Use Connected TV To Sell More Cars

Over the last several years, we’ve seen a monumental shift in the way people watch TV and movies. There are far fewer cable or satellite service subscribers than ever before. When it comes to long-form content, platforms like Hulu, Netflix, Amazon, and countless others have become household names. You probably have a subscription to at least one of these services yourself! A NetTV study found 46% of households subscribe to “4 or more” streaming services as of mid-2021.

Consumers are fleeing traditional TV. Are Dealerships keeping up?

More importantly for dealerships, this means that regardless of your business size, there are now more affordable and more effective options for engaging with your audience through video content than anytime in history – specifically, through connected TV, otherwise known as CTV.

CTV refers to devices including Smart TVs, Amazon Fire Sticks, Roku, Apple TV, Chromecast, and even modern gaming consoles like Xbox, Playstation, and Nintendo Switch. Viewers of these ad-supported video-on-demand platforms represent almost half of all internet users in the US alone. Given that only about 5% of Americans are reportedly in the market for a vehicle purchase at any given time, this is definitely the place you want to be seen by your local audience. 

When it comes to that audience, there’s no shortage of statistics that prove this shift away from traditional TV is already well underway. Nearly 40% of US households are expected to have ditched traditional TV for streaming services by the end of 2022. What’s more, the demographics of these viewers is broad, with Google reporting that between 2016 and 2018 alone, there was a 15% increase in “cord cutters” among 18-49 year olds. As of 2021, about two-thirds of the US population were monthly CTV users. 

A cord-cutter generally refers to someone who has canceled their traditional cable or satellite services in lieu of another option for watching TV. So the question becomes how CTV can help you reach this incredible and emerging audience. Fortunately, with the right technology in place, your options are now more affordable, measurable, and highly targeted. That means your ROI is higher, you’ll see more traffic to your site, and to your dealership. Not a bad deal, right? 

Keep in mind that traditional TV subscribers are also streaming service subscribers in most cases. That means CTV advertising can reach both “cord cutters” and streaming service providers, whereas traditional TV advertising is only influencing a dwindling number of traditional TV subscribers.

Also, keep in mind that around 45% of folks in the US use their mobile devices or tablets while they’re watching TV these days. That’s important because CTV can not only help you more effectively target the right audiences, but also allows for better retargeting to those audiences.

The biggest problem with traditional TV advertising has historically been a lack of visibility on your ad-spend return. There are some ways dealers have been able to measure when someone comes to their lot directly from a traditional TV ad (short-run promo codes, etc.), but in most cases they just have to rely on what their network partners report in terms of audience size, and viewership of the channel within a certain time-frame. It’s certainly not precise. Traditional TV also suffers from far fewer targeting options.Your ad could be shown to anyone watching the network you’ve partnered with, which means your ad spend is often wasted on the wrong audience. 

Traditional TV advertising completely lacks retargeting ability. In marketing, especially when it comes to automotive purchases, it often takes connecting with your prospective customer multiple times before they purchase. With traditional TV, you have no way of reconnecting with a potential customer once the ad is over. Wouldn’t it be better if you could follow up after your ad is viewed through a display ad on their mobile device? 

In contrast, CTV ads allow for a wide array of performance metrics from impressions to verified visits and more, with some services even providing real-time dashboards to measure this data. CTV  allows for intelligent IP targeting, so you know your ad is showing to folks whose search histories actually indicate a real interest in purchasing the vehicles you have on your lot today. 

CTV advertising can also be targeted between multiple (or hundreds) of different premium networks. Though not every CTV advertising service offers multiple networks, a key advantage of CTV advertising is network-fluidity. The most successful CTV advertising campaigns are able to flow money to the networks with the best performance in real time, simultaneously reducing spend at low performing networks.

Explosive growth of CTV is already happening and there is a monumental shift away from traditional TV for just about every audience, while the demand for TV content has never been higher. That’s why now is the perfect time to take advantage of CTV advertising. That’s also why it’s important to have the right partner, who can provide you with reliable performance metrics, intelligent targeting (such as Redline’s AI-driven fully-automated media buying), access to hundreds of premium networks and a real understanding of your business. 

Fortunately, Redline Connected TV is here for you! With 15 years of experience working exclusively with auto dealerships, and as the only auto tech company that started as a dealership service company, we can help you maximize your ROI and drive more traffic to your site, and to your dealership through CTV ads that reliably perform. Contact us today and let us show you the Redline Advantage!