Mumbai: The addressable connected TV (CTV) advertising universe is estimated at six to eight million, according to mediasmart, an Affle company, India and SEA, senior director- brand and strategy Nikhil Kumar. The CTV evolution has arrived in India. Today, you can easily join the CTV ecosystem via a smart TV, dongle, gaming console, or connected set-top-box (STB).
Kumar was addressing the ‘OTT Advertising and Connected TV Summit 2021’ organised by Indiantelevision.com on 7 October. The two-day event is co-powered by mediasmart, an Affle company and summit partner – The Q. Stakeholders across the industry engaged in insightful discussions on the dynamics of OTT and CTV advertising.
The growth of CTV in India is driven by several factors. Chinese manufacturers have played a pivotal role by introducing low-cost smart TVs for as much as Rs 15,000. Low-cost dongles like Amazon Firestick and Google Chromecast are popular ways to access web content. Jio has led the adoption of connected STBs. These technologies have driven the penetration of the CTV market to a point where you don’t necessarily have to be from a metro or Tier-1 city to be a part of the CTV ecosystem. According to a report by Counterpoint Research, India’s smart TV market saw 65 per cent year-on-year growth in Q2 2021 due to increasing demand.
Some may conflate over-the-top platforms with CTV but they are completely different ecosystems. While OTT can be seen as a subset of the CTV ecosystem, its journey began almost two decades back with Netflix. Certainly, a majority of the usage on CTV is driven by OTT viewing. A report indicates that 91 per cent of users watch movies on CTV, there is also a small but growing audience that is listening to music, playing games, and catching up on the news.
“CTV is reaching an incremental base of evolved users who have come into the ecosystem to enjoy everything that the internet has to offer,” said Kumar, adding that the pandemic has played the role of a catalyst for CTV.
“People confined at homes realised that linear TV was mundane because of repeated content and were looking at new ways to entertain themselves,” he added. It helped that India has the cheapest data costs in the world at $ 0.09 per Gb. A survey showed that 78 per cent of smart TV users were accessing the internet via direct apps instead of search and discovery platforms.
Even though the base of CTV was nascent compared to other media, mediasmart was excited to tap into the opportunity. “We’ve always been a platform that’s believed in strong digital ownership of the consumer journey,” said Kumar.
The company did not look at CTV in isolation. When it targeted a CTV household, it assumed that there were three to four members in the household who owned a smartphone. They developed a technology system called ‘Household Sync’ that maps the user journey on CTV and mobile.
Marketers have always bifurcated between brand and performance, opined Kumar. “Here’s a technology that puts your brand advertising on the largest screen possible but also delivers middle and bottom-funnel conversions, so it takes you across the entire funnel. At mediasmart, we’ve always valued metrics such as cost per conversion and verticalisation approaches.”
mediasmart’s solutions looked at delivering immediate action-oriented feedback to advertisers on the brand impact. Their platform allowed them to look at completion rates on TV followed by retargeting on mobile devices. It also let them measure click-through rates to analyse if the brand was reaching the last mile. “Ultimately, what every brand is concerned about is the bottom-funnel,” opined Kumar.
The CTV market is growing in double-digits month-on-month that will lead to an increase in users, advertising penetration, and reach. In markets like the US, the share of video impressions on CTV is as high as the share of video impressions on mobile. While the US was never a major mobile market, unlike India, Kumar explains that the opportunity is still attractive because even though the base is small, the impact is large.
He added, “There is a lot of headroom for CTV to grow in India. There is still a significant base of box TV users in India who may potentially migrate to low-cost smart TVs. Apart from cord-cutting, there is a whole new generation of 'affluent cord nevers' who are opting for CTV systems over DTH and cable connections.”
(Source: India CTV Report 2021 by mediasmart, an Affle Company, VTION, and Interactive Avenues)
For more information: https://indiantelevision.com/events/oact-summit-2021/
