TV Advertising Is Back. But It’s Not What You Remember.

6 May 2025

For years, TV was dismissed as outdated, expensive, and inflexible. But television advertising is making a comeback, and not for nostalgic reasons. Today’s resurgence is driven by innovation, not sentiment. And it’s reshaping what advertisers can expect from the biggest screen in the home.

The Rise of Digital Changed the Game, and TV Had to Catch Up

When platforms like YouTube, Meta, and Google entered the advertising space, they fundamentally shifted expectations. Marketers were drawn to their promise of precision, personalisation, and performance. Qualities that left traditional TV behind.

TV had its limitations as:

  • Brands were buying audiences in bulk based on broad assumptions.

  • There was minimal post-campaign data or feedback.

  • Application of uniform messaging shown to all viewers, regardless of context or interest.

Digital platforms offered new levels of targeting. But they also came with their own challenges. For example, view-through-rate of three seconds is deemed as acceptable and delivery of performance.

And shared devices mean that ads designed for one demographic are often served to another. A campaign targeting 20-somethings is viewed by a 9-year-old on their parent’s profile, for example.

This disconnect erodes the value of one-to-one targeting. The reality of co-viewing and shared logins breaks the accuracy promised by digital.

Closing the Gap: Hoppr and StarHub Bring Addressable TV to Singapore

Despite Singapore’s digital maturity, the market has lacked true addressable TV options. Global streaming giants like Netflix and Disney+ offer no ad-supported inventory on the island.

That’s now changing with StarHub Total TV.

Hoppr, in partnership with StarHub, has launched Supply Side Ad-Insertion, or SSAI-enabled instream advertising delivering the first large-scale addressable TV inventory in Singapore. This includes over 120 million premium impressions per month, across live TV, catch-up, on-demand, and streaming content.

This inventory is easily accessible through Darwin, Hoppr’s planning and campaign management platform. It gives brands and agencies the ability to plan, activate, and measure their campaigns across Total TV with transparency, flexibility, and performance at the core.

A Smarter Buying Experience

One of the biggest advantages? It’s simply simplicity.

Hoppr eliminates the need to negotiate placements one by one or manage fragmented inventory. Whether buying direct or programmatic, advertisers can now secure entire addressable TV campaigns in one place. All premium placements across StarHub’s linear, on-demand, and digital environments are aggregated into a single, audience first, streamlined buy.

The Promise of Darwin

At the heart of Hoppr’s Total TV solution is Darwin, an end-to-end campaign management platform that delivers:

  • Smarter audience reach: As campaigns are planned to maximise reach and avoid overexposing the same households.

  • Real-time audience insight: With the ability to tap into second-by-second viewing data across 141 live channels and over 500 streaming apps.

  • Granular targeting: Define audiences based on their viewing behaviour, interests, and geography.

  • Full-funnel transparency: Measurement reports that show exactly how impressions are delivered, how frequency builds over time, and which audience segments or creative assets deliver the strongest performance.

Darwin empowers planners with the same data-first mindset used in digital, finally available for the Total TV environment.

The Future of TV Advertising Starts Now

TV has evolved — and it’s better than ever.

What’s emerging is smarter, data-driven, audience-first advertising. Powered by real-time insights and technology built for today’s media landscape.

With Hoppr and StarHub, Singapore advertisers can finally access scalable and measurable premium Total TV inventory built for today, and tomorrow.

TV is back. But it’s no longer just television. It’s Total TV.

About Hoppr


We’re Hoppr and our Total TV platform uses a patented overlay technology that offers a unique way for advertisers to engage households on the largest screen in the house.

Using behavioural data driven research, combined with new ultra-premium inventory, we curate an audience that is - for the first time ever - guaranteed to view a brand’s advert on TV.

We have the connected solution for a disconnected TV audience that delivers engagement and attention.

Our CTV platform can be used to deliver true hero storytelling moments and provide new advertising revenue opportunities for all. Hoppr has a global team operating across North America, Europe and APAC.