“The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated” – Linear TV

In the same vein as the famous Mark Twain quote, while it is agreed upon that linear TV’s share of audience has reduced over the last few years, it is a bit too premature for an autopsy. Streaming and linear TV co-exist side by side – in fact over 40% of streaming households – using 30 million LG smart TVs as a proxy –  use a combination of linear and streaming TV. The trick is understanding how much of each type people are watching, and balancing ads accordingly. The most effective TV strategies will strike the right balance between both forms of television advertising.

Arch Enemies or Dynamic Duo?

While some brands remain hesitant to move into CTV advertising, more innovative marketers have embraced the new world of streaming with open arms. They understand the power of TV audience data for precise targeting and granular measurement, and are not looking back. While linear TV provides mass scale and national reach, CTV provides targeted incremental reach and enhanced frequency optimization as an extension of linear TV buys. With CTV, brands can target the right audience, at the right time, with relevant creative or messaging and pinpoint viewers not already exposed to their linear TV campaigns.

Across LG smart TV households, audiences engage with both streaming services and cable TV services, underlining the importance of advertising campaigns having a multi-touch approach.

A recent campaign from an insurance brand running an audience data-driven campaign on LG smart TVs further demonstrates the inefficiency of linear TV on its own. Looking at the frequency across light, medium and heavy TV viewers, the campaign only reached less than half of light linear TV viewers, with a frequency of less than once per week. Conversely, heavy linear TV viewers were shown the ad about nine times on average per week. The amount of time spent on linear TV is not uniformly distributed, resulting in the insurance brand missing out on large swaths of its audience while some of their viewers were bombarded with the same ad multiple times.

CTV fills in these gaps by connecting with light linear TV viewers on a variety of streaming platforms, where they spend more time. Similarly, marketers can use CTV targeting techniques to suppress heavy linear TV viewers to avoid oversaturating them with ads.

How does CTV complement Linear TV?

There are three main ways CTV can enhance linear TV advertising:

1. Understand Your Ad Exposures: ACR, or Automated Content Recognition data on smart TVs gives brands glass-level insights into what audiences are watching. Brands can get detailed information on which viewers saw their ad on linear TV, and more importantly, which viewers did not.
2. Applying the ACR Data: The linear TV viewership data can be leveraged to retarget (on streaming TV and other connected devices) those who saw the ad on linear TV or target only those who were not exposed to the ad on linear TV. This data can also be used to control frequency and ensure that viewers see the brands’ ads a specified number of times, regardless of where they might see it.
3. Reach Those Who Prefer Ad-Free Environments: Some people might only watch subscription based streaming TV without any ads. In that case, brands can rely on native ad units – those that appear on the home screen of major OEM streaming platforms such as LG’s webOS, to reach audiences from the moment they switch on the TV, before they enter their preferred ad-free environment. While this “last-touch” technique has been popular with media companies and streaming service providers for years, general market brands, too, now draw in audiences with these interactive, highly visible ad units.

 

The Future is Streaming, and TV Networks Are Way Ahead

TV networks, movie studios, and content aggregators have long been part of the gold rush to streaming environments, which has recently hit a frantic pace with the introduction of services like Redbox, Discovery+ and ClixTV in the past year alone. Networks are clear on the power of bundling linear and streaming TV to make it easier for brands to take advantage of the multi-format ad ecosystem. For instance, ViacomCBS (recently rebranded to Paramount Global) has moved into the streaming business with its sister services, including Paramount+, Showtime and Pluto TV. However, Paramount Global is still very much in the cable business, with cable television networks including MTV, Nickelodeon, BET and Comedy Central. Forward-thinking brands understand that linear and CTV are still today, and for the foreseeable future, two parts of a whole.

Interested in partnering with us to build on your linear TV campaign, bridge the audience gap between linear and CTV and gain incremental reach? Contact us at info@lgads.tv or send us a message on our contact page.

Often when brands are thinking about their advertising strategy, they make ad buys based on general market audience profiles, without stopping to consider the nuanced, specific segment of women. Yet, women control over $10 trillion in consumer spending in the US. Additionally, according to Traqline, women account for a considerable percentage of traditionally male product purchases — 45% of auto tires and batteries, 50% of consumer electronics and 55% of small appliances. With women being at the forefront of many purchase decisions, brands should dedicate a portion of their budget to advertising to this audience group in a manner that reflects their values and beliefs.

In celebration of #WomensHistoryMonth, we brought together a panel of female powerhouses to discuss how brands can better reach and engage with the highly receptive women audience segment. Our expert panel included Tiffany Pegues, Group Leader, Consumer Advocacy and Insights at Church & Dwight Co. Inc.; Katie Klein, Chief Investment Officer at PHD Media; Amy Sheridan, Senior Director, Global Integrated Media at Nike; and our moderators — Katherine Yager, VP of General Market Sales and Monica Longoria, Head of Product Marketing at LG Ad Solutions.

When it comes to reaching women audiences and connecting with them on a deeper level, here are three tips to keep in mind:

1. Don’t Think Pink: Women are multilayered, multifaceted and dynamic individuals. Brands must truly understand a woman’s nuanced personality, tailoring their messaging and creative to represent her accurately. Advertising based on gender stereotypes will not only make a woman feel unseen, but likely prevent her from buying from the brand. As women grow and navigate different life stages, they prioritize different things. A single, working woman will have different priorities compared to a married woman or a mother. Brands must be deliberate in the way they speak to women so as to resonate with them in a way that earns their loyalty.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        vvv 
2. Content Is Queen!: The importance of following your audience and meeting them where they are cannot be stressed enough. Attention and consumption habits are fragmented, making multi-media marketing a necessity. Video on TV and cross-screen devices, if integrated into content in the right way, can strike a chord with target audiences. Short-form and long-form content both have their own place in media, but lines are starting to blur in terms of where this content can be found. For instance, LG TVs now have the TikTok app available, meaning that short-form content can be viewed on the largest screen in the house and is not restricted to mobile or tablet.                                                                                                                                                                                                  vvv 
3. Not Out With The Old, But In With The New: Millennials are an important target for brands. But the up-and-coming Gen Z and Gen Alpha cannot be left unconsidered. Gen Z especially looks up to and resonates with brands that take a stand on social issues and have opinions on topics that matter. These generations are also not monolithic and consist of cohorts of diverse thoughts and backgrounds that marketers must embrace. To resonate with these audiences, brands must first consider what aspect of Gen Z audiences they want to tap into and then decide the media mix that will have the most impact.

A common thread amongst all the expert opinions in our webinar was for there to be women representation both on camera and behind the scenes. For brands to design campaigns that target women, it is imperative to have women at the helm of decisions who can accurately portray women, their needs and values. Investment in diverse talent is critical not only to amplify the voices of women in general, but women from different backgrounds, cultures and belief systems to help truly make a difference.

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