Before you start reading, I want to go on record and state, every channel has a place and a purpose, including television. I'm an advocate of TV. Who am I kidding, I'm a junkie. I love it as a marketer and as a consumer. That said, TV versus X, Y, Z. has got to stop. We are wasting our time discussing a one "versus" the other. No media channel has killed another channel (with the exception of the phone, it did pretty much decimate the telegraph).
Channel and content consumption are very complex discussions that require more time than one blog post.
Today, the Center for Media Research and the Council for Research Excellence (CRE) released there findings on Video Consumer Mapping (VCM). The title of the release, TV Still Occupies Two Thirds of Adult Screen Time.
Three topics ran through my mind when reading the release study:
I. Kaizen
Marketing is about continuous improvement. Solutions are no longer static activities that can be passively planned, placed, and reflected upon. Everyone seems to be looking for "the algorithm" that taps into the consumers brain and rains money down on them. Stop looking, doesn't exist. The New World Trend is harsh: marketing folks can't phone it in anymore. Commissions on media are gone. Expected results are in. We have to work for our money.
II. Old News/Tired Thinking/Move On Please
For me this discussion is tired. It reminds me of the
Newspaper industry in the late 90's arguing about their dominance over
the Internet (I could go on but I'm not into kicking and beating a field of dead horses). The focus of discussion needs to shift from time spent to relevance of engagement. Change is hard. As I have previously discussed, in hard times and confronted with change, you cling to what you know. The industry knows TV. Case in point: Mike Bloxham, director of insight and research for Ball State's CMD,
observes that "What differentiates this study... (is that) it's not a
study about TV or the Web or any other medium... it's about how, where,
how often and for how long consumers are exposed to all media... the
observational method is the only real way to achieve accurate and
reliable results." One question Mr. Bloxham: Why does the findings and
the article start out by saying "TV still occupies two thirds of adult
screen time...." if the study wasn't about TV?
III. Focus On The Gold
It's time to get off of thinking about Awareness only and only through the channel of Television. I don't even know what that means anymore. I have a flat screen portal on my wall that delivers video for Networks, but it also delivers telephony and Internet, I have a laptop (I work on it, I watch TV and I listen to iTunes), Pandora (is that radio), I have an iPhone (at night I watch TV on it so as to not disturb my wife). FOCUS has huge implications for all primarily around the "Awareness" measurement and phase of the customer life-cycle. Awareness was ad agencies and content producer's bread and butter for over 100 years. That has changed and the large players are clinging on for dear life. To grow, you have to let go. If you're not changing, your dead. Moving forward, the goal of a marketer or agency must be holistic solutions that create engagement, not just "got a problem? let's do TV."
The following illustrates at a high-level the paradigm all markets face. Money is generated on the back end of the life-cycle however most resources are focused on the front-end of the life-cycle and primarily one one channel - TV.
As an ex media director I can here the debate now:
TV=Awareness=Eyeballs=Sales. Consider the following equation and tell me if you still agree.
Marketing Budget: $1,000,000
Solution: Television
100,000 Adults 25-54 (Reached/Exposed), CPM $10, Customer Engagement & Impact: Unknown (Unless this was a completely pristine test where the advertiser has never run advertising). If previous marketing efforts in a market and on the particular brand's product or service has been executed and someone wants to challenge my statement that you can definitively prove the impact give me a call I'd love to chat. 314-255-5333.
Solution: Social Media
78,600,000 Adults (Reached/Exposed), CPM $.013, Customer Engagement: 765,000, or fewer than 1%, visited an advertiser page on MySpace,
though roughly half who did (358,000) visited the advertiser's website (there it is - those are the people that matter - they have a reason for engaging the brand - if the interaction creates a relevant engagement they will not only provide cash flow but they will be your best advertsing channel money can buy, Impact: Package-Goods Brand Earns $1.28 Million in Sales From $1 Million Social-Media Campaign
Do you still agree with only thinking about TV=Awareness=Eyeballs=Sales?
I realize this is one example and it is a bit extreme but hopefully you get my point.
There is also the debate about the halo effect of Awareness on Consideration/Preference, Conversion, and Retention/Loyalty. I understand the argument and support to a point. Greater attention to allocation strategies are absolutely necessary in order to provide a solution that generates better results for clients.
If anything the picture should look like more like this:
NWT