As streaming services continue to dominate modern entertainment, advertising slots are opening up by the thousands. Is your business taking advantage of this new advertising outlet?

OTT advertising — or over-the-top — gives small businesses and big corporations alike the ability to use streaming services and devices like Amazon Prime or Apple TV to communicate directly with their potential clients.

In 2018, about 90 million American homes had a paid cable or satellite TV subscription, and has been declining ever since. However, in the same year, there were more than 170 million streaming subscribers across multiple services, and the number has increased every year since.

Hulu and Roku both have broken $1 billion in annual OTT ad revenue, and more and more streaming services are adding advertisements to their platforms every day.

The ability to use sophisticated technology has led to more advanced targeting abilities for advertisers with advanced analytics data and dynamic ad tools — all for less money than a traditional TV ad spot. While the market is growing — is OTT advertising worth the money?

While television advertising requires large amounts of money, small businesses can easily afford OTT advertising, averaging $40 for about 1,000 impressions versus traditional television’s $200 depending on channel.

When to Use OTT Advertising

Streaming through OTT services like Hulu, Disney+, Peacock, and Netflix accounts for about a quarter of the time spent using their television according to a Nielsen survey. With the market growing every year, the time to begin an OTT marketing plan is now.

If you want to target a specific demographic, this is the way to go. If you’re running multiple ads and want to know which tests better with which audiences, streaming services offer all the data to deeply analyze your metrics and see which ads are working and which ads aren’t.

Whether you’re a new small business looking to break into a specific regional market, or a large firm with multiple ideas unsure which is best, OTT could be a great addition to your existing marketing plan.

Tips for Effective OTT Advertising

When it comes to new marketing strategies, the more you know up front, the better.

• Pinpoint your targeting. One of the biggest benefits of using OTT advertising over traditional television ads is the sheer amount of data streaming services provide. When you know your audience, you can target a super specific demographic, down to the geographic location, and see how many of those viewers became conversions with which specific ads.
• Keep it short. While OTT ads can run from 15 seconds up to 1 full minute, it’s hard to keep an audience engaged for 60 straight seconds. Some services like YouTube allow users to skip an ad a few seconds in, so make the most of your first 5 seconds. 30 seconds is a good goal, but if you can pack the brand message into 15 seconds, even better.
• Personalize everything. With television ads, most ads needed to appeal to the large demographic television can reach. With buyer personas and customer data, you’ll know who you need to reach. Thanks to OTT advertising, you can program multiple personalized ads on one streaming service that are handpicked by the algorithm for each viewer who sees it. Focus on actor casting choices and your overall image for that demographic.
• Check formatting on all devices. Sure, your ad looks great on a big screen TV in someone’s living room — but what about smartphone streamers? Customers could be using a standard television, tablet, laptop, desktop, or phone to watch your ads. Be sure it works on every one to avoid wasting money.
• Put cross-channel retargeting to use. OTT advertising goes beyond basic video streaming ads. You can use website retargeting to keep customers engaged with your products across multiple websites or devices. If someone is browsing for a new swimsuit and lands on your page without buying the swimsuit, they can soon see ads for that same swimsuit — and every other suit you sell — across food blogs, social media, news outlets, and more.

The bottom line: We have been increasingly recommending launching an OTT campaign with hyper-personalized advertisements on the same granular level as social media ads.

Contact Us Today

If you’re looking to dip your toes into the OTT advertising market, we can help! Contact us today and let us help get your brand message in front of younger demographics on phones, tablets, laptops, and televisions all at once.