[INFOGRAPHIC] Where CTV Advertising Fits in the Modern Marketing Funnel

The way people move through the marketing funnel has changed.

They don’t follow a straight path from awareness to purchase. They bounce between devices, platforms, and moments of intent. They discover brands on TV, research on mobile, compare on search, and convert later.

That shift has forced marketers to rethink how the marketing funnel, sales funnel, and overall digital customer journey actually work.

And it has created a bigger role for one channel in particular: connected TV (CTV).

CTV is no longer just a top of funnel awareness play. It is a full funnel advertising channel that supports everything from impressions to measurable conversions, with real performance data tied to outcomes.

This guide breaks down where CTV fits across the modern marketing funnel, how it supports each stage, and how to measure its impact using real marketing metrics like return on ad spend.

Understanding the modern marketing funnel

At a high level, the marketing funnel stages still look familiar:

• Awareness (top of funnel)
• Consideration (mid funnel)
• Conversion (bottom of funnel)

But the way people move through that conversion funnel is much less predictable. Instead of a clean, linear path, today’s funnel marketing looks more like a loop:

• A viewer sees a video ad on TV
• Searches for the brand later
• Clicks a paid social ad
• Visits the website
• Comes back after another touchpoint
• Then converts

This is why full funnel marketing matters more than ever. You need to show up consistently across the entire journey, not just at the moment of purchase.

CTV plays a unique role here because it connects high-attention awareness with measurable performance outcomes in a way few performance marketing channels can.

The role of CTV in full funnel marketing

Connected TV sits at the intersection of branding and performance marketing channels.

It combines the reach and storytelling power of traditional TV with the targeting, measurement, and optimization capabilities of digital advertising.

Just as important, it aligns with how people actually consume media today.

Streaming sessions are longer. Attention is higher. And viewers are more engaged.

That attention is what fuels performance later. Which is what makes CTV one of the few channels that can support full funnel advertising in a single platform. Let’s break that down by stage.

Top of funnel: building awareness that actually sticks

Top of funnel marketing is about getting in front of new audiences and making a lasting first impression.

This is where CTV has always been strong. Unlike mobile or display impressions advertising, CTV ads are:

• Full screen
• Non-skippable
• Viewed in a lean-back environment
• Often watched with others

That combination leads to higher attention and stronger brand recall.

Instead of fighting for attention mid-scroll, your message becomes part of the viewing experience.

CTV also allows you to align with key moments like premieres, sports events, and cultural tentpoles. These moments drive spikes in engagement and give your brand a natural entry point into the conversation.

At this stage, success is measured through marketing metrics like:

• Impressions
• Reach
• Brand lift
• Video completion rate

The strongest awareness strategies combine two approaches:

1. Always-on campaigns: Maintain a steady presence to build familiarity over time
2. Moment-based campaigns: Activate around premieres, sports, and cultural events when attention spikes

This combination ensures you are not just reaching audiences, but reaching them at the right time.

With Paramount Ads Manager, Peak Placement automatically optimizes delivery across Paramount’s most popular shows, helping you:

• Maximize reach across premium inventory
• Capture attention during peak viewing moments
• Continuously improve performance based on engagement signals

Of course, awareness is not the end goal. It sets up everything that comes next.

Mid funnel: turning attention into consideration

Mid funnel marketing focuses on reinforcing your message and staying visible as audiences move closer to a decision. CTV plays a key role here by reinforcing memory and staying visible across the journey.

Key KPIs for marketing at this stage include:

• Website visits
• Cost per visit
• Engagement rates
• Lift in branded search

CTV advertising on Paramount Ads Manager supports this in a few key ways:

1. Advanced Interests & Behaviors targeting

With Paramount Ads Manager’s Interests & Behaviors targeting, you can make sure you’re reaching the right audience, in the right place by targeting real-world behaviors that signal purchase intent. For example, if you’re a home improvement business, there are targeting options that allow you to reach Homeowners, audiences interested in Home and Garden, or people experiencing major Life Events like moving or purchasing a home. At this stage, you’re able to know that their intent is much more closely aligned with the product or solution that you’re offering, and can use CTV to reach them at the time that they’re most likely to act.

