Connected TV (CTV) spending is growing rapidly in political campaigns, but the real shift isn’t simply that campaigns are spending more on streaming. It’s that campaigns are following voters as media consumption continues its steady migration from traditional broadcast to streaming platforms.
In this episode of the Campaign Trend Podcast, Eric Wilson sits down with Chauncey Southworth, CEO of Cross Screen Media, to unpack how campaigns are navigating the evolving video advertising landscape – and why the biggest strategic debates today aren’t about whether to use CTV, but how to use it effectively.
Political video advertising overall is projected to grow from roughly $9.8 billion in 2022 to about $11.2 billion in 2026. But much of the growth in CTV isn’t coming from new money – it’s coming from campaigns reallocating their budgets to follow audiences as viewing habits shift toward streaming platforms.
That shift is particularly significant for down-ballot races. While top-of-the-ticket campaigns still dominate spending, CTV allows smaller campaigns to target households inside expensive media markets without paying for the entire market. For a state legislative campaign in a large market like Dallas, that means reaching voters on the biggest screen in the house without the prohibitive cost of a traditional broadcast buy.
But as campaigns adopt streaming, a new operational question emerges: who should control the buy?
On one side are traditional TV buyers, who understand reach, frequency, creative rotation, and media markets. On the other are digital specialists who bring experience navigating programmatic platforms, identity graphs, and the technical challenges of targeting and fraud prevention.
Southworth argues the answer shouldn’t be determined by turf battles. Instead, the campaigns that succeed will be those that integrate their video strategy across channels (linear TV, streaming, and digital) while measuring reach and frequency holistically.
The fragmentation of streaming also introduces new creative considerations. Linear TV viewers might see over 13 minutes of ads per hour, while streaming viewers may only see about four minutes. That means campaigns often get fewer opportunities to make an impression, increasing the importance of message testing and creative optimization.
As political media continues to fragment, the lesson is simple: campaigns that break down internal silos and treat video advertising as one integrated ecosystem will be far better positioned to reach voters where they actually are.