New Report on Digital Interactive TV
January 31 2003
The IPA s new report, 'Beyond the Red Button', which is published this week is a snapshot of the commercial market for interactive TV in the UK and highlights how this exciting medium is currently being used by both advertisers and broadcasters.
This report follows on from Howard Unna's Report on digital interactive television published by the IPA a year ago.
The new report summarises recent developments in interactive TV by illustrating examples of advertising, sponsorship and programming drawn from IPA interactive TV case studies. It aims to encourage the advertising and media community to become more involved and understand how broadcasters are using interactivity to create better TV.
Bill Gash, author of 'Beyond the Red Button' says: 'Interactivity is now a key differentiating factor in much of the advertising, sponsorship and programming that we re seeing on our screens. True interactive TV has moved into peak time and with more than 8m households connected, broadcasters and advertisers are innovating with smart ways to engage and involve viewers and generate new revenues.'
The report makes a number of key findings:
- The most exciting innovations are being made by broadcasters to create original programmes, where interactivity is at the core rather than as a 'bolt on' feature. Advertisers can learn from their experiences.
- As consumers become more confident using interactive services, their expectations grow. TV is increasingly something to be part of not just something to watch. This is especially true of children and young adults, often the household's 'TV experts'. The use of iTV is accounting for a growing share of viewing time.
- Consequently, interactivity is forming a key part of strategies used by broadcasters and the platform operators (such as Sky, NTL and Telewest) to generate new revenues and increase viewer loyalty.
- Most interactive TV advertising formats are skewed towards DRTV models to generate response and customer data. However, for many brands this is less relevant and inconsistent with how TV has been used in the past for brand communications.
- Besides interactive advertising, marketers should consider extending their brands' presence beyond commercial airtime to sponsoring applications, for example the Pepsi iTV game. Some brands will benefit from jointly funding iTV applications with broadcasters or even creating and licensing their own branded interactive content.
- Advertisers and their agencies must participate, not simply spectate, as the future of interactive TV unfolds. This means taking a lead in improving their understanding of how interactive TV can be harnessed to optimise its use for enhanced brand communications as well as response generation.
According to Hamish Pringle, Director General, IPA, 'Beyond the Red Button highlights how interactive TV has moved on in the past year. We're getting ever closer to the holy grail of branding and response in one, and this means agencies are on the threshold of a really exciting new era in creative communications.'
For further information, visit
www.ipa.co.uk
All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas unless otherwise stated.
