The research company surveyed 500 marketing decision makers or influencers in the UK, France, Germany, Italy and Spain in July this year, and found that UK respondents showed more caution about raising their overall marketing investments compared respondents in the other markets.  However AudienceXpress notes that most will not ‘go dark’ and 53% plan to at least maintain their current levels of spend or increase it.

The report also found the customer acquisition is now the top marketing priority for 43% of UK respondents. The second most important priority for UK advertisers is revenue growth (38%) while fore UK agencies it is customer retention (34%).

Among UK respondents, 45% believe that reach is the number one driver for marketing success, with advertisers ranking targeting as the second most important (26%) and agencies choosing media channel selection (32%) and tailoring creative (30%).

The survey found that the audience targeting methods Advanced TV offers is considered the top driver of spend (28%) followed by the ability to connect with viewers across screens (25%). The biggest barrier to investing more in Advanced TV for UK advertisers was a lack of awareness (45%), however UK agencies (at a rate of 30%) state that it is an unwillingness on the part of clients to experiment with Advanced TV, that is inhibiting spend.

Stefanie Briec, Director, Head of Demand Sales UK & International AudienceXpress at FreeWheel, said: “Optimism for AVOD and FASTs among UK marketers closely reflects the collective enthusiasm of the EU5 markets, with on average almost nine in ten survey respondents planning to increase their levels of spend in these channels.

“Continuing to meet marketers’ demand for advanced technological capabilities, such as data-driven and audience-based targeting, will drive additional growth. These findings also highlight the importance of raising awareness, as well as the need to quantify Advanced TV’s performance and prove the value of adopting these impactful channels.”

However, with the shift to TV streaming, advertisers now have an opportunity to reach and engage with consumers on the most powerful medium like never before. TV streaming offers consumers a wide variety of quality content to choose from, often at a lower cost than linear Pay TV. Findings from Roku’s 2021 Streaming Decade report shows that 90% of UK consumers now class themselves as streamers, and 2 in 3 are willing to pay for an ad-supported service at a lower cost than a monthly subscription, with free services that are completely ad-supported offering even more choice.

Optimising for the user helps the advertiser too

Although subscription models are popular, consumers are also open to advertising on TV streaming in exchange for quality content and lower costs. By having an innovative content and advertising experience, platforms and streaming services can drive engagement with consumers to a level only possible by having direct relationships with viewers. This in turn enables those providers to offer richer audience data and large, relevant audiences – making them a compelling investment source for advertisers seeking to reach new viewers and re-engage with those they once targeted on linear. That investment creates a flywheel effect, allowing ad-supported streaming services to continuously level up the experience and adding more entertainment, attracting more viewers and more advertising opportunities. However, while the theory is sound, how can this flywheel effect deliver positive advertising returns?

Identifying the advertising opportunities

On TV streaming there are many subscription VOD services that don’t currently feature advertising. However, advertising supported business models are increasingly taking a greater hold of the market. For advertisers, it represents an opportunity to diversify their inventory and to reach audiences who’ve shifted away from linear.

And it’s not a trend solely focused on millennials or Gen Z; streaming has become popular across all age groups. Our report shows that 94% of 18 – 40-year-olds are active streamers, whilst 84% of those aged 41 – 70 are regular streamers too. This change in behaviour means advertisers cannot think of streaming as simply an optional extra, it needs to be part of a fully integrated investment strategy targeting a range of demographics.

TV streaming can also be a powerful mechanism for brands new to TV advertising. Targeted campaigns on traditional linear TV in the UK is limited only to regional geographies, which still requires a large investment and typically leads to waste. In contrast, by relying on data and an understanding of the audiences likely to watch content on streaming services, advertisers on these services can be much more tailored in the audiences they target. In doing so, enabling the campaign efficacy and reach to be much higher and more likely to lead to better long- and short-term campaign metrics as a result.

When part of a unified platform, streaming also enables advertisers to gain one holistic view of consumers across services. This insight provides brands with the opportunity to reach viewers across streaming services, aligning with their interests through a much more targeted approach that further reduces wasted spend. In the future, such a setup could even translate into complete cross-media measurement mechanism that seamlessly blends all media into one metric.

Find the right partnerships

With the rapid growth of TV streaming, some are arguing we’re entering a new gold rush in the industry. The boom in TV streaming has created a very competitive market, with numerous streaming platforms and tech companies competing over content, customer experience and low costs. The challenge now for advertisers isn’t whether to invest in streaming services, it is which services and platforms they need to consider.

