Did you miss our recent Innovation Showcase? The CAF’s got you covered! Read the recap below or check out the webinar recording.
With recent market shifts, ad-supported streaming has become the talk of the town. Its popularity is surging to match consumer habits, and platforms like Netflix & Disney+ are matching this behavior with new AVOD offerings.
The Roku Channel is a top five channel on the Roku platform that reaches 80 million people in the US.1 In its five years, The Roku Channel has brought many first-of-its kind AVOD innovations and campaigns to market.
Here’s a quick snapshot of what we learned during the CAF Innovation Showcase that can help your brand break through the noise and stand out on ad-supported streaming.
Takeaway #1: Ad supported streaming services are growing at a faster rate than non-ad subscription based services. According to Roku data ad-supported streaming is particularly strong and growing 1.5x the rate of subscription streaming services.1 We believe that the tiering of subscription streaming services into ad-supported and ad-free services will accelerate this timeline, allowing advertisers to access a new audience that was not accessible on linear.
Takeaway #2 Find your Audience.
As a marketer it is important to reach a growing audience with buying power. Half of households streaming The Roku Channel have an 18-34 year-old present in home, and in homes with Gen Z viewers, The Roku Channel is one of the top apps on the Roku platform in the U.S.2 The Roku Channel is attracting younger more diverse audiences with higher HHI while those same audiences are declining and leaving linear TV. We expect other AVOD services are seeing similar trends. Using First-Party data you can personalize your message to your intended audience.On streaming marketers can tailor their message to specific audiences instead of taking a one-size-fits-all approach.
Takeaway #3 Find your audience when and where they are watching
Successful brands activating on ad supported streaming use contextual targeting in streaming to align their products with content that amplifies their brand, so you can reach sports viewers with sneaker ads and romance audiences with ads for dating apps. For example, the Roku platform offers curated spaces including the Sports Zone to assist viewers in content discovery. Contextual targeting can drive impact by aligning your brand with the right content to deliver full funnel results.
Takeaway #4: Align your brand with Hollywood storytelling and titles
Whether a streamer is watching on demand content or live linear content, brands can leverage the full power of a streaming platform and spectrum of storytelling. Ad supported doesn’t mean less premium content, in fact it means more content and exclusive content for audiences that they can’t find anywhere else.
For example, the Roku Original biopic Weird: The Al Yankovic Story had the biggest opening weekend audience in the history of The Roku Channel and garnered more unique views and streaming hours than any other video-on-demand content launch in the history of The Roku Channel.2 Original content brings a highly engaged audience into the ad-supported ecosystem.
Takeaway #5: A great campaign on ad supported streaming provides value to both the consumer and the brand.
This mutually beneficial relationship can drive the most brand lift. Whether it’s curating a Edit Guide or an original show like Roku Recommends that aids in content discovery, creating branded long-form content like Jägermeister did with the Lesbian Bar Project, or developing a commerce experience that allows you to purchase items with just a few clicks of your remote, the opportunities when you leverage the power of the platform are endless.
You can break through the noise and stand out on ad supported streaming when you use streaming as a canvas for innovation and tell you brands story though creative, interactive, and data-driven storytelling.
1 Roku and ACR data, 2021-2022
2 Roku Internal Data