| Monday, October 24, 2005 Customer Dialogue Is A Good Thing, Isn't It? By Tom Hespos Ever written a letter to someone at a corporation with your feedback about a product? A substitute teacher at my high school used to hammer home the importance of knowing how to write a coherent business letter by telling a story about the time he wrote to Johnnie Walker to voice his dissatisfaction with their product, and received an entire case of Scotch whiskey for his trouble. How often do you hear those stories in the Internet age? I've written many letters to corporations over the years, seeking to express my dissatisfaction or to give praise. Sometimes I received a response. More often, those letters went unanswered. I think it's just because many large corporations simply aren't prepared to offer one-on-one responses to people who have comments concerning their products or services. In fact, many corporations I've encountered in my marketing travels have gone out of their way to actively discourage such dialogue. I've had interactive programs canceled because they generated too much in the way of customer comments. I've even had marketing folk tell me that they don't want dialogue with their customers, because their most profitable customer is the kind that hands over his monthly fee without taking advantage of the advanced features of the company's service. In other words, there are clients out there that want to pay us to find people online who will fork over monthly fees without making the slightest bit of ruckus or comment about it. This begs the question--If I could find people who would willingly give me money on a regular basis, in exchange for little or nothing from me, why wouldn't I keep those relationships for myself? I could retire to a tropical island. But I digress... It's painfully obvious that companies that don't want to converse with their customers cannot hope to preserve relationships with them. Whether a customer is dealing with the simplest red rubber ball or the most complex piece of automotive technology on the market, they'll sometimes have questions that can't be answered by a corporate Web site. A company cannot look at customer dialogue as a liability--something that will take away from profitability. It cannot aim to mass market to a niche audience of folks that will consistently pay for something over and over without asking a question or two. It cannot steer people toward customer service solutions that don't work ("Check the FAQ on our Web site") or use a "one size fits all" approach to customer inquiries (opening a call center to address the top 10 FAQs and little else). What many marketing folks fail to realize is that every customer touchpoint is the starting point for a potential dialogue. If dialogue isn't a natural next step in the communications process, then something is wrong , not right. I'd like to see many of these companies that have been traditionally hesitant to engage in conversation with their customers wake up and start an initiative to address consumer inquiries. This dialogue needs to be something that's embraced and not avoided. And if online marketing programs result in more opportunities to converse with customers, that's a good thing--not a problem.
Tom Hespos is President, Underscore Marketing LLC. |
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| Tuesday, October 25, 2005 | |
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Writers Side With Google in Scrap Legal P2P Opens For Business Training Online Media Buyers AOL's Miller Is Staying On Geo-Targeted RSS Ads Surprise Advertisers In Other Media: Bundling Strategy Due For A Rude Awakening Down the Slippery Slope to Regulation - Ouch! Redstone Lends Hand To Both Viacom Units Prime-Time NBC Shows Moving To Restricted Form Of VOD Infinity Reveals Stern's Replacements, New Strategy and Logo Dolan Family Withdraws Cablevision Offer VNU Shares Up On Report Of Possible Buyout |
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Rainbow Media Seeks VOD Pot Of Gold With Indie Films
A media critique by Wayne Friedman , Tuesday, October 25, 2005
FOR THE BIG PICTURE OF the video-on-demand business, Rainbow Media Holdings is thinking small-time entertainment.
Rainbow wants to create a business by releasing independent and small art-house films in theaters on the same day that they premiere on VOD services. Wedging into the business with the small independent and art-house films makes sense with VOD. That's because bigger movies--like that of big network TV shows--are still off limits in VOD land.
Independent films are fast becoming the orphans of the film business, along with art-house movie theaters. Joshua Sapan, president and CEO of Rainbow Media, believes VOD is the key to indies' survival.
To pave the way, Rainbow hopes to release 18 to 24 films a year by initially launching them in Rainbow's own new IFC Center film complex in New York, and on its parent company's own VOD service. Rainbow is owned by cable operator Cablevision System Corp.
Others have tried this before--in one-off film deals. Mark Cuban and Todd Wagner's Magnolia Pictures had a VOD showing of "Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room" through its HD Net programming service. But theatrical exhibitors, for the most part, declined to air the film, knowing it would also get a VOD same release date, which they believed would hurt their box-office business. The film did run on Cuban and Wagner's Landmark Theatre screens.
Rainbow is counting on a niche audience, hungry for specific art-house movies, to buy the VOD service. The company will have no trouble convincing struggling indie producers this is the right way to go. But the main effort will be to encourage existing art-house exhibitors that they should share their window with VOD, and possibly even DVD. Rainbow's argument for those exhibitors seems to be that same-day-and-date releasing will allow more independent movies to survive and get produced.
Perhaps a tougher sell is in convincing other cable operators to make room for a niche movie VOD service--not a service for wide-release movies that, according to pay-per-view histories, reap the biggest financial rewards for cable operators.
As with broadcast networks--who won't be giving up their big-time network TV shows as yet for VOD--movie companies are also holding on to their big film prize possessions. Both theatrical and broadcast network companies aren't ready for massive changes in the traditional ways they do business.
