Commentary
Chasing Reach, But Getting Frequency
- by Dave Kissel , September 14, 2012
It’s no secret that the continuing decline of network TV reach is creating bigger challenges for media planners and their clients. We’re so familiar with this decades-long problem — and the limited range of potential solutions — we tend to gloss over the magnitude of the issue and its significant negative impact on overall media effectiveness.
Case in point: the current state of audience fragmentation.
According to Nielsen, 50% of TV viewership can be found on networks that each have less than one percent share. That’s an astonishing degree of diffused viewing, and it’s only going to get worse.
All this fragmentation has resulted in media plans designed to deliver high reach and average frequency, but which actually deliver highly polarized frequency of impressions. Nielsen and Simulmedia have found that 20% of heavy TV viewers now account for up to 80% of most national TV campaign impressions.
In other words, there is no “average.”
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It’s the classic 20/80 phenomenon: 20% of reach is delivered with excessive frequency to high-index TV viewers; 80% of reach is delivered with inadequate frequency against low-index TV viewers — consumers who are most desirable and influential for the vast majority of brands.
Without the high-reach programming of the past, advertisers struggle to find big audiences. Network TV’s decline is generally blamed for this polarity. However, the strategies commonly used to solve for lost reach, such as cable TV and online video, actually exacerbate the problem. How? They each deliver small reach with high levels of frequency – in other words, tonnage. Media planners simply can’t get the reach without the excessive frequency. Thus, as network TV reach shrinks, excessive frequency grows.
The search for reach has also led planners to place-based digital vendors. But, place-based digital isn’t television, based on the factors that matter most: viewing experience and impact. “Viewers” do not seek out these screens for their content.
As a result, agencies purchase heavy-frequency schedules to compensate for distracted viewing: Ads that are ancillary to people who are preoccupied with everyday tasks. The only thing place-based digital has in common with television is the video screen.
Thus, many planners now assume they must deliver an average frequency of 7-8x, at a minimum, to pound their client’s message into the viewer’s brain. The good old days of 3x average frequency as the benchmark for effective television plans have gone the way of TV dials and rabbit ear antennae. What does this say for the future?
To quote the Bard, “what’s past is prologue.
With network TV continuing its inexorable fragmentation, will 15x frequency be the standard by 2020? If so, expect the “20%” to vomit with a Pavlovian-like response to infinite viewings of what was originally a mildly entertaining commercial, while the “80%” continue to be underexposed, or missed altogether.
Effective media solutions will be those that deliver “network/prime-time TV” programming: big reach with engaged viewers, at effective frequency. Where can that be found? With the exception of the best prime-time programs and events such as the Oscars and Super Bowl, not in television as we know it.
The solution can be found in the creation of compelling out-of-home, prime-time TV-like experiences. Digital, big-screen exposure at cinemas, concert venues and professional and college sports stadiums provide new and effective – and yet often overlooked – means of reaching consumers.
Nielsen, Telmar and MRI, having expanded their capabilities and coverage in this area, confirm the effectiveness of out-of-home TV in achieving low-frequency, high-impact reach. In some cases, the results have included double-digit increases in purchase intent, brand favorability and message recall.
Chasing prime-time TV-like reach requires looking beyond traditional television options to find effective “television” solutions. Those that can deliver “can’t-miss” content to engaged, live audiences, at an effective frequency of 2-3x per schedule, will earn a greater share of media budgets in the future — and with good, measurable reason.
Dave, I recommend you seek out Erwin Ephron's article on propinquity planning. 1+ reach at lower levels but across more on-air weeks will do wonders for most brands as well as save truckloads of advertising dollars. I can also recommend Robert Heath's work on Low Involvement Processing Theory which also supports 1+ reach in terms of both effectiveness and efficiency.
John - Thank you for the comment and for the additional resources. This is a growing problem that simply piling more GRP's on a plan will only exacerbate. New thinking and real solutions are required.
