Five Ways Marketers Can Win in Indiaâ€™s Live Sports Arena

Authored by Gavin Buxton, Managing Director, Asia, Magnite

With more people relying on streaming services to watch their favourite content, OTT and traditional broadcasting are merging, creating new chances and resources for advertisers to connect with their viewers.

Live sports, such as cricket sporting events, area prime example of the collision between the worlds of OTT and traditional broadcast.

According to recent research by Magnite, almost all streamers in India (86%) prefer to watch live content through streaming platforms, with 55% of them regularly tuning in to sports.

The majority of streamers in India (80%) prefer to watch ad-supported content rather than pay for an ad-free service. Moreover, 60% of those seeking to subscribe to a new streaming service plan in the next 6 months intend to choose an ad-supported option.

This offers opportunities for marketers across all industry sectors to reach highly engaged, live audiences at scale. While brands’ spend and objectives vary considerably, all draw heavily on five key guidelines:

Know your audience

Streaming TV is now regarded as mainstream and can include news, live linear events, reality shows, live sports, and beyond. The streaming TV audience is distinctive because it is more highly engaged, actionable, and receptive to ads. Nearly all streamers in India (93%) have responded to ads shown to them while streaming, with 33% going on to make a purchase.

Personalisation is key to driving engagement. 76% of streamers pay more attention to ads tailored to their lifestyle and interests (i.e. a pet owner who is served ads for pet food). Live events also capture viewers’ emotions in the moment, as live streamers (66%) have a higher receptivity to advertisers than non-live streamers (54%).

Understanding your audience and their streaming behaviours can tailor your campaign strategy to maximise ROI.

Choose premium, high-quality streaming environments

It’s important to select the right environment to advertise in, which is key to driving campaign outcomes.

Watching video on streaming platforms is more popular in India compared to social media. People spend around 18 hours per week watching streaming content, while they only spend an average of 16 hours per week on social media. Streamers also seem to be more receptive to ads shown on streaming platforms, with 64% paying attention to them, compared to only 18% paying attention to ads on social media.

With sports audiences conditioned to flawlessly delivered viewing experiences, quality is king – even with ads. Pixelated video, poor sound or other ad quality issues can compromise the viewing experience and, ultimately, the advertiser’s brand value. Frequency capping tools and automated creative review can help deliver seamless execution to meet audience expectations. Don’t let a poor ad experience have a negative impact on brand perception.

Go omnichannel

OTT is highly conducive to an omnichannel marketing strategy, with viewers live streaming sports across a mix of devices. With multiple touchpoints at their fingertips, marketers can effectively communicate and reinforce their message across channels. Instead of considering OTT a siloed channel, make it part of a full-funnel marketing solution. Use tools that streamline and track performance across OTT supply to see where there is an opportunity for retargeting and tailor creative CTAs for each environment.

OTT is especially ideal for those looking to expand their existing marketing strategy, particularly those that rely only on traditional marketing methods, i.e., events, social media, or email marketing campaigns.

As OTT viewing matures, content delivery will improve across devices – and become more interactive. Already, certain live sports apps offer behind-the-scenes content, different angles of the field, or the ability to listen to certain announcers. Media plans that take advantage of such programming across the big and small screen will benefit from greater reach and engagement.

Power campaigns with programmatic

Programmatic trading has robust targeting capabilities, making it a fast-growing method to reach audiences. Global programmatic OTT ad spend rose 32% last year and is expected to continue to increase moving forward.

With programmatic, marketers can easily and efficiently access, optimise, and transact on live sports inventory. An ad can be up and running within minutes, creating more opportunities to tailor or pivot ad creative. Campaigns can also be tweaked in-flight to capture spikes in viewership or play more highly performant ads.

It doesn’t need to break the bank

To access live sports, media companies used to have to ‘go big or go home,’ with big budgets required to win access to sports appointment viewing. That’s no longer necessarily the case. OTT advertising puts smaller and mid-sized brands on a more equal playing field because it doesn’t require astronomical budgets to tap into scaled, diverse audiences that previously required high upfront spend to access. OTT also allows marketers to run both wide or more narrow campaigns, tapping into all parts of the marketing funnel.

In this way, OTT advertising is an especially alluring channel for brands looking to invest in sports while meeting budget constraints. Budgets can also be adjusted based on performance, so spend can be allocated to the most effective campaigns and ad spots.

As OTT’s impression-based buying crosses over to more channels, live sports streaming shouldn’t be kept on the bench. Sports streaming gives brands a low barrier to entry to reaching a massive fan base, with the addressability and tools to score greater ROI on campaigns that win.