Notes for owners · Digital marketing
TV advertising vs OTT advertising: what are you actually buying?
Television sells slots against ratings and prices the wastage in. OTT sells impressions to chosen people and charges for the choosing. Same film, two shops.
The GullySales team · Updated 21 Sept 2026 · 6 min read
Television sells you time inside a programme, priced against how many households the channel says are watching, with a large amount of wastage built into the price. OTT sells you impressions delivered to people picked by location, language, device and behaviour. It costs several times more per thousand, wastes far less, and draws from a much smaller pool. It is the same thirty-second film in both cases. What differs is the currency you buy it in, and who is allowed to see it.
Two different shops selling the same minute
A television buy is a slot: a channel, a programme, a time band, a city or state feed, and a length of free commercial time. You are buying a position in a schedule. Everyone tuned to that channel at that minute gets your ad, including the large majority who will never buy from you.
A streaming buy is an audience: a platform, a geography, a language, sometimes an age band or an interest layer, and a number of impressions. You are buying people, one paid view at a time, and every targeting layer you add raises the price of each view.
Neither model is dishonest about the wastage. Television prices it in, which is why the cost per thousand is low. Streaming removes some of it and charges you for the removal.
Reading a plan from either side
| Television | OTT | |
|---|---|---|
| The unit | Seconds inside a slot | An impression |
| Priced by | Ratings, channel, programme, time band | CPM, rising with every targeting layer |
| Reach available | Very large, city or state at once | Smaller, capped by who streams near you |
| Wastage | High, and reflected in the rate | Lower, and paid for |
| Skipping | The remote, the mute button, the kitchen | Mostly unskippable on ad plans |
| Seasonal loading | Heavy during cricket and festivals | Present but gentler |
| What the report shows | Spots delivered against the schedule | Impressions, completion, sometimes reach |
What moves the number on a television quotation
Four things, in this order. The channel, because a leading Kannada general entertainment channel and a small news channel are different markets. The time band, where prime time from eight to eleven carries a multiple of the afternoon rate. The programme, since a popular serial or a live match is sold separately from the slots around it. And the feed, because buying the Karnataka feed rather than the national one is the single biggest saving available to a regional advertiser.
Two things to ask before signing. Where exactly do my spots fall, hour by hour, and what happens if the channel reschedules them. Packages that promise a large number of spots for a low total are usually filled at three in the afternoon and one in the morning.
What moves the number on an OTT quotation
The platform first. A subscription service that shows few ads charges a premium for the scarcity. A free ad-supported app with a large regional library is cheaper per thousand and reaches a different viewer. Then the inventory type: a pre-roll before a programme costs less than a mid-roll dropped into the middle of an episode people are invested in. Then the targeting stack, where each additional condition narrows delivery and raises the price. Then minimum spend, which is the real gate for a small business.
Ask for the reach forecast inside your own city before you agree to a budget. A plan that can deliver the impressions only by spreading them across four states is not a plan for a single-city business.
The part nobody puts in the deck
Both are one-way media. Nobody buys a water purifier because of an ad during the news. They remember the name, and then a week later they search it, ask a neighbour, or notice your shop. The advertisement is the first half of a sale that gets completed somewhere else entirely.
So the buy is wasted unless the second half exists. Your own name has to lead to you on search. The website must answer the question the film raised, and the phone must be answered by somebody who knows about the offer. We have seen owners spend a month of television budget while a search for their brand returned a competitor's advertisement at the top of the page.
Track it the same way for both. Record calls, walk-ins, branded searches and direct visits for four weeks before the campaign, and compare during and after. That comparison is cruder than a dashboard and more honest than one.
When television is the wrong buy
When your business serves one locality. The smallest thing a broadcaster will sell you is a city feed, and a single clinic with one waiting room cannot use a fraction of it.
When you cannot sustain a flight. Two days of spots buys a handful of impressions per viewer and disappears. If the budget only covers a short burst, put it somewhere with a longer memory.
When the sale needs explaining. A four-lakh machine sold to twelve buyers in a state does not need a mass medium. It needs the names of the twelve.
When OTT is the wrong buy
When your buyers are older and outside the metros. Streaming reach thins quickly once you leave the big cities, and the household that watches the Kannada channel at eight in the evening is not on an app.
When you want simultaneous mass attention. A festival offer that must be known by Sunday is a broadcast job, because a streaming platform delivers your impressions over days at whatever pace the auction allows.
When the minimum spend is most of your annual budget. Paying a platform floor to appear briefly in front of a small number of people is worse than a well-bought regional television flight.
Count the buyers before the money
Start with where your buyers are and how many of them exist. A business selling across a state to lakhs of households has a television problem to solve. A business selling to a few thousand urban families in two cities has a streaming problem. A business selling to forty purchase managers has neither.
Then check the ratio. If the mass medium would reach more people in a week than you can serve in a year, buy the narrower one even though it costs more per thousand. If you need the whole state to hear one thing on one weekend, the low cost per thousand is the point and the wastage is the price of it.
Most SMEs are not ready for either yet, and that is worth finding out before the money is committed. Suppose a search for your own brand name does not put you first, and the phone goes unanswered at four in the afternoon. A mass medium will pay for both of those problems at full rate. A free audit looks at that side first, using the enquiries you already get.