Audience Insights

5 Questions to Help Jumpstart Your Streaming TV Ad Campaign

Planning an effective streaming TV ad campaign is not much different than any other form of advertising. The biggest difference is the video production required (though that’s not the focus of this article), but the biggest challenge is oftentimes only having a few seconds to grab a consumer’s attention and keep them engaged.

How do you maximize on 60 seconds or less for a successful streaming TV campaign? The secret lies in asking the right questions up front, determining who you want to reach, developing a clear game plan for what you want to communicate with your ad, and identifying which action you want consumers to take after viewing it. With this focus you will quickly become a streaming TV ad campaign pro.

Here are a few questions to ask and general guidelines to follow before you ever schedule that casting call or book a location for your shoot. Time is money in streaming TV advertising and here’s how you can make every second count.

1. Who is your Target Audience?

All too often, advertisers have a hard time defining exactly who they are trying to reach with their ads. It’s actually a pretty easy mistake to make because finding your audience is full of nuances that can be hard to get right. For example, if you fall into the trap of casting a wide net, saying, “We want to attract people who will buy our products and services,” don’t be surprised if your ad campaign falls flat. Sure, you’ll get a lot of eyeballs (aka, impressions) on your ad, but will those impressions convert into actual customers? Unfortunately, probably not.

That’s why it’s so important to get a crystal clear idea of who you want to reach before developing any creative or launching any ad campaigns. The more specific you can get around who your target consumers are, the more likely you’ll be able to get your ad in front of the eyeballs that really count. Not only will this help you refine your ad, it will also influence how you set up your ad campaigns. Keep in mind, that while knowledge is power, getting too granular isn’t always the best strategy. Sometimes this actually narrows your reach too much and, in order to strike that perfect balance, you will want to loosen the reins on the specificity of your targeting.

First start by building audience profiles, using demographic indicators like location, age, gender, purchase interests, and lifestyle to paint a clear picture of your ideal consumer.

By clearly defining your audience, you’ll have the best chance at deploying a successful ad campaign that not only reaches those specific consumers but also resonates with them at a more relevant level.

2. Where does your audience live, work, or play?

Aside from simply identifying where your ideal consumers live, it’s worth connecting the dots between where they work and play too. This will help you develop variations on your ad that speak to consumers in more relevant and timely ways based on their current location, increasing the chances of them taking action on your offer in real-time.

For example, if you’re a health and fitness advertiser and you are looking to reach people interested in working out that go to the gym frequently, you can reach those specific types of people and get your ad in front of them. And who knows – they may even be watching that ad on their mobile device while AT the gym!

3. What is the one message you want to convey to consumers?

You only have a few seconds to grab the attention and pique the interest of the people seeing your ads, so don’t make this experience more complicated than it needs to be. As a general rule of thumb, stick to one clear message and, if possible, make sure it’s communicated at the start of the ad. This is even more important for shorter streaming TV ad spots (i.e. 15 seconds or less) where you have very little time to get your point across and then motivate viewers to act.

4. Why should your audience care?

This is perhaps the most important litmus test of them all. You might think that the message you’ve put forth in your ad is the one that needs to be conveyed, but is it really the message that’s going to resonate most with your audience? Sure, we all have business priorities, but communicating those priorities in a way that doesn’t necessarily speak to the needs, wants, desires, or expectations of the people you are trying to turn into actual customers does not make for effective advertising.

You need to ask yourself why your preferred audience should care about what you have to say. And if you find that there’s a disconnect between what you want to say and what your audience wants—or, rather, needs—to hear, then it’s time to go back to the drawing board.

5. How can consumers take advantage of what you have to offer?

The final step in building an effective streaming TV ad is making sure that your single, clear message is complemented by a single, focused call to action. Once your audience has viewed your ad, what should they do next? Again, you don’t have a lot of time to capture a viewer’s attention, much less to get them to act, so be sure to keep the message focused and make it abundantly clear how consumers can take advantage of whatever it is you have to offer.

Short, sweet, and simple is a great rule of thumb to follow. The more barriers you can eliminate, the more likely you will be to turn prospective customers into paying customers!

Tips to remember before creating your streaming TV ad?

No matter how big your budget is or how sophisticated your streaming TV ad may be, if you aren’t clear on your overarching strategy and have a solid understanding of what will motivate your audience to take action on what you’re offering, you’ll be hard-pressed to drive results that spark business growth.

Enjoy the development process – get creative with your ad! Just make sure to stay focused and don’t let yourself get blinded by the “fun” or novelty of it. After all, a piece of advertising creative is only as good as the long-term value it drives for any brand or business.

Learn more about how you can start advertising on streaming TV and getting your offers in front of the right audience with our self-service solution.