Commentary

CTV Projected To Grow 33% In 2022 To $19B: What If It Was All Bought In TV Upfront?

Connected TV (CTV) advertising revenues will continue to soar in 2022 -- up 33% over the year before to $18.9 billion, says eMarketer. Comparable numbers from Standard Media Index in conjunction with the IAB project a 40% hike to $21.1 billion.

No matter what path you pick, the growth rate is expected to decline in the next five years. At the same time, CTV is expected to rise in another area -- via the traditional TV upfront market.

Over the next five years, eMarketer says, CTV is estimated to hit $38.8 billion -- accounting for 10% of all digital media ad spend.

At that level, connected TV ad spending will be near the $40 billion or so that national TV networks pull in collectively from advertising revenue per year.

The IAB says overall digital video advertising -- CTV and other platforms -- will be $50 billion this year, nearing total linear TV spending.

Total TV advertising, including local TV, syndication advertising, broadcast and cable networks, has been around the $70 billion level for the past several years -- adjusting up or down every other year for big Olympic and big political election seasons.

In that regard, we wonder if the traditional linear TV upfront market should find a new definition -- especially if in a few years the bulk of the $20 billion or so bought in the upfront ad market, set to start soon for the September to August TV season, goes to all things streaming, CTV, and other things digital.

If we figure that $10 billion of the projected $40 billion in CTV yearly ad spend goes into traditional upfront TV buying -- perhaps largely due to legacy media-owned TV platforms. Should we treat the upfront market differently?

eMarketer estimates that next year there will be five players in the CTV space -- each generating over $1 billion in annual ad revenues: YouTube, Hulu, Roku, Tubi, and Pluto TV.

Three of these are owned by legacy media companies -- Walt Disney, Fox Corp. and Paramount Global, respectively. By that time, NBCUniversal's Peacock may not be too far behind.

You might argue that the overall CTV/digital video world does not have the supply-and-demand formula constraints that linear TV has had on its side -- in weak and strong markets -- for decades.

But that's not totally true when it comes to current premium streaming limited-advertising-supported options owned by traditional media companies.

Sure, those companies can easily expand those ad availabilities --- just as they can on linear TV platforms.

Right now premium streaming platforms for consumers -- when it comes to advertising exposure -- appears stable.

Then the other age-old upfront question comes to mind -- flexibility.

When advertising-supported, premium CTV becomes the top overall TV earner will brand marketers still need to buy a full-season's worth of premium TV advertising before a TV season starts?

1 comment about "CTV Projected To Grow 33% In 2022 To $19B: What If It Was All Bought In TV Upfront?".
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  1. Ed Papazian from Media Dynamics Inc, May 26, 2022 at 8:47 a.m.

    Wayne, when looking at overall "TV" ad spend stats---real or guesstimated---it's important to consider the kinds of advertisers involved. For example national  ad spend---on linear TV---is only about $42-45 billion per year and much of that---about 90%--- is branding advertising. Roughly $32 billion of this national ad spend consists of upfront buys of all types in all dayparts. Which leaves the remainder for scatter and direct response---the latter mainly on cable. So when we speculate on how much of this might be diverted to CTV/AVOD we need to ask ourselves how much of the CTV/AVOD ad spend  will consist of money shifted away from "linear TV" and how much of it comes from somewhere else---for example, small, local advertisers or search advertisers or digital video advertisers---few of whom are involved in linear TV's upfront negotiations.

    What seems to be happening is a gradual flow of national scatter dollars into CTV/AVOD due in large part to very high scatterCPM  prices. And a few enlightened brands seem to be investigating the obvious targeting and other advantages inherent in well executed CTV/AVOD buys. But a fairly large part of the CTV'AVOD ad spend appears to consist of ad dollars coming from sources that are not your traditional linear TV upfront buyers. In other words, it's misleading to assume----as some do---that all of the national linear ad spend is at play---and likely---sooner or later---to move to CTV/AVOD. Too many variables are involved.

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About the Author

Wayne Friedman is West Coast Editor of MediaPost. You can reach Wayne at wayne@mediapost.com.