Business Insider: A Gas Station Ad Platform Says Its Business Is Soaring in the Pandemic As Driving Picks Up. Here’s the Pitch Deck It’s Using to Win Advertisers.
By: Patrick Coffee | Business Insider
GSTV, which runs ad-driven videos at gas stations, has grown in recent months despite the pandemic's dramatic impact on the ad industry, according to CEO Sean McCaffrey.
Its pitch deck to advertisers makes the case that they can reach people in transit at a time when they're likely to spend money.
GSTV hopes to be an alternative way for brands to boost sales now that foot traffic is down and the status of big advertising events like live sports remains unclear.
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The pandemic has people relying on their cars more than ever before — and advertisers want to reach them as they drive.
That is the central insight behind a pitch deck that GSTV used to return to growth by emphasizing the continued role that gas stations play in American life, according to CEO Sean McCaffrey.
GSTV is a private, nationwide network that provides an ad-driven video service to stations and convenience stores like Circle K and Speedway. Each day, GSTV releases an original clip of news, sports, entertainment, and ads that plays in front of drivers as they refuel.
McCaffrey said the platform, with 24,000 locations, reaches one in three American adults who are traveling by car.
GSTV is classified as out of home advertising, which accounted for $8.6 billion in spending last year. McCaffrey wouldn't share GSTV's revenue but said its clients include PepsiCo and that some brands have spent up to eight figures on the platform annually.
He said a key element of its appeal is that people spend far more money on the days they refuel, particularly at grocery stores, big box retailers, and fast food chains. And most also use their credit cards to buy gas and other items at the stations, creating anonymized first-party data that GSTV can use to target ads.
McCaffrey said the company then helps advertisers run hyper-local campaigns that promote nearby businesses or target the sort of people most likely to use a certain gas station based on both demographics and buying behaviors.
"We think of each station as an addressable household," he said.
GSTV hopes to fill a void left by the cancellation of live sports and other top ad spaces
McCaffrey said his company has weathered the effects of the pandemic and exceeded pre-coronavirus growth in recent weeks via the strategy outlined in the pitch deck GSTV has presented to media-buying agencies and brands.
"We've had more brand-direct conversations in the past six months than in the last two years," McCaffrey said. "Brands are generally taking more ownership of outreach because the market is so chaotic."
The deck also emphasizes the money left up in the air by the cancellation of major pro and college sports leagues to appeal to marketers who are under pressure to prove that their spend drives sales.
Another reason GSTV was less affected by the pandemic than some ad businesses, McCaffrey said, is that its audience included essential workers who were on the front lines in the earliest days of the quarantine.
The platform has also collaborated with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Ad Council in recent months, airing public health campaigns and PSAs encouraging consumers to frequent restaurants and other businesses.
The deck claims GSTV has more locations than McDonald's or Starbucks.
Partners include the NFL, Live Nation, host Maria Menounos, and news network Cheddar.
Data from Mastercard says customers spend almost four times as much at big box stores after filling their tanks than they do on days they don't fill their tanks.
The deck says Chipotle can use GSTV data to target people who live near a restaurant or whose demographics make them likely customers.
GSTV worked with IPG's Acxiom to target those most likely to own a particular brand of car.
Affordable gas has encouraged greater mobility amid lockdowns, according to the deck.
GSTV argues advertisers can reach Americans driving over the holidays as driving replaces air travel.
Its data shows consumers on the move spend more at each stop than they did pre-pandemic.
Spending at convenience stores is up more than 100% compared to the same period in 2019, the company says.
TV viewing is also down by more than 20% among key demographics since the pandemic's peak in March.
GSTV claims it can help replace the billions lost in live sports ad deals.
Gas stations were among the businesses least affected by the pandemic, according to data from Foursquare.
Convenience Store News: Make Converts Out of Gas-Only Customers
By: Tammy Mastroberte | Convenience Store News
In the June issue of Convenience Store News, GSTV’s Eric Sherman, SVP, Insights & Analytics, and Dan Trotzer, EVP, Industry speak to the challenge fuel retailers face in pump-to-store conversions, and showcase how GSTV has become a valuable asset for capturing consumer attention and driving foot traffic.
Read the article HERE.
Adweek: GSTV Understands Crisis Messaging to Guide Brands Through Covid-19
By: Doug Zanger | Adweek
Key insights:
The network of screens at gas stations and convenience stores reaches 1 in 3 American adults.
GSTV expects to play an even more vital role, as people who choose to travel this summer will likely do so by car.
As the pandemic continues, brands are determining the best way forward in terms of their messaging to consumers. Like advertising before Covid-19, people were inundated with all kinds of marketing that could simply get lost in the shuffle.
A great deal of advertising has shifted online as people hunkered down at home. Yet essential businesses remained open, including gas stations and the convenience stores attached to them. GSTV—which broadcasts advertising and content at the pump—found that messaging on the platform’s 24,000 locations became essential communication. GSTV reaches one-third of American adults each month and counts Nielsen, Comscore, IRI, Placed and others as data partners.
