The CTV Playbook For B2B Marketers
For years, we’ve been talking about the promise of CTV. Not just as a more efficient version of linear, or a digital delivery mechanism for the same old 30-second spots—but as something bigger. Something that could expand what it means to “advertise on TV.” The theory went like this: if TV became more like digital—targetable, measurable, flexible—then more advertisers would be able to use it. Not just the Cokes and Toyotas of the world, but mid-sized brands. Challenger brands. Regional players. DTC startups. And, maybe most surprising of all, B2B companies.
The funny thing is, that’s exactly what’s been happening. Quietly at first, but now with increasing momentum.
The first wave was smaller local and regional brands who could use better targeting to expand their TV presence. They were followed by SMBs. Small and medium-sized businesses who had never even considered TV as an option—because why would they? It was expensive, broad, and hard to measure.
But with CTV, that changed. Suddenly you could buy inventory programmatically, target a very specific geographic or demographic niche, and even use AI tools to generate creative quickly and affordably. The combination of lower production barriers thanks to AI, better targeting, and brand-safe environments made CTV feel like a viable move. Not just for awareness, but for credibility.
For most consumers, seeing a company advertise on TV still carries weight—it signals scale, trust, legitimacy. And for an SMB trying to stand out from the crowd, that’s worth a lot.
But as significant as that shift has been, the even bigger opportunity might be in the B2B space.
B2B marketers have long had a fraught relationship with TV. The format never quite fit. TV was seen as a branding tool, while B2B was—and in many organizations, still is—treated as a pure performance game. The logic was simple: long sales cycles, niche audiences, and highly considered purchases don’t lend themselves to mass media. If your total addressable audience is 150 decision-makers at Fortune 500 companies, why would you spend six figures to reach a few million people? TV was too big, too blunt, and too hard to measure. Better to stick with LinkedIn ads, white papers, email nurture streams and the occasional webinar.
But that logic only holds up if you assume TV still works the way it did 30 years ago. And that’s where CTV changes the equation.
Because CTV behaves more like digital, it enables something that was never possible in the linear era: precision delivery of brand messages at scale. And when you combine that with the right data sources you get something pretty remarkable: a TV ad buy that can actually target viewers by job title, industry, company size, and even department. In other words, a way to put your message in front of the exact people you care about, in an environment that feels premium and brand-safe, and that delivers the kind of impact only TV can provide.
The combination is especially potent in B2B, where credibility is currency and brand-building is often an afterthought. Most B2B marketers are still stuck measuring performance in clicks and form fills, even though every major study—and most CMOs, if you get them off the record—will tell you that long-term brand equity is what actually drives growth. As per some recent LinkedIn research, 95% of B2B buyers aren’t in-market at any given time. That means you’re not trying to convert them tomorrow. You’re trying to make sure that when they’re ready—three, six, or even twelve months down the road—your brand is one of the ones they remember.
And that’s where CTV comes in.
TV has always been great at building emotional connections. It’s what makes the format powerful. We remember great commercials years later not because of the CTA, but because they made us feel something. Humor, nostalgia, awe—whatever it is, that emotional hook lodges in your brain in a way that banner ads or search results never can. And in a B2B world where most messaging is dry, functional, and loaded with jargon, that kind of emotional resonance is a differentiator. It gives your brand a personality. A voice. Something human.
What’s changed now is that you can pair that emotional storytelling with targeting that actually makes sense for a B2B context. No more “spray and pray.” No more hoping your spot on Squawk Box happens to be seen by one of the CFOs you’re actually targeting. No more wondering how you’d even know if they actually saw it.
That last part matters. Measurement is the other half of the equation, and it’s a big reason B2B advertisers are warming up to CTV thanks to the rise of cross-screen clarity in a medium that used to be notoriously opaque. You can now see not just impressions and completions, but actual reach against your defined audience segments. You can track incremental exposure, frequency, and overlap across platforms. And you can do it all in real time, which makes it possible to adjust your strategy mid-flight—something that was unheard of in traditional TV.
It’s not perfect, of course. B2B marketers still need to find their creative chops. But that’s starting to change too. Companies are experimenting with dynamic creative, testing interactivity, and starting to think more like consumer brands when it comes to storytelling.
That’s a good thing. Because in the end, B2B buyers are still people. They’re not immune to emotion. And the fact that they’re thinking about business doesn’t mean they want to be bored. So the brands that figure out how to entertain them, to combine that emotional punch with the right messaging, hitting both the head and the heart— those are the brands that are going to win.
The bottom line is this: CTV is giving B2B brands a new way to show up. A new way to tell their story. A new way to stay top of mind over long, complex buying journeys. It’s not about driving a lead tomorrow. It’s about showing up consistently, with impact, so that when the moment comes, your brand is already top of mind.
So while B2B and CTV might not be words we’re used to hearing in the same sentence, I have a feeling that’s about to change.
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