Connected-TV advertising has a confidence problem hiding inside a growth story. The IAB expects U.S. CTV spending to rise 11% to $29.3 billion, yet 43% of buyers say they are only somewhat confident or not confident in the quality of available supply. That gap matters more than another forecast: budgets are moving faster than the evidence used to justify where ads actually appear.
Low confidence is especially visible in programmatic routes. The research reports weak confidence among 55% of buyers using private marketplaces, more than two-thirds using open exchange or real-time bidding, and 59% buying retail or commerce CTV inventory. Invalid inventory and uncertainty about origin and placement sit at the center of the concern.
Why performance reporting is not enough
A campaign can hit a cost target and still buy poor media. CTV supply passes through apps, aggregators, resellers and automated auctions, so the final placement can be difficult to reconstruct from a dashboard. Buyers may see completed views without knowing whether the environment was legitimate, suitable or valuable to the brand.
The IAB data shows why this is a commercial issue. Cost and audience delivery were each cited by 47% of buyers as reasons to reduce or pull spending. Brand safety followed at 41%, while placement transparency reached 34%. These are not peripheral compliance worries; they are conditions that determine whether money stays in the channel.
The evidence pack every CTV buy should have
Marketers should ask for a supply-chain evidence pack before approving scale. It should name the apps and publishers, identify every reseller, explain how invalid traffic is filtered, define what counts as a completed view and show how placement logs can be reconciled after delivery. For live programming, it should also distinguish genuine premium access from inventory merely packaged with a premium label.
Targeting remains the leading selection criterion, cited by 49% of buyers, but targeting precision cannot compensate for uncertain supply. A well-described audience reached in the wrong environment is still a weak purchase. Audience logic and inventory provenance have to be evaluated together.
How CMOs should change the buying conversation
- Make app- and publisher-level disclosure a condition of the brief.
- Separate direct supply, PMP and open-auction performance in reporting.
- Audit reseller paths and invalid-traffic controls before increasing budgets.
- Define brand-safety and placement exceptions in advance.
- Connect finance, media and verification teams around one source-quality scorecard.
CTV does not need less investment by default. It needs a higher burden of proof. The channel’s reach and live-video potential remain valuable, but growth without transparent supply creates fragile performance. The better question is no longer simply whether CTV delivered. It is whether the buyer can explain what was bought, from whom and with what evidence.
Sources
- Marketing Dive: Advertisers do not trust CTV inventory
- IAB: 2026 Digital Video Ad Spend & Strategy Report
