As CTV matures, marketers are treating it as a full-funnel engine, balancing reach with performance goals.

“We are building experimentation frameworks that make it a full funnel performance engine versus just reach or just ROI,” said Shruti Khatod, senior vice president, growth marketing and media strategy, at Nutrafol during a virtual EMARKETER Summit.

CTV’s effectiveness stems from its blend of quality content and innovative ad tools.

• “The power of CTV is its availability to bring together premium, high quality and engaging content, along with those advanced targeting and innovative ad formats and technology,” said Benjamin Vandegrift, vice president, measurement strategy and innovation at the Video Advertising Bureau (VAB).
• When combined with granular data for real-time campaign optimization, CTV becomes “the ideal mechanism of advertising,” he said.

Measurement is an ongoing process

Despite progress, CTV measurement remains one of the industry’s thorniest challenges.

• “I genuinely empathize with every brand and marketer who is looking for answers, for measurement, which is really hard,” said Katad.
• She advocates consolidating DSPs where possible and aligning partners around shared KPIs so marketers can achieve “some apples to apples comparison.”

She also stresses the importance of evaluating multiple signals, such as brand lift, search trends, site traffic, retargeting pool growth, and monitoring creative performance over time. A long shelf life for creative, she says, is a strong indicator “that something is working.”

Marketers should be cautious about focusing too much on bottom-of-the-funnel metrics, said Vandegriff.

“It’s important to take a balanced or full funnel approach to overarching campaign goals,” he said. “While most advertisers’ ultimate goal is to sell something, it’s incredibly important to remember that the first step to achieving that goal is that somebody needs to know who you are. They need to trust you as a brand.”

How AI will reshape the future

AI is starting to influence creative and data-driven processes in CTV.

• Katad sees immediate opportunity in creative production, asking: “How do we actually use AI smartly to get variations to hit on different points… and not burn through your bank while doing that for CTV?”
• She believes AI can accelerate insights, helping teams sift through data faster to optimize in real-time.

Vandegrift cites computer vision technology as a major AI breakthrough.

• “Companies are using this technology to determine things like what apps are being accessed and viewed, what emotions are characters showing in a particular scene, what brands or products are showing up, and even what logo inside a stadium is on screen during an exciting moment,” he said.
• These capabilities enable more precise contextual alignment, attention measurement, and valuation of brand placements.

What’s next

Looking ahead, the industry’s biggest leap will come from making cross-platform identity solutions widely available, said Katad.

She wants “cross-publisher identity and frequency deduplication through clean rooms” to become accessible to all advertisers, unlocking “real incremental reach, reporting, [and] consistent attribution.”

Vandegrift anticipates major momentum in new ad experiences like split-screen ads or shoppable formats.

“These innovative ad formats are creating powerful moments for brands and for audiences,” he said.

This article was prepared with the assistance of generative AI tools to support content organization, summarization, and drafting. All AI-generated contributions have been reviewed, fact-checked, and verified for accuracy and originality by EMARKETER editors. Any recommendations reflect EMARKETER’s research and human judgment.

This was originally featured in the EMARKETER Daily newsletter. For more marketing insights, statistics, and trends, subscribe here.