The Interactive Paradigm: Redefining Brand Engagement in the Connected TV Era
The Blueprint: How to Read This Article
To truly understand the Connected TV (CTV) opportunity, one must look beyond the hype of “new screens” and understand the mechanics of the shift. This article is structured to mirror the strategic decision-making process of a modern marketer:
- The Creative Reality: We begin by addressing the biggest hurdle—the disconnect between buying inventory and designing for interaction.
- The Engagement Mechanics: We explore how to win attention without breaking the viewer’s “lean-back” experience, drawing on insights from the Agency Reporter Connected TV Asia Symposium 2025.
- The Omnichannel Strategy: We look at how CTV fits into the broader media mix, moving beyond silos.
- The Technological Enabler: We move to how AI is solving the scale problem by personalizing creatives in real-time.
- The Transaction Layer: We answer the critical question of where the purchase happens—the remote or the phone.
- The Commercial Logic: Finally, we tackle the ROI question, providing the arguments needed to justify premium CPMs to CFOs and clients.
The living room is no longer a place of passive reception; it has become a command centre of participatory experience. For decades, television advertising relied on a simple contract: brands bought time, and audiences—ostensibly—paid attention. That contract has been shredded. In its place, a new “glass-to-glass” ecosystem is emerging, where the journey from the camera lens to the viewer’s screen is not just a delivery pipeline but a two-way street of interaction.
With CTV ad spend in India rocketing, the medium has graduated from an experimental sandbox to a strategic cornerstone. But for advertisers and media planners, the transition brings a new set of rules.
1. The Creative Gap: Stop Treating CTV Like “TV Plus Digital”
One of the most significant friction points in the industry today is the disconnect between media buying and creative execution. Agencies often secure premium CTV inventory only to fill it with standard 30-second spots designed for linear broadcast.
Prrincey Roy, CEO and Cofounder of Huella Services, identifies this as a critical missed opportunity. “The biggest mistake is that agencies still treat CTV like TV, just with a digital tag attached. Everyone’s buying placements, but very few are asking the more important question: ‘What are we actually showing people?'”
Roy argues that a 30-second TVC was never built for interaction, and simply slapping a hotspot on it doesn’t solve the problem. “CTV gives you attention, but you also have a remote in someone’s hand. If the story doesn’t guide the viewer to participate naturally, the tech goes to waste. Right now, the buy is being done like television, but the planner is a digital buyer, and that gap shows. Until the creative is designed for CTV, not just adapted for it, we won’t unlock the real value of interactivity.”
2. Winning Attention Without Disruption
While the creative mindset shifts, the execution must respect the viewer’s state of mind. This delicate balance was a central theme at the recent Agency Reporter Connected TV Asia Symposium 2025, where industry leaders unpacked the mechanics of attention.
Rahul Joshi, National Sales Director – India at Silverpush, presented a compelling case for “Winning Attention on Connected TV with Non-Disruptive Ads.” During his session, he argued that the future of engagement isn’t about forcing the viewer to act but about integrating brand messages so seamlessly that they enhance rather than interrupt the viewing experience. Highlighting AI-driven solutions like Attune, Joshi emphasized that creative formats must respect the content ecosystem, ensuring that “interactivity” doesn’t become a synonym for “annoyance.”
This aligns with Prrincey Roy’s philosophy: “For me, the line is simple: if the interaction feels like a task, you’ve already crossed it. CTV is still a relaxation medium; people come here to unwind. If you ask them to click, scan, or vote without giving them a reason to care, it becomes intrusive.”
3. The Omnichannel Imperative
But creative is only half the battle; the strategy is the other. At the same symposium, Russhabh R Thakkar, Founder & CEO of Frodoh, moderated a critical discussion on “CTV in the Media Mix.” His core argument was that CTV cannot exist in a silo.
Thakkar stressed that for maximum impact, CTV must be viewed as part of a broader omnichannel strategy, working in concert with Digital Out-of-Home (DOOH), mobile, and social platforms. The goal is unified brand messaging where the big screen builds the brand and the smaller screens (mobile) harvest the intent. He posited that as we move forward, the distinction between “digital” and “TV” will blur, leaving only “screens” and “contexts.”
