Skill Level Needed to Buy Ads
Expert Touch Needed
Digital Ads Playbook
Over-the-top and Connected TV Ads
In Depth Assessment
From Roku and Hulu to Peacock and Paramount Plus, it seems like there’s always a new streaming platform out there haranguing us to watch their content. All of that content means a surplus of inventory and eyeballs for advertisers. OTT and CTV inventory, like the ads you might see while watching a show on Hulu, gives digital advertisers access to premium video inventory that’s close to the traditional TV experience while maintaining the targeting and measurement strengths of digital.
While OTT/CTV inventory can be accessed programmatically, you could also access this inventory via a direct deal with a vendor. Unlike a programmatic campaign where you would likely be accessing multiple OTT/CTV vendors or publishers through a single buy, direct deals are usually through single publishers and have a minimum spend threshold.
Organizations or campaigns that want to run their quality video content in a TV-like environment
- A campaign with a mid-sized digital budget might use OTT/CTV ads to run some GOTV messaging in the final weeks before Election Day.
- A campaign with a large digital budget might use OTT/CTV ads to reach voters with a large-scale persuasion campaign.
- Pretty much all of this inventory is non-skippable
- High attention environment
- Reachable audience that’s growing across all demos everyday
- Expands reach beyond the walled gardens of social media platforms to the rest of the digital world
- Most costly digital inventory of all options in the assessment
- Can require ad creative that is costly to produce
- Complex buying method with numerous levers and variables requires an expert touch
- Often not able to find sufficient scale with custom list audiences
- As the newest kid on the digital advertising block, there are constantly new players in the game and best practices are evolving
- Because this category covers many different vendors and publishers, there’s no single political ad policy we can list here. These publishers will usually have some sort of attestation form that you will need to fill out with information on your candidate or organization. They will also likely require there to be disclaimers within your ad creative, and they usually require disclaimers to be consistent with FEC regulations.
- Publishers may occasionally have additional restrictions for political advertisers; some may refuse to run electoral ads for c4s or PACs but may be more lenient on advocacy ads for c3s. It is best to make sure to ask about political ad policies when evaluating potential advertising partners.
- Awareness
- Persuasion
- Mobilization
Typical pricing model: CPM
$30-50+ CPM
Quick Facts
Over-the-top (OTT) and Connected TV (CTV) Ads
Typically Managed By
Ad Agencies
Notable Targeting Capabilities
- Demographic targeting
- Geotargeting
- Behavioral targeting
- Contextual targeting
- Retargeting
- Custom list audience (sometimes)
- Lookalike audience (sometimes)
Available Creative Formats
- Videos (15s, 30s)