James Murdoch lifted the lid yesterday on the next phase of their assault on the front room - Smart TV - coming sometime in 2007.
The Smart TV concept turns the Sky Plus box into a local ad server, using part of the hard drive to store advertiser content, that then fills the programmed ad slots. They already know your name and address, and with behavioural targeting they can work out what you are in the market for.
“A customer is sitting at home watching Lost on Sky TV. We know they have a baby because they’ve been tuning into lots of kids programs. We think they might need a new car. Using Smart TV, our clients like Toyota can insert an advert directly into the viewing. They don’t know the advert is customised for them. They don’t need to know. The ad is perfectly suited to a family’s need - a deal that suits their particular life stage. And, as always, the most relevant advertising is the least resented.”
In addition to your TV viewing habits, if you’ve taken Sky Broadband too then there’s another pile of data that can be interpreted to further refine your personal media schedule (suddenly lots of blokes start to get a bit uneasy knowing their browsing history might one day be informing tonights ad selection midway through Corrie).
No doubt the privacy lobbyists will be up in arms over how much data Sky is hoarding, but this observational approach to media planning has proven itself online to increase the acceptance (and hence effectiveness) of ads. Just like online though, the concept of niche-vertising relies on a larger and larger pool of ads to satisfy all of those scenarios the data mining identifies. Without that large pool pretty quickly you’re back to filling the slots with the closest match, which is oftern barely better than the status quo. Will there be enough money to develop ads for all those slots? Somehow I doubt it.
What’s not clear yet is whether they’ll afford advertisers longer slots. Could Sony “buy” the entire ad break at peak times or around cultural events to run their latest 5 minute mini-epic. Or could it go the other way, and we’ll see slots rammed full of 15 second blipverts?
It’s hard to predict who will be the winners and losers here - other than Sky right now. Agencies should be all over this like a rash. At last there’s a digital concept that’s easy to understand, package and sell to their clients. It’s called TV.
Media planners will be rubbing their hands at the über-planning fees and consultancy they can charge for identifying all those scenarios and niches. The channels, especially the smaller ones, should see the value of their slots increase. But what’s going to happen to all those in-house ad sales teams?
And, theoretically the viewer should get a better, more relevent, service. Been browsing for holidays online the past week, perhaps you’re in the market for a cruise?
It’ll be interesting to see how this unfolds.
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