Digital Marketing for Tech Companies: A CTV Brand Lift Case Study

Client: Meizu (Global Smartphone Manufacturer)
The Goal: A brand awareness commercial as part of an ongoing ad campaign.

We’ve already talked about our long-term partnership with Meizu in this case study.

Because of this ongoing relationship, for this specific video, we didn't have a rigid task to push a brand-new message or announce a new product. As part of promoting the entire brand and boosting awareness, we plan our ad campaigns six months ahead. During one of these planning sessions, our creative team came up with a bold idea: let's make a commercial that pretends to be part of the universe of a highly anticipated fantasy blockbuster hitting theaters.

The Creative Strategy: Pop-Culture Hijacking

To execute this "hijack," we chose the vibe of a popular Disney franchise (The Last Warrior). The movie itself was a modern take on classic regional fairy tales and folklore, which meant we weren't trapped by copyright restrictions. We simply tapped into the same legendary narratives, letting the audience automatically connect the dots into a "shared universe."

We built our commercial around a famous, instantly recognizable historical painting of three knights on horseback. Because the local audience knows this imagery by heart, the plot was read instantly, without any unnecessary setup.

When marketers look for connected tv advertising examples that actually work, they usually find boring product features. We chose contrast. This approach is a staple in effective consumer electronics advertising. We used two main hooks:

• Hook 1: In the original painting, the knights are looking into the distance, sternly searching for enemies. We kept the exact framing and poses, but our knights weren't looking for a fight—they were just admiring the breathtaking beauty of nature. That was the first hook, instantly breaking viewer expectations.
• Hook 2: While admiring the view, the knights speak in archaic, old-world phrasing. But then, the youngest knight suddenly drops a modern slang word, pulls out a smartphone, and starts recording a video of the scenery.

This collision of the ancient past and modern tech perfectly mirrored the movie's universe, where a modern-day hero falls into a fairy tale. For a 15-second spot, this was a phenomenal set of hooks to grab and hold the viewer's attention.

Live-Action Production Challenges

Despite the minimal action in the frame, the production process was incredibly complex.

We shot far outside the city, scouting a location with the perfect field and a specific forest line in the background. The most unpredictable part? The weather. Even though we scheduled the shoot strictly according to the forecast, the weather had its own plans. We had to halt production for 30 minutes and wait out a sudden, heavy summer downpour.

Oh, and the black horse showed some serious attitude—it flat-out refused to stand in a straight line with the other horses!

To make sure the audience instantly recognized the painting, simply putting three guys on horses wasn't enough. We had to find three differently colored horses exactly like the original art: black, white, and chestnut. Our costume designer painstakingly recreated the armor, down to the exact pattern on one of the knights' shields.

In post-production, color correction was crucial. We didn't want to go for medieval brutalism or copy the grim, cloudy contrast of the original painting. Instead, we opted for a warmer, more fairy-tale color palette. Our VFX and clean-up specialists also added hills and specific landscape elements to the background to achieve a 100% match with the painting's composition.

Media Distribution: Reaching the B2C Audience

As a video marketing agency, we know that a great creative and flawless execution are not enough to make an ad campaign successful. If you want to excel at marketing for tech companies, smart distribution is everything.

During the media strategy phase, we used custom whitelists, selecting only those domains where the historical video player viewability exceeded 80%. We bought inventory through Private Marketplace (PMP) deals with Tier-1 Publishers, completely cutting out junk sites with low visibility.

For mobile OLV (Online Video), we focused heavily on In-stream formats (pre-roll / mid-roll), where the video plays inside the main video content, rather than just scrolling past in an article text (Out-stream).

To maximize attention, we used a cross-screen approach. A significant chunk of the budget went to Connected TV (CTV)—where viewing happens on a large living room screen (a lean-back experience with 100% viewability), while mobile OLV provided frequency of contact and the ability to click.

We also shifted our campaign optimization from classic CPM to vCPM (cost per thousand viewable impressions). The algorithm automatically cut off platforms where users scrolled past the page too quickly.

The Results: Measuring Active Attention

This comprehensive approach—from creative and production to media distribution—is what modern digital marketing for tech companies should look like.

For B2C brands, standard views aren't enough. When evaluating attention metrics video campaign brand lift, we relied on trusted industry trackers. Here are the campaign results for this specific commercial:

• Viewability Rate: 88%
• VTR (Video Completion Rate): 78% for OLV
• Active Attention Seconds: 9.5 sec
• Ad Recall Lift: +26%
• Brand Favorability Lift: +8%

Methodology:

• Surveys embedded into digital platforms (YouTube) and conducted via specialized research panels (Nielsen).
• Integral Ad Science (IAS) tracking.

Stop making commercials nobody watches. Start engineering attention.

‍Beautiful visuals are useless if your target audience scrolls past them in two seconds. As a premium creative video agency and TV commercial production studio, Lava Media bridges the gap between cinematic storytelling and hard media metrics. Whether you need a hilarious pop-culture spoof to break through the B2C noise, or a hyper-targeted Connected TV campaign to drive measurable brand lift, we handle it all—from the first storyboard to the final vCPM media buy.

Don't just pay for a video file. Partner with us to build a comprehensive video marketing strategy that your audience literally cannot ignore.