Every evening, millions of households across India are streaming content on their TVs – watching cricket, bingeing shows, or catching up on live events. And almost instinctively, someone reaches for their smartphone — to search, browse, order, or transact.
This is the reality of modern media consumption in India: discovery happens on the biggest screen in the house, but action happens on the most personal one.
Yet much of advertising strategy still treats these ecosystems separately.
While consumer behavior has shifted decisively to multi-screen consumption, a large share of ad budgets remains concentrated on mobile-only performance channels. At the same time, Connected TV (CTV) has quietly scaled into a mainstream, high-attention platform.
India today has more than 600 million OTT users, while the country’s CTV audience has crossed 129 million users reaching 45 million households. The growing adoption of CTV has been driven by affordable Smart TVs, cheaper broadband access, and the rapid expansion of streaming platforms.
Streaming itself as consumer behavior has also become a mainstream habit across urban and increasingly semi-urban households. This has enabled expanding the reach of CTV beyond metros into a scalable, high-attention ecosystem. Brands across categories like FMCG, Automobile, Lifestyle, and BFSI are leveraging CTV extensively for brand awareness & recall, the potential has still been limited to the upper funnel, missing out on the performance capabilities of CTV.
The biggest perceived historical limitation of CTV advertising has been its disconnect from performance marketing. That gap no longer exists.
Modern CTV ecosystems now enable advertisers to build far more connected, creative, and performance-oriented experiences across screens.
This includes capabilities such as:
The result is a far more intelligent advertising environment, one where exposure on the television screen can immediately translate into measurable engagement on mobile.
This is a critical shift because it transforms CTV from a passive awareness channel into an active intent driver. And in a market like India where mobile remains the primary device for commerce, app engagement, and digital transactions, CTV’s ability to bridge high-attention storytelling on the big screen with seamless mobile action creates a significantly stronger pathway from awareness to performance.
Another major evolution is in measurement. Traditionally, television advertising was viewed as a black box. With CTV’s programmatic capabilities, advertisers have a deeper view of the impact of CTV ads. Via sophisticated MMP integrations and DSP partners, advertisers today can increasingly understand QR scan behavior, app installs originating from CTV exposure, incremental lift, and other downstream in-app actions, enabling an integrated ROI measurement.
This is changing how brands evaluate television advertising altogether. The conversation is shifting away from: “How many people watched?” to “What action did that attention create?”
That distinction is redefining the role of CTV within performance marketing conversations.
One of the biggest challenges for advertisers today is not just reaching audiences – it’s reaching new audiences.
Traditional digital channels often operate within closed loops. The same users are exposed repeatedly, leading to frequency fatigue without meaningful incremental reach. This results in wasted impressions and rising acquisition costs.
CTV changes that equation by enabling advertisers to access audiences in environments that are less saturated by repetitive performance advertising and more conducive to storytelling. Importantly, these audiences are often encountered in moments of higher receptivity, such as during entertainment, sports, or shared household viewing experiences, leading to better engagement and action
Finally, one of the most persistent myths around CTV is that it is expensive. In reality, CTV is often misunderstood because it is evaluated through the wrong lens.
Yes, CPMs may appear higher compared to traditional mobile inventory. But CPM alone is an incomplete measure of value.
What advertisers are actually buying through CTV is:
When evaluated against business outcomes rather than isolated media costs, the economics begin to look very different. For many brands, the combination of CTV and mobile is already demonstrating:
The conversation, therefore, should not be: “Is CTV more expensive?” Rather, looking at it from the perspective of “Is fragmented attention becoming more expensive?” Because increasingly, in a multi-screen environment, that is the larger risk.
Several macro trends make this moment particularly important for India:
Together, these trends are creating the conditions for a more connected advertising model — one where awareness and action no longer need to exist separately.
CTV has earned its place as a premium environment for storytelling and reach. The opportunity now is to connect that attention to measurable business outcomes. For advertisers already investing in CTV, the next step is not necessarily increasing the spend but modifying the existing media mix.
As the lines between branding and performance continue to blur, the most effective strategies will be the ones that bring the two closer together rather than treating them as separate objectives.
Unlock the next frontier of performance marketing. Team mDSP enables brands to capture the full value across CTV and mobile. Get started with us: https://mdsp.co/contact