The growth of CTV has led to increased spending and shifts from traditional to digital channels. However, the focus of making TV more like digital (greater targeting, automation, measurement) has overshadowed the importance of the consumer in CTV.
C is for Customer
Early in my career I worked at Discovery, where I carefully programmed TV logs to ensure a pleasant viewing experience for consumers. By comparison, today’s automated CTV tends to prioritize performance over the viewer’s experience. We should avoid turning CTV into a channel solely focused on immediate actions (much like direct response ads on linear), as it contradicts the purpose of TV advertising, which aims to associate brands with great content for better recall and consideration.
Much has been said about Netflix’s entry into ad supported tiers. Netflix’s approach of prioritizing customer experience and returning money to advertisers due to over-frequency sets a positive example for the industry. Considering the connectivity aspect, consumers move seamlessly across channels, making it crucial for marketers to manage frequency and avoid annoying audiences with repetitive ads. Managing frequency and optimizing results can be achieved through buying mid and long tail inventory where your audiences are engaged, working across multiple platforms to maximize reach, and working with partners who have tools to plan, buy and measure campaigns leveraging large data sets with access to inventory across the full CTV ecosystem.
C is for Creative
Often overlooked in the planning and activation process, creativity should be considered alongside planning and buying to deliver the best results. CTV is still a fantastic storytelling platform, particularly when a brand is looking to grow or highlight their values and benefits to consumers. It’s important to try different creative approaches and new innovations in the space to see what drives the most response and outcomes. For example, there’s shoppable TV creative that allows you to point to QR codes or even buy products through platforms like Roku that can be fulfilled from partners like Walmart and Instacart. All this innovation in the creative space should be tried and tested to land on the messaging and tactics that work best for your audiences.
C is for Comparison
Each medium, including TV, is effective in its own way, driving sentiment, action and results. Instead of comparing all channels alike, focus on metrics like audience duplication, incrementality, reach, and conversions, but don’t ignore understanding the positive halo effect of each media channel (particularly TV) on another. Ultimately, TV can be used as a holistic channel with various tactics to support branding, consideration and sales. The key here is to plan, manage and measure your media investments holistically with partners that can provide insights on channel performance and who have the breadth and depth to activate TV, display, mobile, social, etc. since we are living in a hyper-connected, multi-screen world.
In conclusion, bringing the consumer back into focus in CTV is crucial for achieving fruitful results for brands. Consumers are the ones who will take action, and their experience should be a top priority in CTV advertising.
Posted at MediaVillage through the Thought Leadership self-publishing platform.
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The opinions expressed here are the author's views and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaVillage.org/MyersBizNet.