Incorporating local streaming TV into existing marketing strategies requires an understanding of the channel’s capabilities, allowing teams to adapt tactics to suit their needs. The scope and scale of local streaming TV are often misunderstood, which means that money and opportunities are left on the table. 

In this State of the Industry report, Digiday and Amazon Ads surveyed 790 brand and agency respondents to understand how they use local streaming ads, particularly how they’re positioned, the strategies used, and the channel’s strengths and challenges.

At a high level, the survey revealed that overall ad budgets for general streaming have increased from 2024 to 2025.

In 2024, about one-third of marketers (39%) allocated more than 41% of their total ad budgets to streaming TV ads. That number increased to 59% in 2025 — 18 percentage points higher. 

The increase in budget allocation to streaming TV ads reflects the channel’s rapid growth. According to a BIA report, ad spending across local TV is projected to reach $2.8 billion this year, increasing TV ads’ share of the local TV advertising sector to 10.7%, up from about 9% in 2023. 

Local media revenue overall is expected to reach $171 billion this year, according to the same report, largely due to evolving consumer preferences and emerging technologies, indicating a major shift in overall localization efforts. 

Based on budget reallocations, local streaming ads are gaining in popularity among marketers.

In terms of the distribution of ad budget, most of the local streaming TV budget allocation came from social media, while all other channels saw less budget reallocated to local streaming ads. Marketers’ budget reallocation from social media to local streaming TV increased from 24% in 2024 to 40% in 2025.

A variety of factors contribute to the significant jump in respondents moving social budgets into local streaming TV efforts. Frequent algorithm changes on social media that decrease organic reach and impact the visibility of brand content require constant adaptation, and, in many cases, increase the reliance on paid advertising. 

Social media is also a crowded space. Between fighting to stand out due to the sheer number of brands, advertisers and frequency of ads, users are often overwhelmed and suffering from ad fatigue and banner blindness, which requires that marketers refresh their creative more frequently. 

Streaming TV, on the other hand, is gaining viewers, it’s becoming increasingly measurable and cost-effective, and has a plethora of targeting capabilities. Not to mention streaming TV’s more engaged environment, generally with a more frequency-capped ad structure. Notably, in June 2024, streaming TV beat the previously set record (by cable) for total TV usage at 40.3%, according to Nielsen’s report The Gauge. 

Brands are naturally exploring additional channels like local streaming TV to complement their media strategies as social media continues to struggle with declining reach and content saturation. These challenges make it harder for marketers to achieve consistent results and ROI from advertising across social — 68% report they worry about proving ROI from their social efforts, making it difficult to justify further investment.

One of the reasons behind the budget reallocation and increase in local streaming ads could be its impact on annual revenue. More than half of respondents (57%) said that local streaming TV ads account for at least 41% of their annual revenue.

On top of revenue performance from local streaming ads, the channel had three more standout features compared to other channels. Marketers primarily invested in local streaming due to its competitive advantage in local differentiation, advanced targeting capabilities and cost efficiency. 

Aside from cost, related to total profits, survey respondents said they gravitated toward local streaming ads due to their more niche targeting abilities with local audiences.

“The focus on competitive advantage and advanced targeting makes perfect sense because reaching local markets is increasingly competitive, with crowded spaces where a broad-reach approach just doesn’t cut it anymore,” said Jenn Donohue, director of local ads at Amazon Ads. “What’s encouraging is seeing cost-effectiveness rank so highly. It tells me advertisers understand that streaming TV isn’t just about premium placement, it’s about efficient spending that delivers measurable results.”

When respondents were asked about the strategies they implemented with local streaming ads, the appeal of local streaming TV’s niche targeting capabilities became even more apparent. 

The top two survey responses centered on ad optimization: CTA focus came in first at 46% and performance-based optimization followed at 44%. These are common strategies regardless of ad type. The third-highest response was leveraging local influencers at 38%. Again, the emphasis is on using smaller local marketing levers to reach unique audiences.

The place respondents put local streaming TV ads within the overall marketing mix also calls back to the locality advantage. 

Just over half (51%) of brand and agency respondents said they integrate local streaming TV with location-based campaigns. And, based on previous answers, marketers are using this to reach more niche audiences with specific messages or collaborating with local influencers to better resonate with them. 

“Location-based integration should be the primary way that local advertisers approach streaming TV — it’s the perfect complement to their business needs,” Donohue said. “Traditionally, radio and television stations covered much broader geographic areas than local advertisers actually needed to reach their customers. Amazon DSP and direct solutions change this dynamic entirely, enabling advertisers to buy streaming TV, display, video and audio inventory that reaches audiences in specific states, designated market areas (DMAs) or zip codes at scale.” 

Beyond strategic use of local streaming ads, respondents were also asked about the results of using the channel. The top result is increased brand awareness at 57% of respondents. This is followed by increased sales and higher targeting efficiency, both at 44%.

While brand awareness and sales are general results that could apply to any marketing channel, the higher targeting efficiency of local streaming ads shows the strength of being able to reach audiences at a local level. 

This allows marketers to meet consumers closer to home, rather than attempt to reach them through general, broad marketing plays.

Amazon Ads’ Donohue said the survey results made a lot of sense when understanding how local businesses think about advertising. Local advertisers can’t afford to run a campaign that only does one thing, as they need their dollars to work harder across a variety of goals. 