David, the works I refer to support REDUCTIONS in GRPs, and focussing on reaching a SMALLER proportion of the target but doing so more refquently so as to remind/nudge them towards purchase. Basically, people (consciously or sub-conciously) remember TV ads (positively or negatively) so it only small exposures for recall to occur. Rather than trying to 'sell the message' again, you remind them of your brand hopefully in their next purchase window. I worked on a margarine brand here in Australia that were wedded to two large bursts targetting a 70% 3+ reach over three weeks, that basically consumed their whole budget. They made a lot of noise and with a lot of trade support sold a lot of margarine for a few weeks and then sales dropped right back way below their base line. We shifted them to 22 weeks a year (virtually week-on/week-off) targeting 38% 1+ reach in each on-air week. We rotated the progammes we were in from pod to pod so that each week's 38% was different so that the total 1+ reach accumulated. We spent no more money. The networks liked the continuity. We were able to buy with longer lead times and at better rates. Year-on-year sales were up by more than 5% whereas they had been in a slow slight decline. I refer to a TV-only buy here, but the same principles apply for cross-media buys. The actual levels we bought to were arrive at by econometric analysis of the client's sales data. This was done around 10 years ago. Does this sort of thinking qualify or am I still off beam?
John - I think you are on to a very good solution, but one that may only work for certain types of brands, particularly CPG. For products that are continually purchased, i.e. margarine, the ability to tie increased sales to a change in media levels and flighting is fantastic. However, for many of the larger advertisers here in the U.S., who need to drive short-term promotions (fast food, big-box retailers) or to launch products (autos, movies), the necessity to drive reach over a 2 or 4 or 6 week period is critical. These advertisers have to have reach in the 80-90% range over these timeframes in order to reach their business goals....and where we see the phenomenon of excess frequency evident. Curious to hear if you have any relevant data/learning on those types of advertisers with those communications objectives.
David, I agree that it is 'a natural' for products with short repeat purchase cycles (RPC), such as CPG. I also want to emphasise that the 1+ continuity strategy is only recommended for established brands with 'no new news'. During launch it's all about making a noise - a high initial 3+ reach burst followed by high 1+ reach weeks. But in a past life I also thought about it a bit deeper, and the following (Australian) example shows that it is not just CPG that benefits. Here in Australia we sell around 1 million new vehicles a year, but we keep our cars for a bit under 10 years on average. (Obviously commercial vehicles are replaced more frequently than personal vehicles). If you followed a 'mimic the RPC' strategy you would only be on air sporadically across a decade - which would clesarly be brand suicide. The key is to NOT look at the RPC but to look at how many of your target are in a 'purchase window' during your proposed activity. With the 1 million cars that is 20,000 sales a week. At say $25k per vehicle we're talking $500 million up for grabs every week. The US has 15 times the population of Australia - do the maths. If you're not in there fighting for those sales on a regular basis you will slip from the consumers mind. A car is a high involvement / high price brand, so memory effects are strong. Margarine is a low involvement / low price brand so memory effects will be week. If you think of these two ends of the spectrum on a probabilistic basis your chances of success will he higher if you have advertising impacts in as many weeks of the year. That is, if you consider that once awareness is built and each consumer has taken their personal 'brand image' from the communication and stored those images in their memory, you are better to 'nudge' those memories (i.e. a single exposure) more frequently than assailing them again with a massive campaign, blowing most of your budget then disappearing from the adspace,
David,
one aspect of frequency planning which is frequently (sorry) overlooked by media planners is the phasing and rotation of the creative message. High frequency per se is not a dilema (and can actually be an opportunity) if the creative message(s) is rotated properly. Another resource which you might want to check out on the area of effective frequency is the work by Michael Naples.
Regards,
Joe.
Thanks, Joseph. You're spot on, pardon the pun. If you have a creative catalog ample enough to prevent wear-out of any one execution, that's terrific. But if you're using network and cable TV your impressions are still overly focused on the 20% that views the most TV. Those people would be getting the same amount of heavy brand exposure, but with different executions. My suggested solution is to look beyond traditional broadcast and cable TV, through media that deliver a television-like experience and whose audience has a higher composition of lighter TV viewers.
Yes, this is always a problem when the consumption of a particular medium is made up of heavy, medium & light consumers. One approach / solution to this problem which I like to use is to set an acceptable range of frequency exposure levels (e.g 3 - 5 OTS) for our target audience and to share this level / target with the particular media owner and to agree that my client will not pay for frequency activity delivered outside the acceptable range. It's not perfect, but at least my client is only paying for the frequency targets they want to achieve etc.
Regards,
Joe.