2. Sequential messaging

Instead of showing the same ad repeatedly, you can guide viewers through a series of messages that build understanding and trust over time (and avoid content fatigue).

3. Cross-channel reinforcement

CTV works alongside search and social to improve performance across your entire media mix. When someone has seen your brand on TV, they are more likely to click, search, and engage later.

In fact, we learned during our Better Together webinar with agency Compound Growth Marketing that pairing CTV with their other channel campaigns drove:

• 60% greater reach vs. social alone
• 14% higher click-through rate among exposed audiences
• 313% higher likelihood to complete a lead form
• Significant reduction in cost per acquisition

That’s what we like to call the CTV Peak Performance Effect.

Bottom of funnel: driving measurable conversions

CTV is increasingly playing a role in the sales funnel, not just the marketing upper funnel.

With advancements in measurement and attribution (and real-time reporting in the Paramount Ads Manager dashboard), you can now connect TV exposure directly to outcomes like:

• Purchases
• Leads
• In-person store visits

This is done through TV attribution analysis, which links ad exposure to downstream actions across devices. That makes it possible to evaluate performance using core metrics like return on ad spend.

ROAS calculation

ROAS measures how much revenue you generate for every dollar spent.

ROAS formula: Revenue ÷ Ad Spend

If you spend $10,000 on a campaign and generate $40,000 in revenue, your ROAS is 4x.

CTV platforms now provide this level of visibility, allowing you to treat TV as a performance channel, not just a branding investment.

This is a major shift in how marketers think about marketing investment ROI.

You can make a solid impact on your ROAS at the bottom of the funnel with Paramount Ads Manager by tapping into the following solutions:

1. Retargeting and re-engagement

With Retargeting, you can reconnect with viewers who visited your site or engaged with your brand, bringing them back into your funnel.

Take it from ecommerce brand Midwest Photo. They ran an A/B test with Paramount Ads Manager to better understand the impact that Retargeting would have on their growth marketing goals, and drove ~41% higher site visit rate and ~29% more efficient spend with retargeting.

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2. Paramount Ads Manager Pixel: Performance you can prove

By installing the Paramount Ads Manager pixel on your site, you can:

• Track bottom-funnel conversions driven by CTV campaigns
• Measure site visits and purchases after ad exposure
• Better understand how TV impacts your full funnel marketing performance

This unlocks true performance measurement for TV.

Bringing it all together: the full funnel impact of CTV

Here’s how it all connects across the funnel:

• Awareness: High-impact video ads introduce your brand
• Consideration: Retargeting and cross-channel visibility reinforce your message
• Conversion: Attribution and measurement tie exposure to real results

That full funnel approach is what drives stronger outcomes over time.

When campaigns are connected across stages, you are not starting from zero at each step. You are building on previous exposure and familiarity.

How automated optimization improves performance

One of the biggest advantages of modern CTV platforms is automated optimization for TV advertising. Instead of manually adjusting campaigns, platforms can:

• Optimize placements across top-performing content (this is called Peak Placement in Paramount Ads Manager)
• Adjust delivery based on performance signals
• Expand reach across high-value audiences

This allows campaigns to improve over time without constant intervention.

It also helps maximize efficiency across the funnel, ensuring your budget is working as hard as possible at every stage.

Why CTV belongs in your performance marketing mix

For years, marketers treated TV and performance marketing as separate strategies.

That divide no longer makes sense. CTV brings together:

• The scale of television
• The precision of digital targeting
• The accountability of performance measurement

It supports the entire video sales funnel, from first impression to final conversion.

And most importantly, it aligns with how people actually behave today across the digital customer journey.

Turn attention into measurable results

The modern marketing funnel is not about choosing between awareness and performance. It is about connecting them.

Paramount Ads Manager gives you a way to do both in one channel:

• Reach new audiences at scale during TV’s biggest shows
• Use advanced audience targeting to reach the right audience, in the right place & time
• Measure real outcomes like conversions and ROAS

Ready to start making a full-funnel impact on CTV?

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