• by Jack Loechner , Staff Writer @mp_research, April 22, 2008

Channel Hopping Consumers More Loyal to Content Than TV Channels

According to results from Accenture's Global Broadcast Consumer Survey, consumers are growing increasingly disenchanted with their overall television experience, but are remaining loyal to their favorite programs. Although television remains the predominant mass communications device worldwide, with 97 percent of respondents watching TV in a typical week, consumption patterns vary based on a number of factors including geography, age and socio-economic status. While 70 percent of consumers watch four or more television programs a week, 71 percent of them watch programs on four or more television channels.

This channel-hopping, concludes the report,  demonstrates that consumers are more loyal to the content they want to watch rather than the branded distribution channel to which they may be accustomed.

David Wolf, senior executive with Accenture's Media & Entertainment practice, said "People are... moving away from traditional, linear programming... Age has become the leading indicator of these new behavioral preferences with consumers under 35-years-old the best indicator of these impending changes and future broadcast consumption patterns. Today's youth are... increasingly excited by the availability of new choices."

The survey also found that while 83 percent of the respondents expressed discontent with watching broadcast or cable (e.g "live" TV), 33 percent are still watching eight or more programs per week. In the United States, 46 percent of 18-24-year-olds view content via mobile devices; but only 19 percent of those 55 and older.

Wolf observed "The under 35-year-old group is more likely to watch content on alternative devices, more likely to be familiar with On Demand TV, prefers watching content on demand and is more willing to pay to download content."

According to the survey, consumers have already developed some ideas about what type of content fits best on which alterative device:

• 27 percent would enjoy watching full TV episodes on their PCs
• 27 percent would like to receive public service info
• 26 percent want to watch new content not normally on TV
• 25 percent watch content they themselves create
• 16 percent would like to receive program highlightsor shortened versions of TV episodes.

The survey also found that 37 percent of adults are willing to pay on some basis to download TV shows from a digital service, with half preferring a monthly fee for unlimited downloading and slightly fewer preferring to pay for a season of a particular show.  Thirty-three percent prefer to pay nothing in return for watching advertisements within the downloaded programs.

Commercials are by far the top complaint about ‘live' TV (64 percent), followed by not being able to ‘rewind' (40 percent) and not being able to watch programs at the viewer's convenience (38 percent).  Much less troublesome are unappealing content (14 percent), and being unable to watch programs away from home (8 percent), to interact (7 percent) or to rate programs (7 percent).

Wolf concludes that "What these geographic findings all underline is that a one-size-fits all approach to digital services will not work. Industry participants need to think global and act local...."

More information on Accenture's Global Broadcast Consumer Survey can be found here.