CTV Advertising
Last updated September 2026
CTV advertising places video ads on connected televisions, the smart TVs and streaming devices such as Roku, Fire TV, and Apple TV that stream content through apps rather than a cable box. It delivers programmatic-style targeting and measurement on the biggest screen in the house, where OTT content is most often watched.
Connected TV, CTV, is the device: a smart TV, or a streaming box or stick, that runs apps like Hulu, YouTube, or a local streaming service. CTV advertising is the ad inventory served through those apps onto that screen. It is a subset of OTT, defined by the hardware rather than the content.
01
Why the device distinction matters
A household might stream the same show on a phone during a commute and on a connected TV that night. Both are OTT viewing, but the CTV impression is the one happening on the living room screen, typically watched at higher attention, often as a shared household experience. Advertisers who care about that context buy CTV specifically rather than OTT broadly.
02
How CTV is bought
CTV inventory moves through the same programmatic pipes as display and other OTT formats, bought through a DSP against audience and household data. Formats are almost entirely pre-roll or mid-roll video, non-skippable, and sold at a premium CPM reflecting the big-screen, high-attention environment.
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Household-level targeting by geography, demographic, and behavioral or contextual audience segments.
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Non-skippable video in a big-screen, high-attention viewing context.
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Frequency capping to control how often the same household sees the same spot.
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Reporting on completion rate and, with attribution in place, downstream conversion lift.
03
Conduit's role
CTV is one of the higher-production channels in the mix: it demands broadcast-quality creative, not a repurposed social clip. Conduit builds CTV creative and manages the buy as a white label service, typically layered with geofencing so a household exposed to the CTV spot can be measured against an actual visit or call.
The reporting for CTV campaigns should always tie back to the same GPS foundation used everywhere else, since a view-through conversion on a streaming platform is only meaningful if it can be connected to an actual business outcome.
Where this applies