As more marketers and brands, particularly digital brands – those born from the digital era – discover the benefits of TV streaming advertising, the broader industry will start to benefit from the trickle down of those investments – with analysts, vendors, writers, producers, creatives and more in line to benefit from the boom of TV streaming advertising.

Making great TV content is expensive, and it’s crucial that the advertising industry recognises and understands the unique value that only TV entertainment delivers – and are prepared to make the investment to ensure it remains a premium inventory.

The future of TV

Streaming is the future of TV, and it represents a huge opportunity for advertisers, platforms, and services. For consumers, streaming means more choice and easier access to the premium entertainment they love. And, as consumers shift more of their entertainment time to streaming, incorporating ad-supported services into their viewing stack makes perfect sense. To deliver the best opportunities for all parties, TV streaming should continue to deliver the basics of great TV: premium content and a great user experience that makes it easy for consumers to access the entertainment of their choice.

The companies say the ACR-powered viewership data will enable advertisers “to achieve incremental results beyond linear TV buys and measure campaign reach and frequency” in a country where 82% of the adult population watch connected TV content.

The announced launch marks the fifth international expansion for Samba TV in 2022, after having expanded its advanced TV footprint in Britain, Germany, Australia and France. It also represents the second consecutive “top 15 world advertising market” it has entered this year alone.

David Barker, SVP of International Sales at Samba TV, said: “We are thrilled to be announcing our latest partnership with Smartclip in Spain to offer advertisers an advanced new capability to connect with audiences across every screen, delivering seamless viewing experiences in the growing CTV space.

“The combination of our privacy-compliant viewership data and Smartclip’s impressive tech infrastructure will empower advertisers to drive meaningful business impact and future-proof their omni-screen advertising strategies as viewership behavior continues to evolve.”

Ángel Fernández Nebot, Country Manager Spain at Smartclip, commented: “At Smartclip, we continue to move towards integrated solutions, which respond to current multi-screen consumption. Our strategic partnership with Samba TV allows us to achieve a unique position in the market.

“Thanks to this agreement, we can offer the best advertising solutions, taking advantage of the synergy between linear television and the rest of the media. Together we will deliver the Spanish market far greater efficiency in the media plans of our advertisers, helping to maximize the results of their advertising investments.”

Virginie Dremeaux, Vice President of Marketing and Communications International of FreeWheel commented, “The research findings reinforce the continued positive trend toward advanced TV identified in FreeWheel and CoLab’s 2020 survey, with a third of TV ad budgets reportedly being assigned to advanced TV channels in 2021 compared to a fifth last year”.

Breaking down advanced TV advertising spend into VOD, CTV and OTT spend, the study reveals that UK advertisers expect an increase across the board over the next year, by +15.1%, +8.8% and +14% respectively, while agencies forecast an increase of +5.2%, +9.5% and +6.2%.

While both UK advertisers and agencies foresee dedicating more budget to advanced TV, they rank the key drivers behind the spend growth slightly differently. 53% of agency respondents chose linear TV reach extension as a main factor, and 50% ranked ad effectiveness. Advertisers focused on advanced TV’s targeting capabilities across audiences (66%) and platforms (56%).

Across all UK marketers, the ability to measure ROI remained of signal importance – with 42% of those surveyed affirming it as a major factor in securing buy-ins, and 39% ranked the ability to gather data to optimise campaign performance in-flight, as highly important. Agencies and advertisers differ slightly in the weights they assign to the drivers that will unlock further budget, with agencies (47%) more concerned with access to deterministic exposure data as a basis for measurement, and advertisers prioritising data integrations (41%) and trusted third-party certification (37%).

Despite these minor differences, Virginie Dremeaux highlights the shared conviction among UK marketers, about the indispensability of advanced TV for advertising: “Critically, there’s increased recognition from both groups of advanced TV’s potential to reach highly engaged audiences in premium video environments through effective ad campaigns. With greater education and experience, I’m confident advertisers and agencies can continue to achieve the return on investment they need from these channels.”

Methodology: The study was conducted between 23 July and 2 August 2021 in key European markets:  Italy, France, Germany, Spain and the UK, in collaboration with independent research company CoLab Media. In the UK, the survey was completed by 102 marketing decision makers or influencers – 40% of respondents comprised advertisers and 29% agencies, with the remainder being media owners or others. A variety of agencies took part in the survey, from small independents to larger conglomerates: 27% of the agencies surveyed in the UK had over 500 employees.