value, or is it just taking credit for conversions that would have happened anyway?
For brands serious about understanding their media effectiveness, incrementality testing, whether through PSA tests or geo-lift studies, provides the statistical rigor to prove whether CTV is genuinely driving incremental customers or merely piggybacking on existing demand.
Given tvScientific's sophisticated approach to incrementality testing, it's a metric we’re uniquely positioned to deliver on, and one that separates real performance from vanity metrics.
Surrounded by the smartest people in the business
Coming from enterprise companies, David wasn't sure what to expect from a quickly growing startup. What surprised him most wasn't the technology or the innovative approach. It was the people.
"Just having everyone available from all levels whenever you need them, willing to roll up their sleeves and help with clients, help prospect, help solve issues on the drop of a dime. That level of availability was really refreshing."
It's that entrepreneurial energy and collaborative spirit that makes tvScientific feel different. Everyone's building something together, something that's genuinely changing how television advertising works.
Interested in becoming a tvScientist? Apply here.
