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Programmatic CTV is the Secret Weapon For Political Ad Campaigns

Forecasts for 2023-24 predict a record $10.2B in political spending—the most expensive cycle ever, up from 13% the previous year. 

We work intensively in political advertising strategy and have seen firsthand how programmatic reaches people in multi-channel premium environments with a timely and local approach. 

We also understand that advertisers are cautious. 

There are some commonly held assumptions about programmatic from five years ago that don’t hold water today, especially as data becomes more available, and detailed.

So let’s bust some myths: 

“Programmatic advertisements means there’s no guarantee your ad will show up on brand-safe, quality content”

False: If you’re managing the campaign yourself or working with a managed service programmatic ad tech, you can access high quality, brand safe inventory. 

“Audience data might not be authenticated and match rates might be low”

False:  You can (and should) update voter lists daily for accurate targeting. Klever has access to New Daily Voter segments, so that we can dynamically roll this into audiences right up till Election Day, and update Early Voter segments to ensure campaigns aren’t communicating with constituents once they’ve already placed their vote. 

“Traditional TV will always be the dominant investment.”

Not exactly: Investments in digital will take up 28.1% of U.S. political ad budgets in 2024, a huge jump from just 8.2% in 2016 and a strong indicator that political buyers are deviating from Traditional TV advertising more and more. 

You can achieve more with programmatic political ad campaigns. Here’s how: 

Reach

The scale of Connected TV (CTV) is undeniable. As noted in a previous blog about CTV, it accounts for 2 hours of watch time per day. With a year-over-year increase of 18% in industry ad spend and over $28 billion in total dollars, CTV offers an unprecedented opportunity to reach a politically relevant audience at scale. Whether you’re targeting new voters, or trying to capture swing voters, CTV maximizes exposure. 

Transparency

One of the standout advantages of programmatic advertising is its granular audience targeting. By leveraging audience segmentation, political campaigns can reach voters based on state, city zip and congressional district. This is important on two fronts: you as an advertiser know that your campaign is shown on high-quality, brand-safe inventory. There is also greater assurance that impressions aren’t being wasted. For political advertising, targeting needs to get granular. 

This particular election year is contingent on swing states, so resonant messaging to very specific voter segments is crucial. This is where Traditional TV comparatively falls short. While inventory is high quality, granular targeting is almost non-existent.

Measurement

Programmatic advertising delivers trackable and justified spending, crucial for grassroots campaigns and crunchtime campaigns where sentiment needs to be improved by certain dates. With advanced tracking of spend across platforms and content, political campaigns can more easily justify their investment because they understand what’s working. What’s cool about an advanced programmatic feature like Klever’s PROXIMITY is that it uses voter movement data to deliver localized ads where they have the greatest impact. Whether it’s targeting key swing districts or reaching voters around specific events, PROXIMITY enables campaigns to connect with voters in meaningful ways. Every dollar in a political budget needs to be maximized. 

Optimization

Optimizations are necessary for any media campaign, but are particularly vital to the ongoing success of political campaigns. With increased investment in digital, it's important to retain humanity in all your messaging, which is why a synergistic approach of nimble hands and smart tech is the best campaign management strategy. 

The competition for quality, targeted inventory is fierce for political buyers. If you want to get plugged into one of the most engaged audiences on premium inventory—you’re leaving opportunity on the table if you don’t leverage programmatic CTV for political campaigns. 

If you’re curious how you or your client can leverage programmatic the smart way—talk to a Klever mind. 

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