The search behaviour habits now being leveraged can be combined with any of 1,000+ existing AdSmart attributes – from postcodes to life stage, or mosaic groups – to refine campaigns. Ruth Cartwright, Investment Director at Sky Media, believes that, “Being able to embrace the best capabilities of digital but in the brand safe, big-screen world of TV, makes campaigns more relevant and impactful.”

Sky says its latest advertising innovation is driven by industry demand to bring digital and TV campaigns closer together. “Search Behaviour attributes allows brands, for the first time, to target audiences based on specific online search behaviours, including frequency and intent,” the company explains.

Seven search behaviour categories are available at launch: Home & Garden, Travel, News, Job & Education, Arts and Entertainment, Games, and Pets & Animals. As well as mixing this knowledge with existing AdSmart attributes, it can also be matched to advertiser first-party data. “As an example, a custom campaign could see a holiday or insurance company target those who are actively searching for holidays or flights. This could be further refined or creatively adapted to those looking at beach, sightseeing or ski holidays in a specific area of the country,” Sky Media explains.

The Search Behaviour targeting capability has been developed in conjunction with Captify, which boasts of having the largest onsite search dataset outside walled gardens, harnessing 1+ billion searches a day on 2+ billion devices covering 6+ million websites from over 1,500 publishers (and all in five languages!). Captify emphasises how up to date its data is (real-time), demonstrating interests and needs right now. Captify talks of having “the first intent-powered audience platform for the open web”.

Having this mindset is particularly important when targeting high net worth individuals. While a wide-ranging brand awareness campaign will have some value, the ROI for such a niche group will likely be low. Conversely, High Net Worth (HNW) individuals, like many others, don’t necessarily respond to hyper-targeting. A middle ground is needed to put the creative front and centre and focus on relevancy to the household, using data such as spend and postcodes to reduce wastage.

Get the creative right

Many of the most memorable ads have been led by a strong creative. It requires high production value and, for those targeting hard-to-reach audiences like HNW individuals, an aspirational call to action demonstrates how the product will enrich their lives. It can mean higher levels of investment, but for those targeting HNW individuals – who expect quality from their purchases given the prices they’re prepared to pay – it is vital that the creative matches expectations.

From a technological standpoint, that creative quality needs to be high on all media but particularly TV. When a poor-quality creative is served compared to the programming aligned with, it can negatively impact the user experience. It’s particularly important to get that right in a connected TV environment where content and ads are served over the internet. Watching a pixelated ad alongside a 4K-streamed show makes the brand look bad.

Think about location

Generally speaking, HNW audiences will be physically located in specific affluent areas where location-based data can be invaluable. Many will rightly assume that London has some of the wealthiest postcodes in the UK, but what about outside London? According to Zoopla, Virginia Water in Surrey takes that crown, meaning there’s value in targeting HNW groups outside the M25 too.

Brands cannot assume where their audience will be – they need to know. For example, suppose a luxury vehicle manufacturer wanted to target relevant audiences. In that case, an addressable TV campaign enables them to use high production value creative alongside household targeting that engages the viewer while also providing details on the nearest dealership. It makes for a much more compelling offering.

Address their interests

Relevance is one of the most important factors of a successful campaign, and it needs to be taken seriously, especially for hard-to-reach audiences like HNW individuals. But what makes an ad relevant? In partnership with research company DRG and professors from UCL, we sought to find out for our Thinking Inside the Box research programme. The study investigated whether audiences’ engagement with advertising is affected by addressability to the individual.

When addressed with relevant TV advertising, the findings showed that respondents liked addressable ads almost four times more than non-addressable. They also had more accurate memories, with 74% remembering images from the addressable ads vs 68% non-addressable.

At a physiological level, participants exhibited a greater focus on addressable ads, displayed a lower heart rate and greater external focus than non-addressable. It demonstrates that by being relevant to the viewer and addressing their interests, brands have a higher chance of engaging them, driving brand awareness and short-term sales as a result, particularly for those outlying audiences like HNW groups.

Like any other hard-to-reach or outlier audience, high net worth individuals will have specific interests and expectations. To fully engage them, advertisers need to consider the tools at their disposal that will address their interests and location without being invasive. It takes a nuanced approach, but through a combination of high-quality creative, effective targeting and placing relevance front and centre, you can create an advertising strategy that will deliver short-term sales goals and raise brand awareness with your target audience.