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.
Martech Zone: GSTV: Target Consumers at the Pump with Location-Based Video Experiences
By: Douglass Karr | Martech Zone
Every day, millions of Americans get in their vehicles and go. Fueling up drives commutes, commerce, and connection; and that’s when GSTV has their undivided attention.
Daily, at tens of thousands of locations, their national video network owns a unique moment that matters, when consumers are engaged, receptive, spending more today and influenced for tomorrow and beyond. In fact, GSTV reaches 1 in 3 American adults monthly, engaging viewers with full sight, sound, and motion video at an essential waypoint on their consumer journey.
GSTV Overview
Case studies of GSTV include social engagement, retail sales lift, increasing ad effectiveness, store and dealership visitation, lift in consumer spending, building viewer awareness and tune-in, and lifts in website visitation.
GSTV Short Form Video Example
Chances are that you’ve seen and responded to these short form videos that drive a call-to-action. Here’s a great example for retail establishments to get someone who is pumping gas to walk into the store and make a purchase:
GSTV Reach
GSTV engages adults with hundreds of millions of individual 1-to-1 interactions to entertain, inform, connect, and deliver a moment that moves today and matters tomorrow. Benefits of their target audiences include:
Spending – A young, active, affluent audience, who spends +1.7x more following a fuel transaction
Real People – A Nielsen audited network, with no bots, no fraud and no DVRing
Brand Safe – Premium content curated for a general audience
Engagement – Traveling, dining, listening, shopping, spending, and more while engaging at a pause point in their journey
Capabilities through GSTV’s 95 million unique visitors includes the ability to target first party audiences based on their demographic, geographic, and behavioral data.
GSTV helps marketers achieve quantifiable business results and maximize their ad spend. GSTV has delivered double-digit increases in retail visitation, millions of dollars in sales lift, and significant increases in brand metrics for some of the world’s largest advertisers.
GSTV Extends Content with Loop Media
Loop Media, a streaming media company focused exclusively on premium short-form video, announced a content partnership with GSTV to produce and share short-form music videos, top new music videos, movie trailers for new releases, and top movie trailer compilations.
This short form streaming content provides opportunities for brands and marketers to effectively target consumers outside the home.