CTV: How performance and brand marketing is giving rise to the performance storyteller

Connected TV (CTV) is transforming advertising by bridging the gap between brand and performance marketing, enabling the rise of performance storytellers, says Tony Marlow (CMO, LG Ad Solutions).

Innovation in connected TV (CTV) advertising has allowed marketers to fundamentally rethink how brand narratives and consumer engagement work together to deliver results. In the past, traditional TV and media strategies have divided marketers into two distinct camps – brand marketers and performance marketers.

Brand marketers were constrained by their objectives and the available tools. They required extensive reach, scale, and big ideas, and historically, these media channels and tactics lacked measurable methods. Additionally, achieving measurement meant compromising on scale, reach, and anything beyond a 30-second reel for a canvas or a full-color magazine ad. Moreover, during the early days of the internet age, performance marketers seeking attribution had to operate within the online/digital advertising medium. Emphasizing its lack of the impact of sight, sound, motion compared to what television offered via the largest screen in the home. 

In today's rapidly evolving digital advertising landscape, especially with the rapid emergence of CTV, the traditional binary view is becoming less defined. CTV is frequently perceived as combining the 'sight, sound, and motion' that we have always liked about traditional television with the measurability of digital media. This convergence has given rise to a new breed of marketer: the performance storyteller. With the advent of new tools, methodologies and data, the boundaries are increasingly blurred.

Marketers now find themselves equipped to leverage storytelling – using data to craft and refine narratives that can resonate with people on a personal level – to directly drive sales in a highly measurable way.

 CTV's capabilities is driving storytelling innovation 

Until the rise of CTV, there was very little room for performance marketers to reach audiences with the scale that linear TV provided. While a hugely effective channel for capturing the attention of viewers with campaigns, it offered little measurability. Similarly, when digital video initially emerged, it solved the measurement issue but lacked the scale of linear TV.

However, CTV is reaching a tipping point. UK audiences are increasingly making it their primary way to watch their favorite content via the largest screen in the house. In 2023, UK viewers reported watching linear TV 25% less than the previous year – a drastic increase on the previous years 12% who reported watching linear TV less. At the same time, nine in 10 UK viewers are now reachable via CTV.

Another shift within CTV is creating the opportunity for performance storytelling and opening up the role for marketers to embrace. The uncertain economic situation is causing audiences to change where and how they view content. Increasingly this means switching from subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) services to advertising-based video-on-demand services (AVOD).

In the UK, over a third (36%) have canceled a subscription streaming service due to cost concerns, supporting the trend of subscription cycling. With major streaming platforms such as Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon all launching ad-supported tiers in the last year, it's clear that audiences are demanding AVOD alternatives. This gives marketers ever more opportunities to blend storytelling with performance to effectively reach audiences via the largest screen in the household.

 CTV is opening the door to innovation for storytellers

It is not just wider industry trends that are fueling the rise of the performance storyteller. It is also the evolving technological and creative capabilities of CTV itself.

Marketers looking to harness CTV are no longer confined to traditional 30 and 60 second ad slots. Instead, there is a whole wealth of creative options that can be utilized to cut through. At the same time, this is backed by a wealth of granular data points that allow marketers to track the performance of their campaigns.

Interactive and dynamic ads perfectly showcase this, turning audiences from passive viewers to active participants in ad campaigns. Marketers can use high-impact, gripping storytelling with their assets before using QR codes, interactive ad formats, location-specific messaging, weather-responsive messaging or other prompts to bring audiences into a more cohesive shopping experience. The emotions stirred by a campaign can be quickly acted upon, driving tangible action.

These actions can then be tracked and analyzed, creating a real-time feedback loop to enable marketers to optimize their campaigns to better emotionally resonate and drive sales. When combined with data technologies like automatic content recognition (ACR), this allows marketers to build a complete picture of the sales funnel and better target their audiences.

CTV campaigns remove the choice between impressions and conversions. Instead, both can be achieved in a highly effective, highly measurable fashion.

Perfecting the art of performance storytelling

Compared to the fragmented landscape of the past, CTV is now making it possible for marketers to have the convenience of both storytelling and performance combined into one tactic in their strategies. Today’s sophisticated marketer possesses the skills and has the tools to leverage them effectively . With the performance storyteller needing to straddle the creative and analytical sides of advertising, those who will excel in this role must be both highly attuned to what resonates emotionally with consumers and have a head for data.

 At the same time, this is an opportunity for marketers to keep light on their feet. To truly maximize the potential of performance storytelling, all aspects of the campaign must be optimized in-flight to respond to audience data. This will help to further drive impressions, interactions, and – ultimately – sales.

The performance teller’s role is becoming ever clearer in the modern advertising landscape – and CTV is at the heart of increasing its possibilities. This perfect marriage of creativity and data will enable marketers to execute attention-grabbing campaigns that blend highly emotive creative with highly interactive elements to help take audiences on their next step to purchase. Pairing this revolutionary role with CTV will give brands the opportunity  to be agile, adaptable and quick to respond to changes.

By Tony Marlow (CMO, LG Ad Solutions)