But small niche entertainment can become a current staple of the VOD business.
Clear
Channel Unit Sales Up in First Qtr.
March
07, 2005
By Katy Bachman
Although demand for radio advertising is not increasing, Clear Channel's push for reduced spotloads and 30 second commercial unit as part of its less is more initiative, is having a ripple effect on the radio market. According to Harris Nesbitt's new report of commercial spotloads in February, unit rates could be up between 4 and 6 percent in first quarter.
Based on data from Media Monitors, the Harris Nesbitt Radio Airtime Index analyzes spot activity among radio stations with at least a 2.0 audience share in the top 10 radio markets, representing about 25 percent of radio industry revenue.
For February, the average radio spotload was 11 minutes per hour, slightly higher than the 10.1 minutes per hour in January, but below the 11.7 commercial minutes in October 2004. Clear Channel’s spotloads ran 9.4 minutes per hour, down 19 percent since October and the second lowest of any other major radio group. Radio One had the lowest spotloads with 9.1 minutes per hour. Cox Radio ran 9.9 minutes/hour; Emmix Communications 11.5 minutes/hour; ABC Radio 11.6 minutes/hour; and Beasley Broadcast Group,10.7 minutes/hour. Due to its large portfolio of News stations, Infinity Broadcasting scheduled 12.8 minutes per hour, more than any other group, even as it cut spotloads by 7 percent in Boston, Houston, and Philadelphia.
Clear Channel’s push for 30 second commercial units is also having a noticeable effect on the radio market. In February, 43 percent of Clear Channel’s units were 30 second spots, about double the number of 30s aired in October. Across all radio stations, 30 second units amount to 27 percent of units, compared to 19 percent in October and 26 percent in January.
While the overall effect of Clear Channel’s LIM initiative on the market is positive, Clear Channel is the company taking the most revenue hits. During Clear Channel’s recent year-end earnings call, Clear Channel reported that its first quarter revenue was pacing down 5.6 percent as a result of cutting inventory. In contrast, other radio groups, such as Entercom Communications, Cox Radio, and Cumulus Media, provided guidance in the 3 to 5 percent range.
“Radio operators across-the-street from Clear Channel have neither sought market share advantage by hiking spot loads up (at presumably lower rates), nor sought to cut time radically. That may be due to the beneficially effect on ad pricing,” the report read.
Mark Burnett's Branded Entertainment Apprentice
Deals
A media critique by Wayne Friedman, Monday, March 7, 2005
Please click here. BRANDED ENTERTAINMENT'S YOUNG LEGACY, AS a still growing marketing tool, has never really been about increased sales results, millions of Internet hits, or loud product buzz. The one thing it has been about, is ownership.
Now Mark Burnett Productions, the major proponent of branded entertainment, is suing the young upstart branded entertainment agency Madison Road Entertainment. Burnett claims Madison Road has been selling something it shouldn't - as well as acting as the exclusive representative of some of Mark Burnett's shows, such as "The Apprentice," a show Madison Road worked deals for marketers such as Procter & Gamble and Levi Strauss & Co.
Who has the right to sell branded entertainment in "The Apprentice"? Would that be Mark Burnett? Not exactly. Listening to NBC's senior sales executive Marianne Gambelli at the recent Madison & Vine conference in Los Angeles, she implored marketers to work deals with NBC for branded entertainment. You see, NBC wants advertisers to buy not only branded entertainment, but also its lucrative TV commercial time.
Confusion exists in this new field, and Irwin Gotlieb, chairman of WPP Group's Group M issued just this warning at the same conference. Not only do some companies not have the right to sell branded product integration in a TV program, he said, some don't even know it.
Many branded entertainment agencies play both sides of the fence, claiming to represent both TV producer and marketer, both buyer and seller. But it always causes trouble. An agency can represent a marketer, and secondly a TV producer. Worse still, an agency could deal with your competitor as the next in line.
NBC's arrangement with Mark Burnett adds to the confusion. NBC sells some, and so does Burnett. As the creator of many reality hits, he has the leverage to demand not only full control of branded entertainment activities, but in some cases, such as in "The Contender," a piece of the advertising time.
And the confusion doesn't end there. Companies selling branded entertainment can include a marketer's many agencies: advertising, media, product placement, creative, and new-fangled branded entertainment agencies. And let's not forget other sellers -- TV network advertising sales divisions, TV production studios, and the TV producers.
In other news, the barista at my local Starbucks says he's doing deals for "Amazing Race 12."
Fuzzy marketing boundaries can only mean one thing: If business keeps running this way - with everyone wedging themselves into every deal -- it'll always be business run by apprentices.
Product
Placement: Something New Under The Sun?
by
Mookie Tenembaum, Monday, March 7, 2005
Please click here.
THE BOOK of Ecclesiastes gave us the _expression "there is nothing new under the sun." The growing frenzy over product placement in film and TV only confirms what the ancient religious scholars foretold.
