An example of interactive advertising in an OTT esports stream with PRIME Edge

Three Ways to Increase Your Channel’s Advertising Value

Historically, in the live broadcast industry, the battle for eyeballs and the battle for dollars tend to go hand-in-hand. However, with the advent and widespread adoption of social media, websites, and other digital channels – the correlation between viewership and ad value isn’t as substantial to advertisers. Advertising is a cornerstone of the broadcast business model. And while competition from alternative digital media may be ferocious, the transitional period of live content delivery we find ourselves in presents a significant opportunity. 

Across OTA and OTT channels, new advertising technologies can help you deliver more actionable results to advertisers than ever before. Direct conversion, actively engaging sponsor space, and one-to-one tracking of view-to-purchase is all possible. However, before we begin with what you can do to excite advertisers, let’s start with what their pain points are with the traditional broadcast advertising model.

Why Have Advertisers Lost Faith in Traditional Broadcast?

In today’s digital-driven world of marketing, the concept of views equals value no longer holds water with advertisers. Across platforms like Google, Facebook, and Instagram – marketers can see step-by-step and dollar-for-dollar the return on investment they receive from ad spend. For any campaign run on these platforms, a marketer has access to:

  • The number of views an ad received
  • How many unique clicks it generated
  • The total purchases or other actionable conversions from ad-driven site visitors
  • Real-time performance metrics of these stats

Meanwhile, advertisers can only count on high-level viewership information from their broadcast sponsor partners that does not contain the granular info they need to make the case for more budget. There is a growing assumption amongst marketers that TV ads are too passive to drive meaningful results, and according to a recent survey by Sharethrough, they aren’t wrong. A December 2021 survey of US and Canadian viewers showed that approximately two-thirds of viewers don’t actively watch TV ads – either muting, switching channels, or leaving the room when they’re on-air.1 

Provide Actionable Over-the-Air Analytics with QR Codes

With these pain points in mind, providing more actionable analytics and more engaging advertising experiences can help you win advertisers over. While the OTT space is ripe with opportunities for this shift, there is still one immediate upgrade you can make to your OTA programming – QR codes.

With the ability to take a viewer to a website, e-commerce store, or other desirable advertiser end-destination – all with the quick scan of a phone – QR codes are the perfect way to meet the challenge of advertisers in the OTA space. With the use of trackable links and collaboration with your advertiser’s marketing team, you can prove engagement and demonstrate the return on investment of ad-spend with your channel.

With tools like PRIME CG, you can make QR codes a native element in your day-to-day broadcast graphics. Discover how you can utilize QR codes to offer value to stations, advertisers, and viewers in our recent blog article.

Engage OTT Viewers with Interactive Graphics

Audiences for OTT platforms are growing, and advertisers are keen to capitalize on this growth. According to a MediaRadar analysis of major US streaming platform providers – including the likes of Hulu and Peacock – advertisers spent nearly $1.3 billion in the OTT space in 2021.2 The nature of these web-based platforms provides advertisers with more options for dynamic advertising deployment. Most importantly, they can address the issue of passive ad viewing in traditional broadcasts – through the power of interactivity.

For instance, with PRIME Edge Interactive Graphics, you can provide sponsors with ad space that viewers are actively engaging with. Viewers can surf content within your stream – drilling down on the election results, sports stats, or other data they want to see. These interactive graphics are high-value sponsorship space, as these are elements viewers are choosing to see in-stream rather than an interruption to their desired programming.

Learn how you can drive viewer interactivity in your OTT channels with PRIME Edge.

Drive E-Commerce and Direct Conversion Entirely In-Stream

Interactivity in OTT streams also allows marketers to benefit from the same actionable conversion and ROI metrics that have made digital marketing a dominant force. For example, with the ability to bind clickthrough URLs to interactive graphics, PRIME Edge empowers advertisers to drive direct, trackable conversion and e-commerce purchasing from your streams. Crucially, with a captivated audience tuning in to watch your specialized content, you can serve up ad space riper for conversion than any website or social media channel could offer – here are just a few ideas

  • Drive online registration and ticket purchases to featured local events in the news
  • Highlight the player of the game’s jersey and equipment with a link to an e-shopping page
  • Augment sponsored program segments with interactive graphics that highlight the sponsor’s offering with a link to their website

 The opportunities are virtually limitless. Plus, with the advanced graphic design features of the PRIME Platform, you can create interactive graphics that leverage visual techniques from the digital marketing field to drive further conversion.

Engaged Viewers = Excited Advertisers

With the advances in trackable and interactive technologies for advertising in live broadcasts and streams, live content creators are in a better place than ever to drive advertising revenue. The power of broadcast advertising has always been in its market audience, whether by geography, interest, or the sheer number of viewers. Now, with the tools to better compete with the success of digital marketing platforms, you can offer up more enticing and actionable ad space for your sponsors. Rest assured, your sponsors will come back for more ad buys and chase after their senior leadership for more budget to spend with you.

To learn more about the PRIME Platform’s tools for high-value sponsorship, visit our PRIME 4.3 breakdown page to see how you can drive interactive graphics and QR codes in your broadcast. 

References

  1. Survey: Two Thirds of Viewers Don’t Actively Watch TV Ads, George Winslow, TV Tech, 2022
  2. Data: US OTT ad spend reached $1.3 bn in 2021, Advanced Television, 2022
Dan
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