The search marketer’s guide to connected TV: best practices for making the jump

Lack of video creative and imprecise targeting historically meant that channels like paid search were a better use of a limited ad budget for agencies and smal businesses. With the growth of connected TV (CTV), and its ability to accurately target and measure performance, the largest screen in the house is now available to B2B businesses. And the great news is as a paid search expert, you already have the tools to make your B2B brand’s jump to CTV a successful one.

In an SMX Advanced session, Join Hooman Javidan-Nejad, Director of Performance Marketing at MNTN outlines tried-and-true best practices to bring advertising to the TV screen. Javidan-Nejad explains that by taking what you already know about a channel that is working that is performing and driving results (paid search), you can apply those lessons and best practices to CTV advertising.

CTV: An untapped market for B2B

Javidan-Nejad talks about connected TV (CTV) being a virtually untapped performance channel for B2B advertisers because there are not a lot of B2B advertisers that are using or running as unconnected TV today. And it’s a channel that can be easily activated with tried and true paid search.

So why is CTV now a viable solution for B2B advertisers? CTV checks all the main boxes that a B2B advertiser needs such as precision targeting and cheaper video creation.

Precison targeting. Unline linear TV, you can target by job title, company size, etc., so no impressions are wasted

Video creative that won’t break the bank. The switch to video advertising doesnt mean engaging in an expensive agency.

Measurement. To track cross-device site visits and conversions.

Best practices for your CTV campaigns

1. Create a sophisticated account structure

Cover the full funnel. The way you organize your paid search efforts can be leveraged for CTV as well. Include:

• Campaigns that align with each funnel stage
• Organization by campaigns, ad groups, etc.
• Follow your paid search structure and address each funnel phase such as prospecting (top of funnel), CRM (mid-funnel), and retargeting (lower funnel)
• Segment audiences, budgets, and creative by campaign to maximize performance and align with business goals

2. Optimize your budget.

Reallocate ad spend from poor performing keywords to somewhere it can be more effective and avoid PPC plateaus by repurposing ad dollars for CTV.

The issue Javidan-Nejad sees with B2B companies on paid search is that they spend about 80% of their ad dollars there and then don’t have the budget for new channels. B2B businesses “overdo it” he says.

He suggests that advertisers go to their search term report, sort the search terms terms that are driving traffic to your website and analyzing which ones are costing the most and not converting. That practice alone will allos some B2B businesses to reallocate some of that ad spend toward CTV.

3. Use your existing keyword targets

The third best practice is to rely on the keyword strategy you already know works.

• Employ broad search terms to capture a wider audience
• Use exact keywords, phrases, etc. to capture high-intent users

With paid search you have to make sure that you are leveraging exact keywords and phrases to capture high intent users. And if you you’re interested in driving some top funnel users to your website, you can do that with broad search terms to capture the wider audience.

You can also use some of those learnings from those keywords to structure your connected TV advertising campaigns, Javidan-Nejad explains. You can set up your CTV campaign to use the existing keywords you’re already targeting. He suggests using the search terms report here, too.

4. A/B test to find what works

Your PPC campaigns likely involve continuous testing, including both creative testing and audience testing.

In CTV you can run 2 versions of video creatives for CTV and see which one performed better and which one drove higher website traffic. You can also run the same video, or the winning video to different audiences to learn which one engages more.

5. Make relevancy a key component

In PPC, title, description, and landing page experience ned to align. A higher relevancy means a higher ad score, and then you pay less for those targeted keywords and your ads will be served at the higher position. And when we talk about relevancy in the context of paid search.

The same concept applies with CTV. Relevancy is just as important.

• Video creatives, audiece extension, display ads, and landing pages all need to align
• Look for an ad platform that allows you to target the same CTV viewers with companion banners on display. Javidan-Nejad says that this strategy can lead to an increased campaign performance of up to 8x.

Other considerations

Brand safety

• Just like paid search, CTV is a brand safety haven
• Look for a platform that offers premium non-skippable inventory on the screen

Remove creative barriers

• If you dont have video assets, vheck with your team to see if you can repurpose their videos
• Look for non-agency solutions that allow for easy creative updates

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