Commentary

What TiVo People Know: Part III -- A Modest Proposal

The term "ad-skipping" is frequently bandied about in discussions of TiVo's effect on advertising. It is important to understand that the TiVo DVR does not let you skip commercials altogether. What it can do is fast-forward at any of three speeds through both program content and regular embedded commercials. The system, as currently configured, doesn't distinguish between program and commercials.

It is natural to assume that fast-forwarding does not apply to live viewing. Actually, this is easy to do by watching on a 15-minute delay. Moreover, people who have become accustomed to TiVo will be found to watch fewer and fewer programs live. As a new user accumulates more and more recorded hours, they soon cease to think of real-time viewing as the normal way to watch.

In considering the impact of this behavior, one is tempted to predict that when viewers make the leap to the on-demand world, commercial TV will be forced out of the picture. Some observers will argue that people hate commercials so much that they'll take the free content and blow off all the commercials just because they can. But this is not what we see at Super Bowl time, when advertisers put up their best work, and the commercials are the entertainment, talked about at the water cooler and watched and re-watched for fun. Clearly people will watch some commercials and like them, if they are presented properly.

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Erwin Ephron puts his finger on the real issue in his recent article, "The Uninvited." He draws a connection between the desire to avoid TV commercials and the lack of control over intrusion, pointing out that readers react more favorably to print ads because in going through a magazine, one considers separately whether or not to read each ad. But, says Ephron, the bad commercials drag down the good commercials because TV is not set up for selective avoidance. I respectfully submit that it ought to be.

This is unthinkable to traditionalists who feel that viewers should watch all the commercials, and assume they did so before technology like TiVo started meddling with the implicit contract we had. In fact, people never watched all the commercials; they've always been able to get up and leave during the commercial break, talk amongst themselves, or channel surf. We just kidded ourselves about it.

The traditionalists also declare viewing all commercials to be the fair price to pay for the content advertisers are subsidizing, compensation for the considerable money we shell out for rating points. I would counter that we never needed or expected all the people exposed to a commercial to pay attention to it every time it airs. The majority of avoidance is the out-of-demo waste and excessive frequency that our research tools have acknowledged for years. We do what we can to minimize it, but we know very well it can never be eliminated. Even so, we saw the problem as one of efficiency for the advertiser, not about creation of unwanted clutter for the viewer. This is what is changing now.

After learning that fast-forwarding is the only way to skip commercials, some advertisers will feel a sense of relief, assuming that if theirs is a high-quality spot, it'll catch people's eye as they zip through the pod, and they will stop and watch it. Actually, this is not a safe assumption. A study from Magna Global USA found that the longer people own a DVR, the fewer commercials they watch and here's why: Even if they see your commercial fly by and are somewhat intrigued, it requires an inordinate amount of fiddling with the controls to get back to the exact beginning of any one spot. After a time of experimentation, it is found to be too much of a hassle to do very often.

Others take comfort from the idea that people will at least take away the gist of the commercial as they speed through it, but again, this is not a well-founded hope. DVRs on fast-forward don't really speed up the action, they put up a succession of sample frames. You will glimpse the logo, the product and the actors and have a bare-bones idea of what it's for, but gone are all the audio and much of the story line as well. What a waste of the thought and expense it took to create an effective spot! And, since yours is just part of a fleeting mish-mash of images that make up a whole pod, it's not really absorbed very well.

Then there are those whose proposed solution is commercials that are designed to be viewed at fast-forward speeds. Please! "Blipverts" only worked in the fictional world of "Max Headroom," which will forever remain 20 minutes in the future. If you want to distill your message down to a logo and a few words of copy with no need for audio, why spend your media money on expensive TV time? Just buy some outdoor boards.

One feature that has been under-publicized is the availability of long-form ad units on TiVo. It is difficult for the uninitiated to imagine how these work, why such a small audience is worth bothering with, or how these units differ from a boring, cheesy infomercial. Actually, this capability is one of the most interesting things about TiVo.

