PVRs Turn Marketing Challenges into PR Opportunity
Last month I attended a talk with some of the top advertising gurus in Canada. Sponsored by the BC chapter of the American Marketing Association, the talk focused on trends, challenges and opportunities in advertising this year. Managing directors from Rethink, DDB and TBWA spoke in depth about the intense transformations their industries are undergoing. One surfacing theme was the impact of devices like PVRs on traditional advertising models.
In the old days, marketers engaged in an unofficial contract with TV viewers. In exchange for financing TV production with their ad dollars, advertisers expected viewers to watch their 8 minutes of direct advertising per 30-minute TV show. During that “commercial break” the viewer was at the advertiser’s mercy, bombarded with brand messages designed to encourage the viewer to purchase the product or service. Some ads were better than others. The model worked for around 50 years and generated billions in revenue for TV stations and content producers worldwide. Recently, the wheels have started to come off the bus.
With the advent of the PVR, millions of North Americans are now able to bypass their obligations to advertisers, zipping past ads with the press of a button. It’s a trend that won’t be going away anytime soon. In a recent report released by analysts at In-Stat it is expected annual PVR product unit shipments will surpass 50 million by the year 2014. Meanwhile, high definition PVRs will increase 61% through 2014, and the continued migration towards HD will increase at a more rapid pace. The impact on TV advertising is already starting to show.
Add to the industry turmoil: general audience fragmentation, the rise of satellite channels and video on demand, and the growing focus among many younger generations to get their content on the internet.
Fortunately for PR professionals, advertising’s crisis is our opportunity. Since content is still king, influencing that content through the development of your stories in local programming is a significant opportunity in an era when other marketing tactics are falling flat. An added benefit is the valuable third-party endorsement journalists bring to a particular story (and through it, a brand). While advertising is often easy to dismiss, it’s far harder to reject your company or organization’s message when your service is featured as a growing trend or your spokesperson candidly discusses your issue with a respected journalist.
As a result, media relations is increasingly being perceived as a preferred tactic for marketers looking to get more bang for their buck. After all, why pay for an ad when you can invest the same money to have your message, story, product, spokesperson or service showcased on TV’s actual programming. Public relations is effectively PVR-proof.