According to The New York Times, "Madison Avenue and (the film side of) Hollywood have been working together in earnest since the 1930's--and in some isolated instances, evidence indicates, even before then." Academic research has produced "evidence of product-placement agreements made beginning in the 30's, by major brands like Bell telephones, Buick, Chesterfield cigarettes, Coca-Cola, De Beers diamonds, and White Owl cigars, with major studios like Columbia, MGM, and Warner Brothers."
The "re-invention" of product placement has gained a new urgency because consumers increasingly have the technical power to avoid commercial messages on TV. The blame seems to fall on digital video recorders--but ever since the advent of the remote control, this has not only been possible, it has become widespread. As the convergence of TV and the Internet continues at an inevitable pace, consumers will only gain that much control over what they see and when they see it. Will consumers be able to use tomorrow's technology to totally avoid electronically delivered commercials?
There are companies developing ad serving technology that will try to assure that consumers can't block ads served online. Probably on the other side of the wall in the same building are companies working on advance ad blocking technology to make sure ads are never served against the user's will.
If consumers in fact end up with the power to block all electronically served ads, what can we do as an industry that won't simply annoy our audiences into seeing our ads? As I have written in the past, the single most important tactic is compelling creative. Produce ads that consumers want to see.
Second, serve it in a format that is appealing. I take a world of kidding about the odd names we give our rich media products (Shoshkele, Yachne, Ooqa-Ooqa, Shoshmosis, Shvitzer, etc.), but I do it to emphasis their uniqueness. They not only deliver messages--they offer consumers free tools they might not otherwise get. And so they have the incentive to not only view the accompanying ads, but to spend a longer time with them. Since every one of our new units offer an opt-out function, we were forced to offer the user a better and more interesting experience to keep them engaged. The definition of "a better experience" may be subjection, but with online you can pretty precisely measure the various aspects of what consumers like about your offer.
If there is to be a true reinvention of product placement, I think it will be online, first in streaming video. With TV, even a product placement is passive, because unless the characters interact with it, it sits in the shot hoping for some viewer attention. With online recorded video, there was a primitive process called hotspotting (which we have succeeded in improving and incorporating in our Shoshmosis streaming video unit) that enables the audience to click on a product that appears in the video, and have a window immediately open to explain more about the product or actually be able to buy it at that moment. This is not only pleasing to the user, it gives the "advertiser" some metrics to measure user interest in the product.
With TV or movie product placement, advertisers are left wondering exactly which aspect of their overall marketing efforts have generated the in-store sales. With the new online streaming video hotspotting, there is a direct link to consumer interest and action.
With streaming video, programming can be altered to include virtual products that weren't in the show or movie that the consumer first saw, so there is a great secondary market emerging. And finally, as more and more video is shot just for the Web, look for product placement opportunities that really are something new under the sun.
source:
Column : AIRPLAY 101 : How To Use
Radio To Boost Your Online Sales
By Bryan Farrish -
www.radio-media.com
for more topics and tips visit radio media
How To Use Radio To Boost Your Online Sales With indie distribution now firmly established on the web, we'll now cover how to use radio to make online CD sales happen. We will focus on album CD sales that are purchased through CD Baby, the largest online CD sales site devoted to indie releases; and we'll focus on commercial radio, which is much more suited to doing this type of thing than non-commercial radio is.
There are two main ways of using radio to drive people to buy your CD on CD Baby, both of which may also help you obtain spins: (1) Buying radio spots (commercials) that drive listeners to your CD Baby page, where you then benefit from album purchases, or (2) Doing a Per-Inquiry (PI) setup at stations, whereby the stations run your spots for free, and then they get paid from each CD sold. While everyone reading this will of course want to try the second option first, you should know that it is at least a hundred (100) times harder than the first one. Here's the easy one...
Buying spots on a commercial station is straightforward, controllable, and has predictable costs. If your band name is XYZ, you simply tell the station to record a spot for you that plays the song's chorus at least twice, and then tells listeners to "buy it online at CD Baby dot com slash XYZ" at least three times. Simple, and it works every time. But it's expensive.
Now the tough one: The PI option is difficult for two reasons. First, a "per-inquiry" setup means that the stations may or may not actually get paid later, based on how many sales you TELL them occurred (yes, they have been lied to before.) Second, there has been a long-standing resistance in the radio business with regards to them participating in music sales. There are many reasons for this, but for the purposes of this article, we'll say that the way to work around it is just to contact a large number of stations (at least 100) if you want to end up with just one that will do it. Once you find a station that will participate:
Create a "partner" page at http://partners.cdbaby.com (you'll need a separate partner account for each station.) If your band name is XYZ, and the station is KPOP, then create a partner page with a username of "xyzkpop" (or, if the station is WBIG, then make it "xyzwbig"), and I'd recommend a very easy password too... maybe even the same as the username. Then give the username and password to your contact at the station so they can verify sales for themselves, and so they can compare these sales to the spins they are giving you.
