Yes, I’d like pizza. Now back to the show.
Advertisers have had an increasingly difficult time reaching their target audience since the advent of DVR. Because users have the ability to record their favorite shows onto some disk media, they also have the ability to fast-forward through commercials. Ever since the dawn of man, we’ve been subjected to advertisers selling us products for thirty seconds up to around five minutes at a time. It seemed at first like we could escape those pesky ads when television went online, alas we find ourselves assailed even there. (Strangely, it appears more effective to have commercials paired with online vs. live content, coincidence? No, DVR destruction!)
Then, in a stroke of brilliance, years ago, DVR saved us from that awful fiend “the television commercial”. It breathed it’s last, kicking and screaming but slowly fading into the abyss.
Or so we thought.
Instead, advertisers adapted. In 2000, Pizza Hut went down under and broke a deal with iTV to create interactive commercials for Aussie users. At the press of a button, iTV owners could order a Big New Yorker and then the ad would disappear. (I’m sure that it was advertised during Weeds, That 70’s Show, and FX Aussie’s rebroadcast of Half Baked) Fast-forward to ‘08 and you’ll find that LA’s women’s basketball team (The Los Angeles Sparks) used this method to get brochures out. And apparently it works. 43% of those who receive the ads don’t just tolerate them, they actually look forward to them.
Why is this happening?
First, 38 million Americans used this method to subscribe to digital cable, the only 2-way medium that would allow for users to respond to the ads. Unlike web ads, television “call to action”s required the end-user to get their butt up off the couch, march down to the store (or perhaps over to the phone) and place an order. Now, they can sit comfortably on the couch and at the press of a button, ¡presto! they have a Big New Yorker at the door.
Second, and most importantly, there are over 112 million cable users total. You may or may not have heard (I hear it all Sunday while I’m trying to watch football) that all broadcasts are switching over to digital. That means those basic users are going to have to upgrade, bringing the pool of users up almost four-fold. (1 out of 3 Americans!)
And if you think it’s just a fad, don’t blink. The Sparks and Pizza Hut aren’t the only ones who’ve caught on. Nike’s doing it. Disney’s doing it. Bertolli is doing it. So why can’t we do it?
It’s a question advertisers should be asking their clients.
