OTT Advertising
Last updated September 2026
OTT advertising delivers video ads through internet-streamed content viewed outside a traditional cable box, on services like Hulu, Peacock, or ad-supported streaming apps. It combines TV-quality video creative with the targeting and measurement of digital advertising, reaching cord-cutting audiences traditional TV buys increasingly miss.
Over-the-top, OTT, describes any video content delivered over the internet instead of through a cable or satellite box. OTT advertising is the ad inventory that runs inside that content: pre-roll and mid-roll spots on streaming apps, ad-supported tiers, and video-on-demand platforms. It looks like a TV commercial but buys and targets like a digital ad.
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Why it matters now
Cord-cutting has moved a large share of video viewing off traditional broadcast and cable entirely. A media plan built only around linear TV misses that audience. OTT fills the gap: full-episode and full-length content, premium production value, and an ad experience viewers cannot skip, delivered to the same households through their streaming apps instead.
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How targeting differs from linear TV
Linear TV buys a daypart and a network, then hopes the right audience is watching. OTT buys an audience directly: household demographics, geography down to the zip code, and behavioral or contextual data, often the same segments used in programmatic display. That precision is a large part of why OTT commands a premium CPM over open-web video.
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Household-level and cross-device targeting instead of network-and-daypart guessing.
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Non-skippable, full-screen video creative that lands like a TV spot.
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Measurable impressions and, with the right tracking in place, downstream conversion lift.
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Access to premium content environments, news, sports, prestige drama, without a network buy.
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Where OTT fits for white label clients
OTT is a common ask from agencies whose clients want to look and feel like a bigger brand without a traditional TV budget. Conduit builds and traffics OTT campaigns as a white label service, often alongside CTV and geofencing so the same household gets reached on the streaming screen and followed to a store visit or a call.
OTT inventory tends to be less saturated with competing advertisers than traditional linear TV or walled-garden social, which is part of why it can produce strong reach at a lower relative cost for clients willing to test it.
Where this applies
