Brand lift measurement for CTV campaigns in India

Brand lift studies are the primary outcome measurement tool for CTV campaigns in India where the goal is brand awareness, consideration, or purchase intent rather than a trackable conversion. In a market without a unified cross-platform audience measurement currency, brand lift studies provide the closest thing to independent evidence that a CTV campaign changed how people think about a brand. Two tools dominate: Google Brand Lift (for DV360 campaigns on JioHotstar and other Google-monetised inventory) and The Trade Desk's brand impact product.

What is brand lift?

Brand lift measures the change in brand perception metrics — awareness, ad recall, consideration, purchase intent, favourability — between people who were exposed to the ad and a matched control group who were not. The difference in response rates between these two groups is the "lift" attributed to the campaign.

Brand lift studies use a survey methodology: a short 1–3 question survey is shown to a sample of exposed viewers and a matched unexposed group (the holdout). The holdout is constructed to match the exposed group on demographic and behavioural characteristics, so differences in survey responses can be attributed to ad exposure rather than pre-existing differences between groups.

The metrics typically measured:

Ad recall: "Have you seen an ad for [brand] in the last 7 days?" — the fastest and easiest metric to move; useful for top-of-funnel reach campaigns
Brand awareness: "Which of these brands have you heard of?" — measures aided awareness; harder to move than recall, especially for established brands
Consideration: "Which of these brands would you consider buying?" — higher up the funnel than awareness; typically requires more exposure and frequency to shift
Purchase intent: "Which of these brands are you likely to purchase in the next 30 days?" — the most commercially relevant metric; also the hardest to move with advertising alone
Favourability: "How do you feel about [brand]?" — measures sentiment change; useful for brand health campaigns

How brand lift studies work

The study runs concurrently with the campaign rather than before/after. This is important: concurrent measurement avoids the noise of external events between a pre-campaign and post-campaign survey, and allows the study to be powered by actual campaign exposure data.

The brand lift study is set up in the DSP before the campaign launches
As the campaign runs, users who are served the ad are logged as the exposed group
A statistically matched holdout group is created from users who were not served the ad (eligible but not reached due to budget or targeting constraints)
Both groups receive a short survey via the publisher's app or the DSP's survey network
Results are reported as absolute lift (percentage point difference between exposed and control) and relative lift (percentage uplift from the control baseline)

Statistical significance is reported alongside lift figures — results below significance threshold (typically p < 0.05) should be treated as directional rather than confirmed findings.

Google Brand Lift (DV360)

Google Brand Lift is available for DV360 campaigns running on YouTube and on Google-monetised CTV inventory. For India CTV, this means JioHotstar inventory transacted through DV360 is eligible for Brand Lift measurement.

Setup: Brand Lift is configured in the DV360 campaign interface. It requires a minimum number of impressions to achieve statistical power — Google's stated minimum is approximately 500,000 impressions for the study, though in practice campaigns need 1–2M+ impressions to get statistically significant results on harder-to-move metrics like consideration.

Spend thresholds: At India CTV CPMs of ₹150–300 for JioHotstar programmatic inventory, reaching 1M impressions requires approximately ₹15–30L in media spend on that specific publisher via DV360. Brand Lift is therefore practical for campaigns of ₹25L+ with meaningful JioHotstar allocation.

Metrics available: Ad recall, brand awareness, consideration, purchase intent, favourability. All five metrics are measured simultaneously from the same survey.

Reporting: Results available in DV360 Brand Lift reporting section, typically with data available within 2–3 weeks of campaign end. Geographic and demographic breakdowns available if sample sizes are sufficient.

The Trade Desk brand impact

The Trade Desk offers its brand impact measurement product for campaigns running through TTD. The methodology is similar — exposed vs control survey — but the survey delivery mechanism differs: TTD uses its own survey network and publisher partnerships rather than Google's survey infrastructure.

India availability: TTD brand impact is available for India CTV campaigns buying SonyLIV (via Magnite/SpringServe) and Zee5 (via PubMatic) inventory through TTD. Coverage is not as comprehensive as Google Brand Lift for JioHotstar-heavy buys.

Minimum scale: Similar impression thresholds to Google Brand Lift — 1M+ impressions recommended for reliable results on most metrics.

Third-party brand lift: For campaigns that don't run exclusively through a single DSP, or where independent verification is required, Kantar Millward Brown, Nielsen Brand Effect, and Dynata offer third-party brand lift measurement that can be applied across publishers. These are commissioned separately and carry additional cost (typically $10,000–30,000 USD for a full study), making them viable only for large India CTV campaigns.

What to benchmark in India CTV

India-specific brand lift benchmarks are not publicly published by Google or TTD, but directional ranges from market research are:

Ad recall lift: 8–20 percentage points for video-first CTV campaigns with adequate frequency (3–4 exposures per household). Recall is the easiest metric to move.
Brand awareness lift: 2–8 percentage points for established brands; higher for new brand launches or categories with low baseline awareness
Consideration lift: 1–5 percentage points — harder to move; requires higher frequency and stronger creative relevance
Purchase intent lift: 0.5–3 percentage points — the hardest metric; rarely moves significantly from a single CTV burst without supporting performance media

These are directional only. Category, brand size, creative quality, and frequency all have large effects on lift. A brand with very high baseline awareness (80%+ aided) will see smaller absolute lifts because there is less headroom.

Limitations and what brand lift cannot tell you

Survey response bias: People who respond to surveys may not be representative of all ad-exposed viewers. Mobile-heavy responders may skew younger and more digitally engaged than the full CTV audience.
Short-term measurement: Brand lift studies measure the effect of a specific campaign in a specific window. They do not measure long-term brand health or cumulative advertising effects.
No revenue attribution: A 4-point lift in consideration does not translate directly to a sales uplift. Brand lift and sales/performance outcomes require separate measurement frameworks.
Holdout contamination: If the holdout group is exposed to the same creative through other media (TV, digital), the measured lift from CTV is understated. India cross-media campaigns that run simultaneously on linear TV and CTV are particularly susceptible to holdout contamination.

India-specific considerations

India CTV brand lift studies have a few structural differences from US or European markets:

Language: Survey questions should ideally be served in the viewer's content language. An English-language survey served to a viewer watching Hindi-language content on a FAST channel will have lower response rates and potentially biased results. DV360 Brand Lift surveys in India are available in Hindi and regional languages for some publishers — confirm this with your Google team before setup.
Baseline awareness levels: For pan-India brands (FMCG, telecom, automotive), baseline awareness is often very high (70–90% aided), leaving limited headroom for awareness lift. Setting the study objective to consideration or purchase intent is more informative for these advertisers.
Co-viewing: CTV in India is frequently watched by multiple household members simultaneously. Brand lift surveys are served to the registered account holder, not to all co-viewers. This means the study may undercount total exposed audience and overestimate lift per surveyed individual relative to the full household audience.