Now
create a simple "radio click-to-order" page on your band site (you'll
need a separate page for each station.) If your site is www.xyz.com, then make
the KPOP order page www.xyz.com/kpop (this is where the your commercial will direct
listeners to). On this page, put the link that CD Baby gives you, which will then
send listeners to your place on CD Baby for purchase, where it will pay $1 per
CD purchased, to KPOP. Confused?... see this diagram:
www.radio-media.com/CDbabyRadioDiagram.jpg
However, this $1 is just the standard amount that CD Baby pays out (you can't change this amount). It is not enough to make a PI radio deal work. I'd recommend paying at least another $4 per CD from your own funds. Even if you make zero profit from the sales, you'll benefit greatly from the gigs and merch that you can sell in the cities where you are spinning.
You
will also want to get an 800 number so people can call from their cars. Get one
from your phone company (about $5/month,) and "piggyback" the number
onto your regular phone number and answering machine. The message should tell
callers to leave their email address, and the station they heard you on, so you
can email them a link to buy the CD (and of course, the link will be specific
to their station, so that station will get credit for the sale.)
Tuesday,
February 22, 2005
Democratizing Radio
By Tom Hespos
Blearily drinking my morning coffee on Saturday, my eyes opened wide upon seeing
a front-page story in The New York Times about podcasting. The story immediately
brought to mind certain predictions I had made for 2005 and beyond, and made me
wonder just how far away the democratization of radio might be.
Think of podcasting as audio blogging - the ability for an independent publisher to release audio content to the masses and make it available for download and playback on a portable device. The article in the Times claims over 3,000 podcasts have sprung up, but there may be many more. Podcasting is something well known to the blogging community and early adopters, but it is just starting to be introduced to the mainstream.
According to the Times article, Heineken has been sponsoring music podcasts, and certain radio stations, especially ones like Air America that integrate blogging into their regular routine of disseminating information, have been releasing podcasts of their radio programs regularly.
Indeed, with the popularity of portable music devices like the iPod, podcasting has great potential to be an alternative delivery mechanism for all sorts of terrific content. I haven't written about it until now, however, because I think the delivery mechanism will benefit from advances in technology and may not look anything like it does today within a year or two.
The iPod is a popular consumer product, as are download-centric audio devices in general, but what I'm really waiting for is bandwidth to open up such that consumers will be able to receive independently produced audio content over the airwaves, rather than via download. After all, we're an instant gratification society.
The Times article mentions that popular podcasts are downloaded thousands of times. But in the current media landscape, are downloads numbering in the thousands anything to get terribly excited about? Not likely. (Tens or hundreds of thousands? Now we're talkin'...)
In my 2005 predictions column, I predicted the eventual opening up of satellite bandwidth, such that independent content providers would be able to buy time for their own broadcasts. I can't help but think this is just around the corner - satellite companies currently sell bandwidth to content providers who cybercast live events and other bandwidth-intensive applications. This begs the question: What happens when portable audio devices and satellite converge? I think this is when podcasting will get much bigger and the playing field for audio could be leveled in much the same way as the Web leveled the playing field for the written word.
Picture, if you will, an explosion of niche content delivered via audio to your portable device, such that you're listening to an interest-based "narrowcast" on the train on your way to work. Your portable device has a time-shifting function much like TiVo, such that it recorded a program about rare stamp collecting while you slept and saved it for playback during your train ride.
The stamp collecting show is produced by two avid collectors podcasting from their home in rural New Jersey, and it reaches 5,000 collectors and enthusiasts with its initial broadcast via rented satellite bandwidth, with another 125,000 downloading the program on a weekly basis for later listening. The show is sponsored by the top stamp appraisal company in the United States.
Wouldn't this be terrific? Audio listeners could align themselves with content providers by interest and lifestyle, as they've done on the Web. This would deliver an opportunity to businesses to produce spots that aren't broadcast to wide swaths of people all over a terrestrial radio market, but to people with a particular niche interest all over the country or the world. Sound familiar? It should. It's what the Web has been doing to mass media for more than 10 years.
I might have a case of pie-in-the-sky-itis, but maybe this eventually loosens the grip on radio that certain large conglomerates have had for several years. And maybe it cures the injustice of, say, the "one size fits all" classic rock station in your market that plays Led Zeppelin to death until you want to heave your copy of "Houses of the Holy" into the trash. Personally, I'm excited and I'm watching this very carefully.
In last week's spin, Tom Hespos referred to the Claria Corp. It should have been noted that Claria is a client at his company. MediaPost regrets the error.
To
respond
Ted
Turner, Hitler, Fox News, and Bison
A media critique by Wayne Friedman, Wednesday,
January 26, 2005
TED TURNER CAME BACK TO beef up a dull National Association of Television Program
Executives (NATPE) meeting with talk of Hitler, Fox News, soft news, and lean
hamburgers -- all to the trade press' delight.
Turner did his usual attacks -- comparing Fox News to Adolph Hitler's propaganda machine of the 1930s, as well as throwing a few barbs at his former company, Time Warner.