“What I find encouraging is seeing 60% get brand awareness while 44% are driving actual sales,” Donohue said. “That tells me streaming TV is delivering on both fronts, which is exactly what these businesses need. It’s common to see a sales bump when you invest more in brand awareness. That’s proof that the brand building is working — there’s a halo effect where community recognition translates directly into business results. But streaming TV goes beyond just that halo effect. Local businesses can now upload their first-party signals to reach their best potential audiences, which can help drive sales and efficiency. They get the community brand building they need, plus the hard performance metrics that help them sleep at night knowing their advertising spend is truly working.”

The main metrics of success marketers consider for local streaming TV ads reflect the results they see in the channel: Traffic lift (53%) and conversions (52%) are brands’ and agencies’ top KPIs. 

However, an interesting note here is two metrics toward the bottom of the list: cross-channel attribution at 30% and ROAS at 22%. For cross-channel attribution, it seems not to be a primary focus for marketers investing in local streaming TV, which could indicate that either it’s hard to measure the impact of the channel outside of itself or that it stands alone in the marketing mix. 

It’s also notable that ROAS is one of the least significant KPIs among survey respondents. With the efficiency and impact that local streaming ads have on revenue, it would be reasonable to expect that ROAS would be a more highly used metric.

Donohue found the lower percentages for ROAS and cross-channel attribution to be in line with the traditional role TV has played in advertising. Because it’s historically been a brand-building tactic over a performance channel, advertisers haven’t been conditioned to focus on ROAS — they ran TV ads for awareness and trust, so success was vastly different than what it was for search or social. 

Additionally, traditional TV couldn’t provide the cross-channel tracking advertisers now expect from digital channels. Local advertisers previously relied on broad assumptions about how their TV spend influenced the other aspects of their marketing mix. 

While streaming TV is changing the landscape entirely, not all streaming solutions are created equal, adding yet another item to marketers’ lists when navigating this space. 

When shifting to channel capabilities and what drives the most value, survey respondents’ low emphasis on ROAS suggests that the results justify the cost of the channel.

Brands and agencies said behavior-based targeting (49%), household-level reach (42%), lookalike audiences (41%) and demographic targeting (40%) are the targeting capabilities that have been most valuable for their campaigns. 

These top responses center on the ability to reach defined audiences. This is a powerful tool for marketers when looking to engage with audiences accurately and not waste ad budget on inaccurate targeting.

However, respondents said local streaming TV also has its challenges, most commonly creative production (40%) and audience targeting (34%). 

Creative production challenges likely stem from the channel being video format-based. If the strategy requires different videos for each local audience, it would be more difficult for a brand to create an increasing number of differentiated videos for each audience. 

The other top-named challenge of audience reach is interesting. So far, the main draw for local streaming is its ability to reach unique audience segments. However, it looks like the channel still has a way to go before its audience reach is as relevant as marketers need it to be.

Marketers have ideas on how to compensate for what they perceive to be local streaming TV’s weaknesses: 44% of respondents said they plan on smart budgeting and geoscaling to overcome certain obstacles. And 42% also noted plans to use smarter audience segmentation. 

These two ideas are likely meant to tackle the audience reach and segmentation problem — the segmentation being a direct response, and the budgeting being an initiative to reduce cost while testing audiences. 

Thirty-eight percent of respondents also mentioned using AI to ease creative production and overcome the previous challenge of producing enough content for each unique audience group.

For the future of the channel, brand and agency respondents identified wants that address not only the challenges mentioned but also some KPI improvements. 

The most in-demand improvement among survey respondents is smarter AI tools for personalization and media planning (49%). This would help with tweaking content for specific audiences, ad placement and targeting.

An interesting finding was that 41% of respondents identified unified cross-platform measurement as a key need. This aligns with the earlier finding that cross-channel attribution ranks low as a KPI — suggesting the issue isn’t lack of interest, but rather measurement difficulty. The demand for better cross-platform measurement tools indicates that marketers want to track local streaming TV’s impact across their entire marketing mix, but current limitations prevent them from making it a primary success metric.

The largest percentage of survey responses (43%) said they see local streaming TV as evolving into a key bridge between awareness and performance, which helps explain the primary metrics of success being traffic lift and conversions.

Forty-one percent of respondents expect local streaming TV to become the primary driver of hyperlocal engagement. The channel’s strong local reach capabilities continue to improve, and 42% of brands and agencies are actively investing in smarter audience segmentation strategies. Given these developments, local streaming TV appears well-positioned to become the hyperlocal engagement solution that marketers expect.

“By connecting interactivity with premium content across our canvas, including Prime Video, local advertisers can connect with highly engaged audiences across their customer journey,” she said. “The hyperlocal engagement capability, with zip-code-level reach, represents the natural evolution of connecting premium content experiences with community-level messaging that converts viewing moments into measurable business outcomes.”

As marketers seek more precise and effective ways to connect with audiences, local streaming TV is proving itself to be a powerful tool for both brand building and performance. Budget increases from 2024 to 2025, a shift away from social media and rising revenue attribution show the channel’s growing importance in media strategies. Brands and agencies are not only leveraging local streaming TV’s advanced targeting and localization capabilities — they’re also expecting more from it: smarter personalization, unified measurement and full-funnel impact.

While challenges remain around creative production, audience segmentation and attribution, marketers are already investing in solutions — from AI-driven tools to geoscaled campaigns — signaling a maturation of this channel. As the demand for hyperlocal reach and data-powered efficiency rises, local streaming TV is poised to evolve from a niche tactic into a core component of the modern marketing mix.

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