Ready For Close-up: Cablers, Studios Push VOD 'Movies' Initiative
Looking to push cable system video-on-demand usage, the major Hollywood studios and cable operators are launching a $30 million marketing campaign.
Under a new VOD brand name, "Movies on Demand," the studios will highlight VOD services, which would heavily compete with brick-and-mortar video stores and other digital film services targeted at consumers.
A main copy line theme of the campaign is: "The Video Store Just Moved In."
The "Movies On Demand" initiative is a promotional group run through The Cable & Telecommunications Association. The cable system partners for the effort include Armstrong, Bend Broadband, Bright House Networks, iO TV, Comcast Corp, Cox Communications, Insight Communications and Time Warner Cable.
The studio partners include 20th Century Fox, Focus Features, Lionsgate, Rogue, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Summit Entertainment, Universal Pictures and Warner Bros Entertainment.
The creative part of the promotion comes from Berlin Cameron United, with media planning and buying handled by OMD U.S. A leading "Movies On Demand" distributor will be In Demand, which currently is used by many cable systems for their VOD efforts.
Media will include TV commercials, print, interactive and a dedicated Web site called CableVideoStore.com.
The opening slate of movies includes "Precious," "The Twilight Saga: New Moon," "Ninja Assassin," "Pirate Radio," "Astro Boy," "Bandslam," "Did You Hear About the Morgans?," "Fantastic Mr. Fox" and "The Fourth Kind."
Derek Harrar, senior vice president/GM video and entertainment services, Comcast, stated: "Improvements in technology, the instant availability of the most recent box office hits and thousands of library titles have fundamentally changed viewing patterns."
Kevin Tsujihara, president of Warner Bros Home Entertainment Group, said: "Movies On Demand is a great way for consumers to rent movies; they are reasonably priced, always available, and the number of day-and-date titles continues to increase year-over-year."
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So the concept, the branding and the availability of more titles all are tremendous steps forward, but for this really to take off, cable needs to address VOD search and discovery. The industry's current interface limits the ability of viewers to find the titles they want, resulting in an underutilization of the service. What's needed are cloud-based interfaces, such as those created for Blockbuster by ActiveVideo Networks, that enable viewers to search across titles, genres and other categories, and also use recommendation engines to allow other titles to "find" the viewer.