4. Personalization at Scale: The AI Revolution
To make these omnichannel interactions relevant, brands are turning to data. The next frontier isn’t just targeting the right household, but customizing the creative itself in real-time.
Varun Mohan, Chief Commercial Officer India at MiQ, notes that we aren’t just approaching a future where ad content changes based on the household profile; we are already there.
“Generative AI, as well as AI agents, can take over refining the creatives and ad content, making them more appealing to households and individuals because they’re based on their consumer preferences and tastes,” Mohan states. “By using data signals like browsing history, past purchases, and time of day, AI can craft and execute the most relevant advertisement instantly.”
This shift allows marketing teams to move into strategic roles while “AI handles the heavy lifting of creating hundreds or even thousands of variations for ads… for maximum effectiveness.”
5. The “Checkout Counter”: Mobile vs. Remote
Once the viewer is engaged, where does the transaction happen? For years, the QR code has been the bridge, but is the TV remote destined to become the new checkout counter?
Tarun Ummat, MD, Teads India, believes that while the remote will initiate more actions, the phone will remain the closer. “India is a ‘mobile-first’ market in every sense — from discovery to purchase to retention. So while remote-level interactivity will evolve, the phone isn’t going anywhere. In fact, the mobile will remain the default transaction device because that’s where identity, UPI, and app ecosystems already live.”
Ummat predicts a future of seamless hand-offs. “Interactivity will get more seamless — voice-enabled actions, one-click remote prompts… Think of it as the remote becoming the initiator, but the phone staying the finisher. The win for marketers is that CTV will feel more and more ‘two-way’, not because the hardware changes dramatically, but because the consumer journey shortens.”
6. Justifying the Cost: Reach vs. Certainty
Perhaps the most common pushback from advertisers is the cost. With CTV CPMs in India hovering between Rs 300–Rs 500—a significant multiplier over linear TV—skeptics often ask why they should pay a premium for smaller reach.
Tarun Ummat argues that comparing CTV to linear TV on cost alone is a flaw in logic. “The first thing I tell them is this: CTV is the only screen where you can finally measure what TV was always supposed to deliver. Once you anchor the conversation on measurement — real attention signals, verified audiences, frequency control, and attributable outcomes — the CPM debate starts to feel outdated.”
“If you judge CTV by linear TV metrics, it will always look expensive. But the moment you evaluate it through digital KPIs, the entire equation flips. The premium you’re paying isn’t for reach — it’s for certainty,” Ummat explains. “Linear gives you mass, but it gives you mass blindly. CTV gives you fewer impressions, yes — but every single one is accountable, targetable, and attributable.”
Validating this shift toward participatory formats, the latest ‘Automotive Ad Engagement Benchmark Study’ by VDO.AI reveals that Remote-enabled CTV emerged as the preferred format for 60% of automotive brands during the 2025 festive season. These campaigns delivered a 93% Video Completion Rate (VCR)—significantly higher than the 85% industry benchmark—proving that immersive, remote-controlled storytelling directly correlates with higher audience retention.
7. The Road Ahead: Solving Fragmentation
Despite the clear advantages, the ecosystem remains fragmented. Major players operate as walled gardens, making unified measurement difficult.
Varun Mohan acknowledges this friction: “Consumer data across JioHotstar, Netflix, Amazon Prime, YouTube, and other major streaming providers is walled off, creating an opaque environment for marketers. Opacity is further heightened because households own multiple devices, making it difficult to directly attribute a consumer purchase decision to a CTV promotion.”
However, Mohan is optimistic about a unified currency emerging. “The number of CTVs is expected to double by 2028 or 2029, transforming the term CTV to just TV… We see this model gradually emerging over the next 18 months and maturing by 2030.”
As the infrastructure matures and the creative mindset shifts from “interruption” to “invitation,” interactive CTV is poised to stop being a “new format” and start being the standard for how brands communicate on the big screen.
But strategy is only half the battle; execution is the other.
In Part 2 of this series, we will open up the “Execution Playbook.” We will move beyond the why and tackle the how—exploring advanced measurement standards, programmatic efficiency, and exclusive category insights.