The wide-ranging interview, at the NATPE meeting in Las Vegas yesterday, covered Turner's philanthropic activities, environmental issues, a growing liking of Bill Clinton, as well as his involvement in a chain of restaurants serving bison burgers.
Ah, the mouth from the South.
Good for cable. Good for a rising, but still struggling television programming conference. The irony is that it took a legend cable executive to put some snap into a convention that had its roots in syndication -- a long-time competitor of cable.
This showed how far things had come. Turner alluded to this in his rant against media consolidation -- and then, maybe for it. Turner humbly spoke from both sides of his mouth, not only as an ousted executive of Time Warner, but also as a current member of the board of Time Warner.
"Just about everything resides in the ownership of five [media] companies," he said.
TV news has been getting soft -- as in Hollywood soft, he said. It should become harder. But he warned that the FCC and the federal government are making it difficult for news organizations to do edgy journalism.
It's hard to know what the press thinks of Turner anymore. Obviously he makes for good quote material, but it comes from a man without a portfolio. He's outrageous one minute and provocatively interesting the next.
When asked by some young professionals what kind of business he would start if he started over today, he said he would open a bison burger restaurant. This was no doubt a bulky, hard-to-digest metaphor for the next several years in television.
Few big TV programming operations really take chances on truly original programming ideas, new racy cable channels or experimental media technologies. Corporate bottom lines don't really allow it.
There's
a lot of beef and protein on the air these days -- but not much fat, or much fun.
Indecency
Undressed
A
media critique by Wayne Friedman, Wednesday, December 15, 2004
THE REAL INDECENCY FINES ARE ready to be imposed. But they aren't the puny million
variety that Viacom, for example, is fighting over.
No, the real penalties are the $2.5 billion kind that a federal prosecutor wants from John and Timothy Rigas, the former senior executives at Adelphia Communications. The Rigas' were convicted of fraud in looting the company of $2.5 billion.
While not technically a fine -- and while it has nothing to do with indecent TV program content -- it's the government's big way of branding a hot iron on some indecent TV business activities.
The Rigas' essentially used their company's coffers as their own personal bank, blatantly disregarding Adelphia's status as a public company that must adhere to strict Securities and Exchange Commission guidelines.
Can the government really get back the money? Maybe.
Prosecutors can enforce a "forfeiture judgment" on the pair which could allow the government to seize their stock in various cable systems around the country that are managed by Adelphia.
This is not a paltry little fine the FCC gives to TV networks or stations when it comes to questionable TV content. The government should be applauded for their good work on penalizing the Rigas' - and should do more of it.
The bigger issue is the dollars themselves - especially news stories of big money and people. Forget about Janet Jackson's breast. As indecent TV content goes, what can you tell your children and teenagers when they hear press reports of multi-million dollar salaries of professional athletes or major film actors?
How indecent is it when sports athletes don't play very well or when big-time actors can't offer good entertainment? What does that tell young people? That big money is not indecent - just possible? Perhaps that $140 million Walt Disney paid to Michael Ovitz as a severance might also be in this category.
If sex and violence are words that will be thrown around with the word indecency in years to come, we'll need to add one more subject: money.
Wayne
Friedman is a veteran media and advertising writer based in Los Angeles and a
regular contributor to TelevisionWeek.
TV
Watch for Wednesday, December 15, 2004: http://www.mediapost.com/dtls_dsp_TVwatch.cfm?fnl=041215
The
Mythical Spirit of Innovation by Nate Elliott, JupiterResearch, Monday, November
22, 2004
DOES OUR INDUSTRY OWE SOMETHING to rich media vendors? Pete Lerma
posed that question last week, and while he didn't offer a final answer, I think
he made his position pretty clear.
Pete said that rich media companies have "inspired us with innovation." Their work built this industry, he said, and if we don't reward rich media vendors with our business, they might never have a chance to develop "the next great, attention-getting platform."
I couldn't disagree more. While they're good at what they do, rich media firms like Eyeblaster and Pointroll have never been strong innovators. They're all second- or third-generation vendors. Most of them have never broken any meaningful new ground; they've simply copied the groundbreaking work of others.
Despite years of implied and explicit claims, neither Eyeblaster nor United Virtualities invented floating ads. The industry's first floating ads, back in 1998, used a free, open-source scripting language called DHTML. By the time Eyeblaster and United Virtualities came to market in 2000 and 2001, respectively, dozens of agencies and sites had successfully run DHTML floating ads.
All Eyeblaster and United Virtualities did was take those DHTML ads and build them in a more complex language called Java. The end result was floating ads that were more complicated and more expensive, and could be seen by fewer consumers. Innovation, indeed.
Pointroll can also thank others for inventing their business. A company called Narrative Communications pioneered interactive banners in 1996. Within a couple years, Narrative - by then known as Enliven - figured out how to make those banners expand, as did a new competitor called Bluestreak. While those companies were building banners in Java, MSN had developed their own expandable banner using DHTML.
When Pointroll was founded in 2000, our industry had already generated hundreds - perhaps thousands - of expandable banners. Pointroll's format may have been the best, but it wasn't significantly different from the other technologies, which had been around for years.
