We're no stranger to
the old "PVRs are killing advertising" debate here at PVR Wire, but the more we read, the more convinced we
are that the advertising industry is slowly making its way to the edge of a very big cliff, with some serious decisions
to be made about where to go when confronted with the precipice. Verizon, Colgate, and Johnson & Johnson were among the companies surveyed in a recent poll conducted by Forrester Research and the Association of National Advertisers, about 70% of whom believe that PVRs and video-on-demand services will "reduce or destroy" the effectiveness of traditional TV ads.
Advertisers really are being forced to think of new and innovative ways to compel viewers to pay attention, and not just as a result of PVRs (please note: we don't count single-frame KFC ads with coupon numbers embedded in them as "innovative").
1. Advertisers need to stop focusing on DVRs and people fast forwarding through commercials and take a look at the real problem -- nobody really wants to watch TV commercials. If they just made commercials that people actually wanted to watch, DVRs and fast forwarding would be a non-issue.
I know when I'm watching a show on my DVR, I do fast forward through most of the commercials. But if I see a commercial I like (for example, those Jimmy Dean Sun Commercials) I will actually rewind back to watch the commercial.
It's just like the commercials during the Super Bowl -- make the commercials entertaining and people will make a point to watch them and the advertising will definitely be more effective than if they were forced to watch the commercial.
Posted at 6:16PM on Mar 27th 2006 by ReplayTVBlog