Tis the Season to Make a Q4 TV Advertising Plan

After a history-making year for ecommerce in 2020, all forecasts predict 2021 will end up even bigger. The National Retail Federation (NRF) anticipated that retail sales for the year would grow between 10.5% and 13.5% year-over-year to total between $4.44 and $4.56 trillion, with non-store and online sales alone growing 18% to 23% for a total of $1.09 to $1.13 trillion. And according to eMarketer, Q4 2021 is expected to be the single biggest quarter for ecommerce yet!

With the majority of U.S. adults planning to do the majority of their holiday shopping digitally this year, marketers are focused on finding the optimal strategy to best position themselves for a huge Q4. Part of finding the optimal strategy is evaluating the diversification of their marketing mix in the face of a hyper-competitive digital landscape with rising year-over-year CPMs on platforms like Facebook, which AdExchanger reported being up 5% to 10% compared to 2020.

But as November creeps closer, it may feel chaotic trying to identify last-minute opportunities and put a bow on your Q4 campaigns. Here’s how you can prepare to use TV to enhance your marketing strategy for Q4, while also setting your business up for a happy New Year.

CTV Must Be Part of the Mix

As Nielsen reported, the pandemic was a catalyst for streaming services as traditional media companies took advantage of their vast video libraries to provide more binge-worthy content for consumers, while established OTT players continued to increase their share of the viewership pie. Digiday predicts CTV ad spending to top $13.4 billion by the end of 2021, a whopping $8% increase over the previous year. Meanwhile, ad-supported video across broadcast, cable and CTV accounted for 70% of TV consumption by mid-2021, per Nielsen, and has only continued to grow.

That means marketers would be well advised to take a holistic, cross-channel approach to TV by harnessing the powerful combination of national linear TV and the rapidly expanding CTV ecosystem. Simulmedia is the only demand-side platform that delivers unparalleled reach, results, and measurement wherever audiences watch or stream TV.

Message to Millions

The mass reach of TV advertising allows you to get your message in front of millions of new people, which is particularly important for marketers and retailers with a national footprint. For them, national campaigns are simply more efficient and economical – not to mention the fact that there’s always the potential for pre-emption when you buy local inventory or Direct Response (DR). That could be disastrous when you have a warehouse of product that needs to ship in time for the holidays.

Fortunately, Simulmedia delivers unparalleled reach, results and measurement wherever audiences watch or stream TV. We can get you access to 120 million households through direct partnerships with 130+ national linear TV networks and CTV publishers, so you can begin reaching a lot of people -- fast.

Don’t Stress About Delivery

There isn’t room to leave the delivery of your TV advertising spots to chance during the critical holiday season. Simulmedia guarantees impression delivery, effectively de-risking your TV investment and allowing you to be certain of how many people you’ll reach in your target during the campaign.

Anticipate Where Potential Customers Will Be Watching

Given the competitive TV landscape, it’s important to be precise with your TV advertising. Simulmedia’s patented forecasting algorithm predicts where your audience will be watching in the future and allows you to buy at the network, day, and daypart level.

Learn What’s Working and Apply It

As your TV campaigns run, it’s critical to take those learnings to double-down on what’s working and cut what’s not in order to confidently scale your spend. Simulmedia allows you to bring your digital tactics to TV through real-time reporting and fast optimizations on the metrics that matter to you.

Flexibility Brings Opportunity

Be nimble to take advantage of cost-effectiveness within certain networks, dayparts, and days of week during the quarter. You should avoid feeling locked into long-term commitments where you can’t take advantage of viewership trends and inventory supply fluctuations (unless, for some reason, you feel you absolutely must be in a particular program). Simulmedia’s access to premium inventory allows us to quickly seize on opportunities and to recommend audience-focused (i.e., network/program-agnostic) solutions that will benefit your brand this quarter.

Download our Q4 TV Advertising Unwrapped guide for detailed steps on how to make the 2021 holiday season a success for your brand.

Want to learn more? Contact us or email us at advertise@simulmedia.com.