The only surviving rich media company that has developed something truly innovative is Unicast. Although interstitials - ads that play between Web pages - were nothing new when Unicast came to market in 1999, pre-cached interstitials were. By downloading the ad before displaying it, Unicast allowed advertisers to use much larger file sizes than they ever could before.
While there's no shame in taking another's idea and executing it well, it hardly makes the rich media vendors strong candidates to lead future innovation. And the recent history of these companies only proves the point.
Sure, each company has developed interesting bells and whistles for their products. Eyeblaster found a way to deliver different versions of their ads to users who'd already seen the creative. Pointroll started letting consumers e-mail themselves from banners. Unicast finally got their file sizes large enough to let advertisers use video.
But for the past several years, none of the big three rich media vendors has introduced a truly new product. All they've done is copy each other. Eyeblaster has copied Pointroll and Unicast ads, Unicast has copied Eyeblaster and Pointroll ads, and Pointroll has copied Eyeblaster ads. They're all just stealing from each other over and over, rather than developing anything.
This is not innovation. And this is certainly not a reason to give the vendors our business. The leading rich media vendors have never truly innovated, and it appears they never will. Pete, our industry doesn't owe these vendors anything.
Instead
of choosing rich media vendors based on loyalty, or guilt, I think we should choose
the vendors that offer the best products. And if we do, we'll probably end up
right back where we started: with Eyeblaster, and Pointroll, and Unicast. They're
not innovative, and they all still have problems to fix. But despite these shortcomings,
and despite best efforts of competitors large and small, these three vendors offer
the best rich media products on the market today. And that, not some mythical
spirit of innovation, is why advertisers and agencies prefer them.
I Stream, You Stream by Nate Elliott, JupiterResearch, Monday, October 25, 2004
AFTER YEARS OF FITS AND starts, online video advertising has grown tremendously in the past twelve months. Advertiser demand is up, inventory is on the rise, and the market is set to explode.
It all began last October, when Starcom MediaVest Group (SMVG) declared that video was a "multiplatform medium," and started actively pursuing online video buys to complement their television buys. SMVG launched a "broadband embrace," which amounted to an upfront buy of online video totaling nearly $10 million.
By focusing on in-stream ads - where an online video ad is shown to a user directly before a piece of online video content, mimicking the television ad model - SMVG showed a great understanding of the market, and helped advance the cause of online video.
That decision finally, mercifully, took the focus away from video banners, which are too invasive to be effective, and put it on in-stream ads, a format both consumers and advertisers understand and accept. SMVG had started a trend, and in the months that followed both they and other agencies bought additional in-stream inventory.
Publishers responded to this increased demand for in-stream video ads, and are now offering more video content than ever before. In coordination with the SMVG upfront buy, Microsoft introduced MSN Video, and was almost immediately serving tens of millions of video streams each month.
Yahoo! Launch and ESPN Motion, two of the early leaders in the space, have steadily added content and ad inventory this year. AOL, Feedroom, and others quietly stream tens of millions of clips each month as well.
In addition to rolling out new video content, publishers are also increasing the inventory available within that content. In the past, sites artificially limited in-stream ad inventory, trying to introduce the format slowly without annoying users.
Often, publishers integrated so little advertising that many consumers had an ad-free experience. Emboldened by the new dollars flowing into the space and the lack of consumer pushback, sites are steadily increasing the ad-to-content ratio.
The increased advertiser demand, the rapid addition of new content and the relaxation of artificial inventory controls will fuel remarkable growth for online video advertising. At JupiterResearch, we're predicting streaming media advertising will generate $121 million in the United States in 2004, up 57 percent over 2003. In 2009, we're forecasting that the market will reach $657 million.
With in-stream video finally hitting its stride, sites that offer the format and agencies that understand how to use it will have a decided advantage in the coming months and years. Over the next several weeks, I'll be examining several of the players in online video advertising. Stay tuned for a look at the leaders.
--Nate
Elliott covers online advertising for JupiterResearch. Described as a "luminary
of rich media," Nate founded the IAB rich media task force and set the first
industry standards for designing rich media creative and for tracking Flash ads.
He keeps a weblog at www.medianate.com.
Rich
Media Insider for Monday, October 25, 2004: http://www.mediapost.com/dtls_dsp_RichMediaInsider.cfm?fnl=041025
Monday, October 18, 2004- source MediaPost Communications, 16 W. 19th St., New York, NY 10011
Young Males Lead The Way Towards a Cell-Only Population
According
to a new analysis from Mediamark Research Inc., 8.1% of U.S. households do not
have landline telephones, up from 4.2% in the spring of 2000. Non-landline consumers
are those who have chosen to rely solely on cell phones or no phone at all.
Andy
Arthur, VP of Client Services at MRI, said "After years of coexistence between
cells and landlines, cell phones have recently begun to contribute to the desertion
of landline service. While non-landline households traditionally have been characterized
by downscale and less-educated consumers, this is clearly no longer the case."
