Perception of CTV ad effectiveness hampered by use of narrow targeting tactics

According to Gracenote, 80% of marketers still use performance-oriented targeting tactics despite citing brand awareness as top objective

NEW YORK, Oct. 1, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- A new report from Gracenote, the content data business unit of Nielsen, identifies a misalignment in connected TV (CTV) advertising: While marketers are prioritizing top-of-the-funnel brand building objectives for their CTV campaigns, in practice, many are employing targeting tactics better suited to reaching smaller audience segments with precision. Current reliance on user- and audience-based targeting is impacting marketers' ability to achieve critical scale and effectiveness with their large investment CTV buys. This is likely why 32% of media professionals surveyed by Gracenote for the report say they don't view CTV to be very effective as a media channel.

Marketers understand that CTV is where consumers are today so naturally the channel is playing an increasingly important role in their media plans. In fact, the IAB expects U.S. ad spending on CTV to reach $26.6 billion this year, up 12% from 2024. According to the Gracenote survey, nearly one-in-three survey respondents report allocating 40% or more of their budgets to CTV.

When asked about objectives against this sizable CTV spend, media professionals indicated that brand awareness was the top goal, followed by revenue growth and customer acquisition. Customer retention, which typically leans on performance marketing, ranked a distant fourth. To better meet their strategic objectives, the Gracenote report asserts marketers should evolve their approaches and leverage more content-based targeting to reach new potential consumers and maintain premium brand alignment.

By focusing on what consumers are watching in addition to who's watching, marketers can open new opportunities to meet their top objectives and achieve the scale needed to drive brand building and customer acquisition. The availability of program-level data organized in a structured taxonomy enables the industry to better leverage contextually targeted CTV advertising to drive business results.

"CTV has not delivered the scale and premium reach that marketers expect of the largest screen in the house largely based on the use of narrow targeting tactics," said Jake Richardson, VP of Partnerships at Gracenote. "By taking better advantage of contextual targeting capabilities with their CTV campaigns, they have new opportunities to drive both return on ads spend and the scale they've been looking for."

Gracenote has a long history powering entertainment search and discovery capabilities that help TV platforms connect viewers to resonant content. Now, the company is actively enabling more effective programmatic CTV advertising by way of new product offerings and strategic partnerships leveraging its gold-standard content metadata, taxonomy and IDs.

The new Gracenote report captures data from a recent survey of U.S.-based brand and agency executives with influence over media planning and buying decisions. Industries in focus included media and entertainment, telecommunications, retail, financial services, automotive, consumer packaged goods and health care/pharmaceutical. The report is available for download here. Learn more about Gracenote Contextual Video Data here.

About Gracenote
Gracenote is the content data business unit of Nielsen, providing entertainment metadata, content IDs and related offerings to the world's leading creators, distributors and platforms. Gracenote has aggregated, normalized and enriched core program metadata covering 40M+ titles in 260+ streaming catalogs in 35 languages and 80+ countries. Gracenote technology enables advanced content navigation and discovery capabilities helping individuals to easily connect to the TV shows, movies, music and sports they love while delivering powerful content analytics making complex business decisions simpler. For more information, visit Gracenote.com.

SOURCE Gracenote