Connected TV (CTV) Advertising Is On The Rise

WITH SKYROCKETING CPMS ON FACEBOOK & INSTAGRAM, MORE BRANDS ARE TURNING TO CTV

This week we’re wrapping up our three-part series on alternatives to Facebook and Google for Q4. Connected TV (CTV) advertising is becoming increasingly popular with brands looking to make the most of their ad spends, and the iOS 14.5 update only expedited the migration of ad dollars from the Silicon Valley duopoly to CTV.

This year CTV spend is expected to more than double the totals of 2020-2021, and growth isn’t slowing down. As a bonus, one of the most effective groups targeted with CTV campaigns is Gen Z, who are still committed to watching programming from platforms like Hulu, Netflix, and Prime TV, but are doing so primarily from their phones.

CTV has quickly expanded to just about every app on your phone, tablet, laptop, and smart TV. Platforms like Hulu went from novelty to necessity among media buyers. Larger upfront spend requirements shrank faster than your post-iOS 14.5 ROAS and now are mostly non-existent.

This makes CTV a prime opportunity for brands willing to invest in the creative to play there. Every time I see a repurposed Facebook ad come on one of my Apple TV apps without sound, I die a little inside (just kidding, I text the brand’s name to our sales team to reach out!). Just as great creative is essential for successful digital ad campaigns, you’re going to be burning money faster than your Congressman.

Now Netflix is jumping into the ad game with a lower-tier, ad-supported membership option. Will new players to the game bring enough inventory with them to satisfy thirsty media buyers and bring down CPM rates as a whole? Not likely. We’ve seen some estimates as high as $60 for a thousand view-throughs on Netflix. Will it be worth it? Time, and Netflix’s targeting efficiencies, will tell.

So how should brands measure the effectiveness of CTV? There are a couple of ways that make sense depending on the campaign, like simple URLs to dedicated landing pages, monitoring for lifts in branded search volume and direct traffic, SMS campaigns. We can also get really granular with strategies working well for our clients, however, we don’t share those outside of one-to-one conversations. 🙂

How are you allocating your Q4 ad spend? If you’re unsure your strategy is the right play, or you’d just like to phone a friend in regards to your overall marketing strategy, we’d love to chat.