Local media buying has reached a tipping point.
For years, local advertisers have navigated a landscape built on disconnected systems, complex processes, and time-intensive workflows. In a world of fragmented consumption across streaming, digital, and broadcast, the cracks have widened. Today’s local advertisers aren’t just buying spots—they’re navigating a tangled, high-stakes ecosystem.
The real challenge? It’s not just about inefficiency. It’s about opportunity cost. The longer it takes to plan, activate, and optimize campaigns across platforms, the harder it is to reach audiences where they actually are—and prove the value of every impression.
The Local Opportunity Is Growing—But So Is the Complexity
The U.S. local advertising market is projected to reach $171 billion in 2025, according to BIA Advisory Services, with digital formats continuing to gain share across nearly every vertical. In particular, local CTV and OTT ad spending is on track to grow 20% between 2023 and 2025, reaching $2.8 billion, as advertisers shift more budgets toward streaming platforms.
This growth reflects a deeper shift in consumer behavior: audiences are no longer tethered to a single platform. They move seamlessly between streaming, broadcast, FAST channels, and digital video—often within the same day. For advertisers, keeping up means more than just showing up. It means operating fluidly across platforms, with the ability to plan, activate, and measure holistically.
But for many marketers, that’s still easier said than done.
When the System Breaks, So Does the Strategy
Executing a local video campaign still often requires toggling between spreadsheets, siloed buying tools, multiple vendors, and disconnected reporting dashboards. Planning and measurement don’t speak the same language. Real-time optimization is out of reach. And media teams lose precious time trying to stitch everything together.
This fragmented approach makes it hard to answer basic questions with confidence:
- Are we delivering incremental reach across streaming and broadcast?
- Are we controlling frequency across platforms—or unintentionally oversaturating?
- Are we making the most of our local budgets based on actual performance?
These aren’t just operational headaches—they’re strategic blind spots. And in a moment when advertisers are under pressure to do more with less, the traditional model no longer holds.
It’s Time to Rethink Local Video—Not Just Rewire It
The answer isn’t more workarounds. It’s a reimagination of how local video buying should work in the first place.
That starts with a mindset shift: treating local not as an afterthought to national campaigns, but as its own strategic discipline. Local audiences are distinct. Local markets behave differently. And local budgets deserve tools built specifically for the complexity of activating at that level.
To meet the moment, advertisers need:
- A single platform that unifies planning, buying, and measurement
- Access to both direct and programmatic inventory
- Real-time insights that enable mid-flight decision-making
- The ability to control frequency, understand duplication, and maximize impact—by market
That’s exactly what Locality set out to build.
Introducing LocalX: A Platform Made for This Moment
LocalX is Locality’s response to the evolving needs of local advertisers—but it’s more than a product launch. It’s a platform designed from the ground up for today’s fragmented ecosystem.
Developed in direct collaboration with advertisers, LocalX:
- Unifies cross-platform campaign planning
- Offers access to both programmatic and direct-sold inventory
- Provides real-time performance insights to measure and optimize
- Reflects how local buyers actually operate—prioritizing flexibility, responsiveness, and results
“We built LocalX not just to solve for complexity, but to reimagine what’s possible when technology and local expertise come together,” said Zach Mullins, Chief Strategy Officer at Locality. “It’s a platform shaped by years of direct buyer feedback—one that brings the best of both worlds: programmatic flexibility and direct buying precision.”
What makes LocalX especially different is what it’s not. It’s not adapted from a national platform. It wasn’t built to force-fit local needs into pre-existing systems. LocalX was purpose-built for local—from its architecture to its interface, designed with the nuance of local execution in mind.
“Too often, platforms have been designed with national buyers in mind, and local gets adapted as an afterthought,” added Mullins. “LocalX is different. It starts with the needs of local buyers—flexibility, granularity, speed—and builds upward from there.”
Why It Matters Now
Consumer behavior isn’t slowing down. Viewers are fluid—jumping between live sports on CTV, local news on FAST channels, and binge-worthy series across streaming services. To keep up, advertisers need a solution that can activate across this evolving landscape with precision, flexibility, and speed.
That’s the promise of LocalX: a new model for local video execution that brings fragmented workflows under one roof—built entirely for the streaming era.
In a time when campaign windows are shorter, budgets are more scrutinized, and outcomes matter more than ever, local advertisers deserve a platform designed specifically for them. LocalX doesn’t just streamline the process—it transforms it.
Watch the LocalX Reel:
Ready to Streamline Your Local Media Buying? Schedule a LocalX demo at localx.com.
