Look-Alike Modeling for CTV Advertising

Consumer data is gold, especially when it allows marketers to identify new audiences with similar attributes to their best customers. This is the power of look-alike modeling.

Rather than having to take a stab in the dark about who your target audience is — or (even worse) take a spray-and-pray approach that wastes ad dollars by reaching everyone and their mother — look-alike modeling lets advertisers identify likely buyers at scale.

As our second-best performing targeting tactic, we’re big proponents of look-alike modeling at Stategus. But how does it work? What kind of data is used? And why is it so valuable in connected television advertising?

Keep reading for how, what, and why. 

What Is Look-Alike Modeling?

Look-alike modeling is a targeting tactic that allows advertisers to reach new, high-potential customers who share characteristics and behaviors similar to their top-performing audience segments. This data-driven approach is a slam dunk for advertisers looking to expand their reach without wasting money on unlikely buyers.

Benefits of Look-Alike Modeling

• Increased reach: Reach new audiences who are likely to be interested in your products or services.
  
  
• Improved ROI: Eliminate wasted ad spend by targeting high-potential customers.
  
  
• Enhanced campaign performance: Drive better results by reaching more qualified leads.
  
  
• Greater efficiency: Streamline your targeting efforts and optimize campaigns faster.
  
  
• Sales-focused brand awareness: Introduce your brand to new audiences who are likely to convert.
  
  

How Does Look-Alike Modeling Work for CTV Advertising

The premise of look-alike modeling is simple: marketers combine internal insight with external data sources to identify new audiences that mirror their ideal customer profile. At Strategus, we start by targeting those high-potential users on the living room TV, and then re-engage them across other screens and channels like online video, display, and streaming audio.

Here’s a look at the step-by-step process involved in setting up a look-alike modeling strategy with Strategus.

• Start with your first–party data: The more insight you have into prospects and customers, the more effective the modeling will be. This data can be pulled from your existing customers, website visitors, and CRM files. We can always work with you to drop a pixel on your website to track visitor activity. That said, paying customers provide a more precise view of the types of people likely to use your products and services.

• Use machine learning to find patterns: Our team of experts then uses machine learning to analyze your data — identifying common characteristics among your high-value customers, such as demographics, interests, purchase history, and online behavior. This allows us to build custom profiles of high-potential users who share similar traits.

• Access our partner ecosystem: From there, we tap into our vast network of data partners to locate viewers who match these characteristics. By combining your ideal customer profile with our ecosystem of 200+ data providers, we can easily identify new audiences that mirror your best customers. 

• Deliver targeted campaigns: Finally, we craft and deliver campaigns that target these profiles across programmatic networks. At Strategus, we take a CTV-first approach by first engaging viewers on the biggest screen in the house: their living room TV. But we don't stop there. We incorporate touch points across other screens and platforms to deliver a cohesive, omnichannel experience that's more likely to drive conversions. This multi-channel strategy ensures that your message is reinforced across different devices, maximizing your reach and impact.

Ideal Use Cases for Look-Alike Modeling

Crafting a successful CTV campaign starts with defining the business outcomes you’re looking to achieve and designing your targeting strategy accordingly. A lead reactivation campaign wouldn’t benefit much from look-alike modeling, whereas an awareness campaign would be a perfect fit.

Here are the top use cases for this approach.

• New customer acquisition: Find new customers who resemble your existing high-value customers.
  
  
• Brand awareness: Reach a broader audience of potential customers who are likely to be interested in your brand.
  
  
• Product launch: Introduce a new product or service to an audience that is likely to be receptive.
  
  
• Seasonal campaigns: Target specific demographics or interests during key periods, like holidays or seasonal events.
  
  

Combining First- and Third-Party Data With Strategus

The key to look-alike modeling is effectively synthesizing data sources. In the very least, advertisers need to activate two distinct data sources:

1. High-quality internal (first-party) data about prospects and customers
   
   
2. Comprehensive and industry-specific sources of third-party data 
   
   

Learn more about first- vs. third- party data →  

Both first- and third-party data offer directional insight when used alone. But when combined, the whole is greater than the sum. This is because synthesizing the two allows advertisers to harmonize the benefits of first-party data (reliability and precision) with that of third-party data (scale and insight into the market at large).

This is worth calling out because not all connected TV providers offer the ability to activate first-party data. Additionally, while it’s become table stakes to target who sees an ad based on basic demographics, we offer much more extensive audience customization.

Customer Success Stories

Curious what this looks like in action? Here are two case studies of brands we’ve partnered with to deliver measurable results using look-alike modeling.

Furniture Retailer Links Brand Awareness to Attributable Conversions

A Georgia furniture retailer sought to build brand awareness while driving both in-person and online sales. We proposed a diverse targeting strategy that included look-alike modeling, competitor conquesting, and retargeting, allowed for precise audience segmentation and efficient budget allocation across high-performing geolocations.

By combining CTV, online video, and display ads into a holistic campaign, we worked with them to drive 12,326 conversions over a five-month period, including 1,599 in-person visits.

Learn More → 

Non-Profit Achieves High Donation Volume With Targeted CTV Campaign

A national non-profit organization (NPO) partnered with Strategus to drive donations during the final quarter of the year, focusing on Giving Tuesday. Using a comprehensive targeting strategy that combined look-alike modeling based on the NPO's existing donor list, identified users with a history of charitable involvement, and focused on specific zip code targeting within the top DMAs in the US, Strategus was able to achieve impressive results.

Despite a limited budget and a short campaign duration, we drove 784 individual donations, totaling over $485,000. This success demonstrates the effectiveness of targeted CTV advertising for non-profit organizations looking to increase donations and reach new donors.

Learn More → 

Get Started

Do your ideal customers love to go hiking? Awesome, we’ll find viewers that share that passion. Are vegetarians drawn to your products? We have the data integrations to find others in your area. 

At Strategus, we go beyond basic demographics to pinpoint exactly who sees your ad — ensuring that every impression drives engagement and action. Our in-house team gathers data from tech partners across the ecosystem with expertise from executing 60,000+ CTV campaigns to craft compelling targeting strategies based on your goals.

Ready to get started? Contact us today to discuss what a look-alike CTV campaign could look like for your agency or brand.