At Amazon’s Upfront UK, senior executives from Amazon Ads, Prime Video and Amazon MGM Studios set out their vision for how brands can connect with UK audiences, alongside a new slate of entertainment and live sports.
Amazon Ads announced that Prime Video is joining Barb CFlight and will become the first streaming service available through the UK’s unified TV measurement framework. Advertisers will be able to plan and measure Prime Video campaigns alongside those running across major UK broadcasters using the same industry-standard metrics for TV advertising.
Prime Video has been part of the Barb Ads Hub’s pre-campaign planner since 2024. Amazon Ads is working with Barb on the new integration, which will be available in 2027.
Luca Vannini, Barb’s Director of Partnerships and Communications, commented: “Our renewed vision is focused on closing the gaps in what we measure to build a more comprehensive picture of what people watch. Bringing Prime Video into post-campaign evaluation is an important first step in delivering on that ambition. By combining Prime Video’s first-party signals with the demographic richness of Barb’s panel data, we can help the industry assess campaign performance across streaming services alongside linear and BVoD. We look forward to adding the other streaming services in due course.”
Phil Christer, Managing Director, Amazon Ads UK, added: “We want to make advertising easier and more effective for brands, so we’re excited that Prime Video will be the first streaming service to join CFlight. It will give advertisers trusted measurement in a currency that the industry already uses, as well as providing greater transparency when planning and measuring campaigns across streaming and linear TV.”
Local relevance to national campaigns
Amazon Ads has unveiled Geographic Insights and Activation (GIA), which it says “helps advertisers find untapped regional opportunities and act on them with just a click”. Using Amazon’s first-party retail signals or an advertiser’s own, interactive maps show how a brand is performing by region against category benchmarks to reveal where their brand presence is lower. Advertisers can then activate a campaign that automatically optimises bids to reach customers in these high-potential areas where better opportunities exist.
L’Oreal worked with Amazon Ads to promote its Kérastase hair serum in Germany using GIA, leveraging Amazon’s proprietary retail sales insights to identify regions with untapped growth potential. By activating a display ads campaign in areas with low brand penetration, L’Oréal achieved a 38 per cent lower cost per sale and an 11 per cent lower cost per sale among new-to-brand customers compared to its standard display ads campaign. This demonstrates how geographic precision can drive efficiency and new customer acquisition, and GIA is available to advertisers in the UK now.
Building on the launch of Interactive Video and Pause Ads last year, Amazon Ads announced Location-based Interactive Video Ads on Prime Video. The new format enables advertisers to deliver national campaigns with local relevance, where a single national campaign can feature hundreds of ads with local offers, store locations, or promotions based on region, all from one campaign buy. It makes it easier for advertisers across automotive, restaurants, and retail to drive foot traffic from the streaming experience and will be available by the end of the year.
“Our ambition is simple — to make advertising simpler and more effective for brands, as well as more relevant for viewers,” explained Phil Christer, Managing Director of Amazon Ads UK. “Our latest innovations will help brands localise national interactive ad campaigns, act on regional growth opportunities, and access industry-standard measurement for Prime Video in the UK. With more reach across premium streaming video and audio than ever before, powered by AI expertise at every step, we’re enabling brands to connect with audiences alongside the entertainment and live sport they love.”
The presentation also set out how Amazon Ads is expanding reach to simplify buying for brands. Advertisers can now access more than 90 per cent of monthly ad-supported VoD reach, according to Barb, as well as audio brands from the UK’s three biggest commercial broadcasters: Bauer Media, Global, and News UK via Octave. Audio reaches audiences that streaming video alone cannot, and Amazon Ads is working with Bauer Media on new research demonstrating the additive value audio offers for achieving brand objectives.
The presentation also featured Amazon Ads Agent, the new connected, AI-first ads platform which brings together Display, Video, and Audio with sponsored ads. It enables advertisers to activate campaigns using manual tools, Amazon’s AI optimisation, or a mix of both based on their campaign goals.
New original and exclusive entertainment
Katherine Ryan, who will star in the third season of Last One Laughing UK, hosted the evening; Lily Allen, whose unfiltered biographical documentary series arrives on Prime Video in 2027, opened the show with a live performance, with three songs from her West End Girl album; and Phoebe Waller-Bridge, creator, writer, executive producer and co-showrunner of Tomb Raider, spoke on stage about her new series which reimagines Lara Croft for a new generation – with Game of Thrones star Sophie Turner in the lead role.
Prime Video presenter Gabby Logan and four-time Champions League winner Clarence Seedorf previewed the return of the UEFA Champions League and the NBA, whilst F1 driver Lando Norris appeared by video to introduce a new documentary following his title defence, as part of a sports documentary slate that includes All or Nothing: Manchester United, following the club across an entire season as Champions League football returns to Old Trafford.
The evening ended with a DJ set from actor Jamie Campbell Bower (best known for playing Vecna in Stranger Things) who will be joining the cast of Prime Original’s The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power Season 3 which premieres on November 11th.
Source: https://www.advanced-television.com/2026/10/08/prime-video-joins-uks-industry-standard-measurement/