As quarantine spread across the country, GSTV’s partners, predictably, shifted their messaging to public service announcements from the likes of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Red Cross and Feeding America. Though a pandemic isn’t necessarily in any playbooks, the platform has extensive experience in times of disaster, such as hurricanes, floods and other times when an area goes dark.
“We’ve seen a little bit of a parallel to times like that where important messages need to get out there,” said Sean McCaffrey, GSTV president and CEO.
McCaffrey estimates that in the first few weeks, pandemic-centric advertising accounted for around 90% of the platform’s content.
“We are so grateful to GSTV for their support of our critical Covid-19 messages around social distancing and joining the #StayHome, Save Lives initiative,” said Lisa Sherman, Ad Council president and CEO. “GSTV was one of our first partners to offer their support in the early days of the crisis, and their extraordinary network of gas stations and convenience stores have delivered our time-sensitive messages to over 95 million people across the country.”
“We’ve always been 3-5 minutes of someone’s day running errands,” added McCaffrey. “We realized that those errands were more important because people were stocking up, or are essential workers. At a minimum, people want something informational and, at best, something a little entertaining.”
Interspersed among the ads, for example, was content from the NFL around April’s virtual draft. At present, McCaffrey said about 30% to 40% of the content is directly about Covid-19, with other brand messaging and creative filling the rest of the inventory.
“We’re trying to make sure that it has some uplift, in addition to helping people be safe,” he said, noting the platform’s other content partners such as Cheddar, What’s Trending and Stadium.
According to McCaffrey, brands have asked for flexibility in managing the next steps, seeing very few cancellations, unlike on TV. Categories that seem to be forging ahead are QSR and more long-term businesses such as mortgages and cars, with tweaks to messaging.
“GSTV has been a valuable component of our marketing strategy for years,” said Casey Hurbis, CMO of Quicken Loans. “Whether our campaigns are focused on growing awareness of the Rocket Mortgage brand, or, in recent months, on opportunities to express our gratitude for the heroic front-line workers in the battle against Covid-19.”
Other brands are coming online, including Verizon and Live Nation, with the latter promoting a livestreamed concert series. And Dining at a Distance, a program to help encourage delivery and support of restaurants, continues to make an impact.
“We jumped at the opportunity to support our Dining at a Distance initiative on their platform,” said Pete Stein, CEO of Huge, the agency leading the program. “Because of GSTV’s vast reach, we were able to share Dining at a Distance across 43 markets, reaching a wide audience in a local way that drove action.”
Inquiries about the platform are increasing as brands figure out their playbooks. In the meantime, the conversations with brands revolve mainly around the context of messaging. According to McCaffrey, even though the scope of the pandemic is changing, ensuring that brands get the tone right remains critical.
“If you have a message that’s tone deaf right now, it’s not something that we want [on the platform],” he said.
Looking forward, with all kinds of scenarios emerging around the possible return of Covid-19 cases, McCaffrey said GSTV has learned from its experience with disasters and the pandemic and can move quickly if messaging needs to return to more information-based ads.
“We will always consider the possibility of another outbreak in all of our planning for the next 12-18 months,” he said.
In the end, though, it’s about serving brands, and McCaffrey believes that providing a sense of calm in a hectic time is crucial. The company is planning for the possibility of a busy summer, when consumers may drive more than fly if they choose to travel. Whatever the case, McCaffrey believes that providing a sense of calm in a hectic time is crucial.
“Marketers are consumers first, and everyone is getting whiplash from the data and news cycle. No single partner has all the answers or all the solutions. We know an already complicated job just became exponentially more difficult and is changing in real time. We owe our brand and agency partners the guidance on how to use our massive consumer attention in the right tone and message.”
Social Geek: Location-Based Video: Sean McCaffrey
By: Jack Monson | Social Geek
Today’s guest is Sean McCaffrey, CEO of GSTV. Sean shares the story of the boom of location-based video advertising and content. We discuss how his team, advertisers, and brands are pivoting to due to Covid-19 and what trends and consumer behavior might linger.
Listen to Sean’s interview here.
Muse: See MoonPie's Twisted Super Bowl Ad, Which Ran at Gas Stations Across America
By: Tim Nudd | Muse
MoonPie and its agency, Tombras, have done lots of fun stuff around the Super Bowl in recent years.
Two years ago, they wrote nine absurd scripts for Super Bowl ads they would have aired, if they'd had the budget. Last year, they went ahead and shot three of those spots.
Now, for year three of what they're calling #TheBigThing, they've finally aired a national spot. Well, kind of. The 80-second spot ran nationwide Sunday at gas stations across America, catching viewers as they were picking up snacks for the game.
The ad features the family from last year's ad who welcomed a MoonPie child to their brood. In a nice meta touch, the spot itself takes place partly as a gas station:
Gas station screens don't normally host content nearly as fun as this. Tombras used GSTV's data-driven, national video network, which reaches one in three Americans monthly at more than 22,000 fuel retailers across the country.