From time to time, on the main TiVo menu screen, a line item with a star in front of it appears. These are termed "showcases." Occasionally there are more than one of them, rotated each time you access the main screen. A typical showcase is up for perhaps a week. The item is identified by a teaser-style description, and can be either ignored, or selected and opened at will. One may be a new 30-second spot that the advertiser is proud of and wants to show off. Another could be a "making of the commercial" mini-documentary showing how it was shot, special effects added, etc. I found some of these entertaining enough to play many times.

A final element of a showcase may be a response opportunity, which can include a request forwarded through TiVo to be contacted, receive information, a video, etc. Or it can refer to a Web site, or list dates and locations of local tie-in events. Theatrical movie trailers often appear in showcase form.

Even without knowing the price structure of these showcases, I'd guess they're well worth it in buzz among the advertiser's sales and dealer network. Then there's the impact on the audience. It's not just the novelty but also the interactivity of the experience, as well as the potential for CRM and taking the viewer a step closer to a sale. Since all this is entirely optional and takes place outside program viewing, it avoids the negative effect of interruption, and the viewers will spend as much time with your messages as you give them reason to. The viewing and response rates are probably a tight secret, but they have to be significant.

Even TiVo has come up with a way to bid for viewers' attention while they're fast-forwarding. The thumbs-up icon is sometimes displayed during certain commercials. It doesn't appear during the program itself, and it doesn't interfere with fast-forwarding through the pod. By pressing the thumb button you exit to a long-form, multi-part message of the same type that is often put up as a showcase on the main menu. You view whatever parts you choose, and, when done, you are returned to the pod at the point from which you left, having missed nothing. This is strictly opt-in, so I don't see TiVo users having a problem with it.

After considering the fast-forwarding problem and the proliferation of advertising options, some will conclude that there is no way to get people to just watch the relevant commercials in the pod, and write off this ad form altogether. I say, not so fast: maybe we can't make them watch, but we can make them want to watch and we could make it easier for them to watch. I'm talking about enabling commercial-skipping, not trying to fight it.

It's not really the creative side that needs to be sold on a change: smart creatives and clients already get that commercials must be made more appealing and rewarding to watch. What needs to be fixed now is the mechanics and our attitude on the media side.

With or without TiVo, people find it much easier to avoid all commercials at once, so that even good commercials are ignored simply because they follow bad ones. But what if we revise the model to combine the opportunity for a TV commercial to attract attention, with the ability to easily choose whether or not to view each one? DVR technology might actually make this kind of selection practical for the first time.

Here's my idea, which should not be difficult to accomplish by having TiVo tweak the existing system: Make it possible for the viewer, by touching a button, to have the DVR skip instantly to the end of each commercial at any time during it, regardless of length, and start to view the next one from the beginning at normal speed. Putting up a billboard/title slide ahead of each spot is one way to go, but since the element of surprise is key to the entertainment value of many spots and their ability to hook the viewer, that would not be as practical.

Some might wonder if this isn't a lot of effort for the person with the remote. It is no more than fast-forwarding, actually. The experienced TiVo user is already accustomed to being a more active participant in program viewing. Now we would extend this interactive, choice-based experience to reviewing a set of commercials instead of fleeing from them. While this an opt-out model (in contrast to showcases, which are completely opt-in), the viewer will have more control than when dealing with a continuous pod, and therefore should feel more positive.

But to make this work, everyone will have to agree to face reality. Advertisers, agencies, and networks must be willing to abandon the unreasonable position that everyone should watch every commercial every time it's put in front of them. It's time to trade in the empty hope that somehow they can be forced to do so, for the more common-sense possibility that people will choose to watch the commercials meant for them, if we make it convenient. Of course it will be a big help when measurement gets to the point of proving that this is effective. Meanwhile, isn't this better than the alternative?

While not a permanent solution to the challenges new technology is throwing our way, it could be the right one to get us through the transition. This is just the beginning of a protracted period of change in the TV content and advertising delivery models. When it ends, spots in pods may be gone, or there may just be fewer of them. Product placement will certainly continue and true sponsorship could be revitalized. More likely, as TV delivery breaks out of the strictures of real-time scheduling, we will see more of a hybrid form a mini-program of five minutes or so that is built to deliver a commercial message but is entertaining and buzz-worthy.

 

Cece Forrester is a media planner in Chicago.

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