The median household income for the non-landline population rose from 63% below that of the general population to 49% below. And the college graduation rate for non-landline consumers has more than quadrupled, to 11.8%. And, the non-landline consumers of 2004 are increasingly younger.
Of the 8.1% of U.S. households that do not have landlines, more than 3 in 10 (31%) are truly "phoneless," having neither a cell nor a landline, down from 70% in spring 2001. Since cell-only households have significantly higher incomes than phoneless households (median HHI $32,948 v. $16,058), and since cell-only consumers are younger (median age 28.8 v. 38.7), the growth of the cell-only segment explains the recent tilts in the profile of the non-landline population.
The research shows that while males represent 48.0% of the total adult population, they account for 57.6% of the cell-only population. "If the traditional patterns hold, these young males may be the leading edge of a larger, more mainstream group of cell-only consumers," said Arthur.
A full 7.9% of single-person households are now cell-only, compared to 5.5% of households in general. That means that 16.7% of single-person households in which a cell phone exists are now cell-only. And, according to the 2004 study, the number of cell phones is equal to or greater than the number of household members in at least 26.3% of U.S. households.
You
can find out more here
Wednesday, October 13, 2004,
news
contributed by MediaPost Communications, 16 W. 19th St., New York, NY 10011
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Fraud Threatens Web
Wired, October 13, 2004
The Federal Trade Commission
believes that no place is more fraud-friendly than the web. The agency estimates
that more than one in 10 Americans (perhaps as many as 30 million people in this
country) have fallen victim to fraud. Last year, internet-related fraud complaints
surpassed all others, comprising 55 percent of all digital malfeasance, and for
the first time the net supplanted the telephone as the most popular initial point
of contact for dupers to meet dupees. -
WanderPod
Brings Wi-Fi Anywhere
Wired, October 13, 2004
Dennis Stacey had one
of the best seats at the Ansari X Prize launches, right alongside the taxiway
where Burt Rutan's SpaceShipOne rolled out to make history earlier this month.
But the Montreal entrepreneur was at California's Mojave Airport not to catch
a space launch, but to prove that he can bring internet access to people wherever
they happen to be. Stacey, 30, is CEO of WanderPort Wireless, a 2-year-old firm
that's established itself as a provider of Wi-Fi hot spots in business, boutique
and luxury hotels in Canada and the United States. Now Stacey and his 15-person
firm want to take wireless connectivity where it's never gone before.
Investors
Flock to Web Networking Sites
AP, October 13, 2004
Internet whiz kids
Marc Andreessen, Josh Kopelman and Joe Kraus share something in common besides
reaping huge jackpots during the dot-com boom. All three belong to LinkedIn, a
rapidly growing online networking service whose ability to connect people with
common friends and work interests helped persuade the trio to invest in the company
before it even started to generate revenue.
Crackdown
on Internet Journalists
Reuters, October 13, 2004
Iranian authorities
have arrested at least six Internet journalists and webloggers in recent days,
colleagues and relatives said on Wednesday, in a further blow to limited press
freedoms in the Islamic state.
Google
Debuts Froogle UK Product Search
DMNews.com, October 13, 2004
Search
engine firm Google Inc. yesterday announced the launch of Froogle UK, its online
comparison-shopping service for Britain and its first expansion outside the United
States.
In Other Media:
The
Man Who Can Save Advertising
Business 2.0, October 13, 2004
With technology
that targets TV ads by neighborhood and even household, Seth Haberman is rescuing
the 30-second spot from certain oblivion.
169
Fox Stations Fined in Indecency Case
New York Times, October 13, 2004
The Federal Communications Commission said on Tuesday that it would fine 169
Fox television stations $7,000 each, or a total of $1.18 million, for violating
indecency rules when it showed a particularly graphic episode of the show "Married
by America'' last spring.
Commercial
war centers on 10 states
USA Today, October 12, 2004
The race for the
White House has come down to what happens in 10 states, according to a new report
that analyzes where the campaigns are running the most TV commercials.
Not
Playing on MTV: Political Ads
Washingtonpost.com, October 13, 2004
Young
people tend to watch a lot of MTV. Political activists tend to spend a lot of
time trying to connect with young people. It would seem only natural that buying
ads on MTV and its sister channels would be a great way to reach young people
with a political message.
New
Report Confirms Online Sites Are Cutting Into Papers' Classified Ads
Editor
and Publisher, October 12, 2004
Craigslist and eBay are now cutting into newspaper
classified advertising, according to a new report released today by Classified
Intelligence, which surveyed 36 newspapers throughout the United States.
Around The Net for Wednesday, October 13, 2004: http://www.mediapost.com/dtls_dsp_atn.cfm?fnl=041013
Computer listening behaviors are all on the rise compared to last year
According to the latest MusicLab report from The NPD Group, even though radio, audio devices and music videos on television dominate overall music listening behavior, the computer is an increasingly significant medium for music listening. Computer listening behaviors are all on the rise compared to last year, with listening to music on a portable music player, streaming music online and listening to music on a computer showing the most notable increases.