"This would seem like a crazy idea for most brands, but it's perfect for MoonPie because it's an 'Outta This World' creative idea and media placement," says Dooley Tombras, president at Tombras. "Millions of consumers stop by gas station convenience stores on their way to parties or to stock up for their own gatherings. So not only did we finally make a TV spot for MoonPie, but we did it while making sure we were in the right place at the right time with a spot worthy of advertising's biggest day."
"Living in New York City for nine years, where they have these baby gas stations, it had been a while since I'd been to a real American fuel stop," adds Jeff Benjamin, chief creative officer at Tombras. "The innovation that's taken place fueled our thinking, and made GSTV the perfect 'Outta This World' platform for our trilogy. What a fun way to keep this campaign running. I'm pumped."
"When Tombras approached us, we immediately realized their idea was a stroke of genius—and not just because of the spot's creative vision," says Sean McCaffrey, president and CEO at GSTV. "Brands today know it's increasingly difficult to find moments when consumer attention is truly focused, so with an unavoidably attention-grabbing spot, and a media buy that leverages the full scale and capabilities of GSTV, it's the perfect way to stand out."
The spot also ran in social media, where MoonPie has a large and devoted audience. Check out last year's spot, "The Family," which was a kind of prequel to this year's.
Read the official release here!
Adweek: Why CES Has Become a Must-Do for Marketers and Agencies
GSTV's Sean McCaffrey on what to expect at CES 2020
By: Sara Jerde | Adweek
The schedule at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is full of sessions related to OTT and connected TV, new tech in the travel industry and even a surprise speaker in Ivanka Trump (who is expected to talk about the administration’s policies regarding technology education for workers).
We chatted with Sean McCaffrey, CEO and president of video network GSTV, about what he’s expecting at CES 2020 and how the event has changed.
This conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity.
What are you looking to get out of CES this year?
It’s a great place to rocket into the new year, where everybody comes back from the holidays and crash lands into this massive show. A huge percentage of people who go to the show probably don’t even hit the convention center, because there’s the whole other tribe of marketers and publishers that take over conference rooms and hotel rooms to talk about the latest innovation. A new phone might be a great consumer device, but it disrupts advertising models, it changes content distribution.
As a unique video platform, we’re there to talk to partners that know us already, like brands and agencies. We’re there to talk to partners that can help our business and add value to those brands and agencies like data partners, video platform partners and so on. Companies we already work with—publisher partners, content creators and makers—a lot of them are there. It’s a place where a high level of folks across the industry come together.
How have you watched it change?
This is my seventh year. Even in that short time, I’ve seen it change from really just a core tech show into a place that marketers, brands and agencies feel like they have to be because technology innovation can have really massive impact on advertising models and consumer connection. For us as a smaller publisher, competing in a sea of giants, it’s a place where top-to-top conversations come together to start the year.
Everyone is so overscheduled that everyone has tried to coordinate and consolidate conversations and content. People have gotten smarter about how they use their time there. People have also gotten realistic about what they expect from the show.
I think some of the overinvestment has faded. People are smart; how they spend their money, for their brand and their company, as well as the kind of conversations they schedule. One of the things I used to barely hear that I’ve heard from at least a dozen people this year: ‘If I can see you in New York, I’m not going to see you at CES.’ And I think that’s smart. People want to use their time wisely.
How does CES compare to the types of conversations you have with potential brand partners at other conferences, like Cannes?
They’re different from a calendar standpoint. CES starts the year, and the show is supposed to be built around innovation, but now it’s the place most publishers talk about what they’re doing differently in the year ahead. It’s a unique combination of marketers, brands, content creators and makers, technology companies, ad tech companies and investors.
Converse to Cannes. Cannes is a more global show and it comes from an ethos originally of creativity. It brings a different type of attendee.
As the ad-tech marina is to Cannes, so too is the private hotel suite in a Vegas hotel high rise. It’s a place where those sorts of people are both looking to make deals, but the overall ethos of the show is different. For Cannes, it’s after the upfronts and NewFronts. It’s later in the year, after a number of big media investment decisions have already been made, it’s not necessarily as much about what’s going to happen in the year. It’s also a reflection backwards on the first half and ahead to the second half.
What trends from the media industry do you see dominating the conversation this year?
The changes in data privacy, how will that impact marketing plans? And how will it impact platforms? Everyone is talking about it, everyone’s planning for it, but it’s finally becoming real as the laws go into effect. So, the confluence of ad tech, martech, brand, agencies and so on, people are really trying to understand what that will mean on a go-forward basis.
The OTT/connected TV space is a really interesting one where that’s going to dominate the discussion this year, because it’s consumer technology.
Any advice for a CES first-timer?
Wear very comfortable shoes. Eat when you see food because you might not know when you’ll be eating next; you’re going to be talking so much. You’re told to bring all sorts of SPF to Cannes. And despite it being Vegas, you need to bring a winter coat.