Creating Clarity in a Changing Media Landscape

What Is OTT?

If you pick up any article about the state of the TV industry, you're sure to see discussions about the disruption that over-the-top (OTT) is bringing to the TV industry.  Millennials have a strong reputation for giving up traditional cable TV and going for "skinny bundles," less expensive bundles of TV packages with far less channels than you would usually find with traditional cable bundles.  With OTT, consumers have additional options for watching content from providers like Sling TV, Netflix and Hulu.  Today, even major cable providers are jumping in to add their own skinny bundles and OTT options.  eMarketer estimates that by 2019, 72% of Internet users will use OTT services, accounting for almost 200 million people. Further, Bloomberg reports that 80% of 18 to 34 year-olds are now using mobile to consume content.

This June, comScore released their State of OTT report showing that 51 million households used OTT services in April and, on average, they watched 49 hours of content.  While 34% of those households don't have any cable package, the clear majority still use cable or satellite packages, 44% and 22%, respectively.  Sling TV users consume a great deal of content, watching 69 hours/month on the service, 20 hours more than the average.  Clearly, while they are doing it in different ways, consumers are still engaging with content a great deal.

Solutions to Digital Ad Challenges

It's key to understand that the future is here, that it's cross-platform and that helping clients find a specific audience is paramount.  Whether that audience is watching traditional television via DISH or Sling TV, marketers are able to get one audience across platforms.  Through this process, marketers are finding new audiences that they haven't hit previously.  

DISH Media Sales has looked very closely at the challenges facing the digital advertising world and has built their platform with those issues in mind.

• Sling TV is premium content and delivers a premium audience.  Viewers are watching live TV and ads are running during those high-quality viewing experiences.  This is particularly important at a time when brands are worried about brand safety and where their ads are being placed online.  With the live TV that the viewer is watching, brands can have confidence that they don't have to be concerned about this issue with ads placed on Sling TV.
• From a viewability perspective, it's a full-screen television viewing experience.  You don't have to worry about viewability as you do elsewhere in the digital space.  Ads on Sling TV are viewed on 100% of the screen and they have a 98% completion rate.  By contrast, for an ad to be considered viewed in the digital space, 50% of the pixels must be viewable and they must be watched for a minimum of three seconds.

With OTT households growing year over year, advertisers will continue to seek better ways to engage their audiences and demand the right audience with the right content at the right time.  This growth is certainly evident for Sling TV, whose business has consistently increased.

Stay tuned here for more insights and understanding of this eco-system as well as the real-time audience targeting tools they've developed.

Are you an ANA member?  To learn more about targeting across platforms, tune into DISH Media Sales' upcoming ANA webinar with Mindshare NA by clicking here.

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The opinions and points of view expressed in this content are exclusively the views of the author and/or subject(s) and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillage.com/MyersBizNet, Inc. management or associated writers.

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