Radio remains the most popular way to listen to music; however, radio listening actually declined four percent since last year (194 million people aged 13 and over listened to music on the radio in March 2005, versus 203 million who listened in March 2004). By contrast, listening to music stored on a computer rose by 22 percent (63.2 million to 77.2 million), online radio listening increased 18 percent (45.3 million to 53.5 million) and free streaming of online music increased 37 percent (33.7 million to 46.1 million).
“ The rise of digital listening and storage for music continues unabated this year,” said Russ Crupnick, president of the NPD Group's Music & Movies division. “Technology companies are providing new tools to consumers in the form of powerful music-enabled PCs and portable music players, music companies are answering the call for more content and consumers are responding positively.”
NPD noted a marked increase in consumers ripping music onto their computers: this activity more than doubled (102 percent) since March 2004. The transfer of music to MP3 players also more than doubled (127 percent) since last year, while paying to download music files increased 93 percent. Consumer visits to music Web sites increased seven percent this year over last.
“ Music listeners today are faced with a dizzying array of methods for obtaining and listening to music,” said Russ Crupnick, president of the NPD Group's Music & Movies division. “Far from inciting confusion, these new technology-driven avenues may be helping consumers sample and enjoy music across a wider variety of music genres. ”
Sources: NPD's MusicLab Surveys are conducted bi-monthly among a group of approximately 5,000 consumers aged 13 years and older; results are calibrated and balanced to represent the U.S. population. The most recent survey was fielded in March 2005. NPD MusicWatch Digital information is collected continuously from the PCs of 40,000 online panelists balanced to represent the online population of PC users.
Give Consumers a Choice
by Roy Shkedi
COOKIES, AND BY DEFAULT THE online advertising industry, have taken their share of punches lately. Industry trade publications and mainstream media outlets have written endlessly about reports that show large numbers of consumers are routinely deleting cookies from their computers. Then Walt Mossberg, one of the most well respected technology reporters in the country, weighed in via his Wall Street Journal column and registered his strong dislike for what he calls "tracking" cookies.
As Dave Morgan pointed out in his MediaPost column, our industry has to work on educating consumers about the need for and benefits derived from cookies. Consumers need to understand that an Internet without a cookie-enabled targeted advertising model will inevitably lead to more and more content accessible only by subscription or micro-payments.
I would, contend, however, that changing and altering consumer knowledge is an expensive and lengthy proposition. We could spend inordinate amounts of time, energy, and money, and barely move the needle on consumer perception of cookies. Lowest-common-denominator reporting in national broadcast media only makes this challenge more imposing. Cookies are inaccurately lumped into much larger articles that I would describe as sensationalized, Internet scare stories: "Beware of cookies. Marketers are watching you," etc.
As an industry, we need to provide consumers with an informed choice -- to opt-out of cookies. I would further argue that this choice shouldn't be buried deep within an ad network's site or privacy policy, but should be offered to consumers within every single ad that we serve them. Anti-spyware companies, which have a huge impact on the cookie deletion rate, also need to give consumers an informed choice. Currently some of those software programs label most third-party cookies as potential threats. Anti-spyware companies don't offer consumers the information that they need to make an informed choice about deleting cookies. Following the labeling of third-party cookies as threats, most consumers delete them without knowing how this practice affects their online experience.
Why won't anti-spyware companies give consumers more information so they can make an educated choice about which cookies to delete? The reason for this is clear: it's currently in the economic interest of anti-spyware companies to demonize cookies as harmful. With many spyware and adware companies changing their policies and business models in the face of pending legislation, the rationale for anti-spyware software has begun to fade. The response of anti-spyware companies has been to attempt to prove the usefulness of their software by labeling and defining cookies as harmful threats.
If the online ad industry were to adopt a strong opt-out policy and give consumers a choice regarding third-party cookies, it would create a stronger argument for anti-spyware companies to stop labeling third-party cookies as threats. If we, as an industry, give consumers a choice at every opportunity to opt-out from third-party cookies, the vendors of anti-spyware software will no longer have a legitimate or logical argument for labeling these cookies as threats.
When anti-spyware companies refuse to provide consumers with specific information about cookies, they do consumers a disservice by erasing cookies that are used to identify consumers who have opted out. Imagine the following scenario after we enable cookie opt-out directly from our banners: Angry consumers will contact ad networks or other companies that employ behavioral targeting technology to find out why they are still receiving targeted ads after opting-out. When that happens, we'll explain to consumers that their anti-spy software deleted the opt-out cookie without informing them which cookies correlate with each ad. Consumers will quickly learn that it's better not to erase cookies using their anti-spyware software or browsers, but instead to opt-out only from the ads they find offensive by using the opt-out links within the ads while leaving the other cookies untouched.
As an industry we claim that we provide consumers with a service. If we really believe in the service that we're providing, we should also allow consumers who don't like our service to opt-out.
--Roy Shkedi is the founder and chief executive officer of AlmondNet, a New York-based media and advertising technology company.
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