OTT Ad Spend Surpasses $1.3b
OTT Spend Now 3% Of Digital
While OTT advertising only accounts for about 3% for 2021 to reach $1.3 billion, experts with MediaRadar say the OTT space is still a place to watch. That’s because the category spend increased by more than 20% between Q3 2021 and Q4; the difference in spending between Q1 and Q2 was also in the double digits at 14%.
“Advertisers are increasingly enhancing their ad buys with OTT,” said Todd Krizelman, CEO & Co-Founder, MediaRadar. “The rise in viewership coupled with limited advertising per show is a great place for brands to get noticed and not be lost among many ad messages.”
The major streaming services – HBO Max, Disney+, Discovery+, Hulu, Peacock, and Paramount+ accounted for more than $438 million of the ads tracked; that’s about two-thirds of the total OTT spend.
Breaking the category down even more, retailers are pushing hard into the OTT ad space, accounting for roughly 16% of Q4 ads; media advertisers, meanwhile, increased their spending by nearly half to account for 14% of ads.
More data from MediaRadar can be found here.
March Madness Draws Viewers To Ads
Meanwhile, although the Super Bowl is over the next big sporting event – March Madness – already has consumers buzzing about ads. According to new data from Next TV college basketball fans will flock to screens in March as the NCAA Division I Basketball Tournament gets underway.
Nearly two-thirds (63%) are expected to tune in to games on multiple devices, both terrestrial and streaming and more than half (58%) will have their mobile devices handy while watching via traditional television so that they can keep up with the multiple games being played.
And, while basketball is the main draw, a growing number of fans will be watching for ads, too. About half say they’ll watch ads during the events and most hope marketers will bring the funny and comical to their spots. How important are these ads? Well, about 60% of viewers say they’ll talk about ads after the games and over the past year most have made purchases because of ads seen during the game.
