Your Winning Ad Frequency Might Be Higher Than You Think

Brand fatigue is always top of mind when advertisers are planning their campaigns, because no one wants to oversaturate their audience. But the truth is that exposure drives results — if you can find that perfect frequency. 

In an effort to demystify this magical number, we put our tech to the test. We launched our first campaign for B2B audiences, and we're sharing insights to help our clients learn the ins and outs of CTV advertising. 

As you'll see, when it comes to the best ad frequency for your campaign, it's not as easy as a single number. 

The right ad frequency depends on what the goals are for a given campaign. 

For our test, we set an ambitious goal to optimize on conversions; we wanted to experiment with the unique value that programmatic TV advertising can offer. 

So in order to determine what the ideal frequency is to deliver our campaign and make an impact with viewers, we looked at when conversion occurs. For the purposes of this experiment, we defined conversion as a visit to our website after viewing our CTV ad. 

We learned that the higher the frequency, the higher the conversion rate. When viewers were exposed to the ad between 5-7 times, they were 8x more likely to convert.  

So while some people converted almost immediately, on average, it took 5 to 7 views of the ad before conversion. 

For some advertisers, that might seem high. But in truth, this is in line with industry baselines for overall delivery; according to a recent report, the average frequency for all CTV campaigns is 7.42.  

Related: Want to know who we're targeting? Read our blog about our audience. 

As we mentioned, the best frequency for your campaign will depend on your goals. While we focused on conversions, many brands turn to CTV advertising for brand lift, foot traffic, and other KPIs. The ideal frequency will vary based on those goals.  

Moreover, not every advertiser will have the same frequency for conversion; we're a B2B platform, so our services tend to have a longer consideration timeline, and it makes sense that we'd land on the higher end of the spectrum. 

Frequency for conversion will ultimately vary depending on the promo, CTA, audience, and campaign type. For example, redeeming a special offer for a low-ticket item might take fewer ad views before conversion, because the reward is more immediate and the price is lower-impact.

Either way, it's important to recognize that conversion is unlikely to happen after just a few views. So what does this mean for CTV advertisers?

1. More time and budget might be required to drive real impact and meaningful results, if conversion is the primary goal.

2. Advertisers should track performance to see what their average frequency is for conversion, and then optimize for it. 

3. They should also test creative to see what elements convert the best, and lean into them when running a conversion-focused campaign.

Our test is still in-flight, and we're analyzing and optimizing along the way! 

For this next phase, we'll see how testing our creative changes time to conversion, and we'll monitor whether lowering the daily frequency cap impacts delivery. 

Phase two is in progress now! Want to be the first to know how it performs? 

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