Live Commercials Will Save TV?

Vitaly Friedman writes "Entrepreneur Mark Cuban doesn't believe that traditional television advertising is dead, it simply needs to be more interesting. And what's more interesting than being live? From the article: 'It's no secret that the traditional 30-second spot has been losing much of its luster with advertisers. With the rise of other media options (videogames, home theater systems, Web surfing) on the one hand and the recent growth of DVRs like TiVo on the other, traditional television advertising has been feeling the squeeze. Broadcasting executives are struggling to figure out the economics of the new digital landscape, and have been willing to try just about any creative idea, such as TiVo's plan to replace old commercials with new ones when watching recorded shows.'"

Sounds expensive...

[brian0918]

Unless these commercials consist of little more than someone scrolling through a powerpoint, how could this not get expensive fast? Most commercials are recycled for months or years, not minutes...

What about no commercials?

[puregen1us]

How about no commercials would save TV? It's the commercials that people hate, so remove them.

TV needs people to watch it, and more and more people don't want to because of the ads.

If 24 is actually 18 hours long, that says something awful about how much advertising is on tv.

Ok, no ads, means no money for tv, so:

Why not reduce ads to a level at which they stop being so intrusive? Have a couple at fewer times and charge more. Make better TV to get more viewers and spots can become more expensive. Revenue could stay the same, and TV would actually improve.

Product Placement

[spun]

Really, while the idea of live and/or more interesting commercials does have some appeal, in the end I think advertisers will simply resort to more and more product placement. Which could lead to some interesting convolutions of plotlines for shows that don't take place in modern society. I can see sci fi shows placing products with the rationalization that they are so damn good that the companies that make them today are still around in the future. But what about historical shows?

I predict more time travel and dream sequences.

This industry is dying, and thank God!

[Ponga]

If you want a road map of whats going to happen to TV, take a look at radio.
Sirius and XM are becoming more popular and from what I've seen, public radio is gaining an audience. People are abandoning commercial radio because now there are alternatives! The same will happen to TV, take note!

-Ponga

Immune to advertising

[BumpyCarrot]

Personally, I'm of the opinion that the problem isn't the medium or the execution, but more that society (or at least, a subset of it) has become entirely numb to advertisements.

Don't get me wrong, I laugh at adverts if they're legitimately funny, but that doesn't mean I'm going to buy the product.

We've been bombarded by them so much that we simply don't take in the relevance of the product. My own mother, who is perhaps the biggest couch potato I know, has been using the ad breaks to make a cup of tea for as long as I can remember.

Additionally, I know myself that much of my product awareness is broadcast from leading individuals in communities that I feel I can trust not to BS me, something not possible until the advent of the internet, and in particular the blogosphere.

Silly networks...the answer is "Charge us".

[popo]

Every time I read an article on this subject, someone is hypothesizing that in the next release TiVo may kill the ability to skip commercials altogether. I can't think of anything to be less afraid of. If TiVo did that, TiVo would vanish overnight and we'd all be watching Myth TV or any number of other PC based solutions.

So what's the solution for the TV networks?

There's only one "killer" solution for the TV business, and its been around for a long time: Its called "Pay Channels". (Or paid digital downloads as the case may be). And its the future, whether you like it or not.

The advertising model as we know it will cease to exist.

Product placement is a fantasy. It will never carry the same level of messaging, or command the same revenues. The networks will try to push it, but the advertisers don't think they're getting their money's worth, and the viewers will just be increasingly disgusted.

The answer is "Pay for it" and its already here [apple.com]

That's because..

[Anonymous Coward]

..commercials these days suck.

I can recall only two commercials offhand. One for Geico - "Of course they want free pie and chips. It's chips, with pie, for free."

And another for.. Progressive, I think. "Is this what your insurance company thought when you told them you have a ninja?"

Obviously, the solution is simple. Commercials need:

a) More British accents
b) More ninjas
c) Possibly more pirates

"More Interesting"

[oGMo]

Japan has way more interesting commercials than us [itsartmag.com].

The problem is hollywood has no idea what "interesting" means.

I have a DVR and I watch commercials

[GWBasic]

I have a DVR and I watch commercials. Typically, when I'm skipping through them, if it looks interesting I'll watch a second or two.

The problem is that advertisers aren't being very scientific about this. When you read a newspaper, no one forces you to read the ads, yet they are very effective! No one has proven that skipping ads makes them less effective.

I think advertisers would be surprised if they tried to determine how much of their message "sticks" when viewers can skip through them. Specifically, when someone is skipping through an ad, that person is paying close attention. Likewise, even when people have the ability to skip an ad, they will still let them play while they walk to the kitchen for a [insert heavily advertised snack or beverage].

A company like Tivo might want to consider investing in experiments that demonstrate how a Tivo can make traditional television advertising more effective.