By Tom Aiello
The rapid growth of Over The Top (OTT) streaming media make it one of the most powerful options to reach military recruiting prospects in 2021 and beyond. We are entering the connected decade of 20’s, and OTT is a great example of this with the benefits of TV and the targeting and prices of digital. With Increased consumption in winter months and as remote learning continues, OTT needs to be a cornerstone of military recruiting media. However, it’s important to understand OTT to maximize its value in a military recruiting application.
First off, many get Over The Top (OTT) and Connected TV (CTV) confused. OTT refers to any streaming service that delivers content over internet like Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime Video. CTV is any device that can stream video over the internet, like smart TVs, Amazon Fire Stick, Apple TV, Roku, Chromecast, and gaming consoles like Nintendo Switch, Xbox, and Playstation. Simply stated, OTT is the delivery platform where viewers can watch TV content online, while CTV is the device used to watch TV content online.
Rapid Growth
OTT is in supersonic growth with more than half of US households now consuming video content in this fashion. ComScore recently reported that 66 percent of Wi-Fi enabled households consume CTV.
COVID-19 has even further accelerated the adoption of OTT viewership. For example, Vevo CTV viewership has increased by 40% in the US since the start of the year alone. This shift is pronounced with 31.2 million US households already abandoning traditional TV in favor of streaming services, according to a 2020 eMarketer report.
Fit For Military Recruiting Targets
There is a powerful fit for active-duty military recruiting. Young adults age 18 – 24 have the greatest viewership of only OTT media - meaning they do not view non-linear TV at all. And with CTV devices like Nintendo Switch, Xbox, and Playstation, this dovetails into an additional connection between young adults and gaming.
Reserve and National Guard recruiting have an equally good fit. Young adults 18-34 consume CTV more than any other medium. And this growth combined with a non-skippable ad format keeps eyes on your military brand.
Local advertising that is closely integrated with local recruiting plans are particularly effective. Some recruiters even call this “close air support.” Aligning geo-targeted media to target recruiting zip codes is a formidable combination with the massive growth in OTT.
One reason OTT is so effective is because young adults openly accept advertising if it means getting free content. That means near perfect ad completion. Viewers are watching the ads through until the end, with an average completion rate of 98% (comScore).
OTT Benefits For Military Recruiting
Unlike linear TV advertising, OTT offers more targeting capabilities. You can define your audience at a granular level to ensure that your ads are highly relevant to the viewer. This creates low-cost, high response for recruiting commands with finite advertising budgets.
OTT creates new types of co-viewing, not possible with traditional TV. People used to co-view TV in the same room or the same house. OTT now enables co-viewing of prospects in different homes. Recruiting ads can reach groups of prospects co-viewing together from remote locations. This not only means impact, but the ads can achieve new types of engagement, which should be considered in the ad creative designs.
Keys For Military Recruiting Success with OTT Media
Matching device-specific targeting to OTT usage of military prospects is important to reach the prospects that will convert. Because the device choices are many, this is an important targeting decision. According to the Video Advertising Bureau, there are 820 million OTT devices in the United States and 30% of those devices are smartphones, followed by smart television (15%). All OTT devices are connected advertising enabled.
Content becomes a key form of targeting. Networks are aggressively adapting their content to CTV environments. Disney to Disney Plus, HBO to HBO Max, NBC to Peacock. But the key is knowing the right content targeting for military prospects.
A solid understanding of OTT targeting for military recruiting will ensure back-end results will be there. Too often there is more to the equation than just media price. These parameters include target categories with best military performance, channels, and dayparting around prospect lifestyles. Programmatic gets into targeting based on geography, devices, operating systems, and ad frequency.
Another key is having the right buying approach based on your recruiting goals. Recruiting goals will define your bidding strategy based on programmatic, premium, or direct with a streaming service. A higher CPM will generally help you have a more competitive bid to win placements on more sought-after networks/services. A higher CPM is also needed if you want to get more granular with specific channel targeting vs audience targeting. But programmatic can spread recruiting budgets very efficiently to achieve more impact – especially at the local media level.
Premium vs. nonpremium inventory is an important consideration. Advertisers will often use premium media around very specific programming to achieve branding goals, but for more transactional recruiting, premium may be too overpriced. For example, Hulu is one of the most expensive CTV outlets. CPMs are between $65-$100. Hulu also has very strict creative guidelines and needs to approve the creative, which can work against recruiting goals.
Understanding OTT brand safety is critical to ensure the brand does not appear alongside questionable programming. This is achieved by working with reputable sources of inventory. Also, advertisers should apply brand safety and contextual targeting data layers. By layering brand safety and contextual relevance at the content level, advertisers can arrive at content which is not only appropriate but also relevant to military prospects.
By applying these approaches with the right agency partner with a deep understanding of both OTT media and military recruiting, recruiting commands can successfully make OTT part of their 2021 military recruiting media plans. With these approaches they can successfully integrate media with recruiting to ensure efficiency and impact to their media investment.
MARCH Marketing provides best-in-class military and veteran expertise to inform strategy, marketing, and services to commercial, government, and non-profit clients. With offices in Chicago, the agency is one of few that provide these type of world-class marketing and consulting services, and the only with deep expertise into the military and veteran audience. When it comes to strategy and communications to military and veterans, MARCH is the agency to call. For more information, visit us at www.marchcorp.com.