Last week I was interviewed by Louise Story, a reporter for The New York Times, about the impact of TV ads seen while fast-forwarding using a DVR. (Click here for the article.)

In the U.S., networks and media agencies have taken up opposing positions on the value of a fast-forwarded exposure. The networks want to get paid for spots viewed under fast-forward conditions, while the agencies see an excuse not to pay. As always, positions taken for the sake of negotiations don’t always take the facts into account.

Over the last couple of years, Millward Brown has conducted a wide range of research into the impact of DVR use in the U.S., U.K., and South Africa. The latest U.S. work (see my post on the subject) confirmed that people who watched TV commercials during time-shifted playback had the same ad awareness as people who viewed the same ads under “normal”  viewing conditions, in spite of the fact that many DVR owners claimed not to pay attention to the ads and to have fast-forwarded through them. Work conducted in South Africa by my good colleague Erik Du Plessis, which will be published in an upcoming edition of Admap, also demonstrates that people watching ads in fast-forward mode report a similar degree of liking for the ads compared to the results from on-air ad tracking.

I referenced our research during the course of the interview with Louise and she quoted me as follows:

Fast-forwarding should not scare advertisers, because consumers are engaged to some degree just by the act of pushing the button, said Nigel Hollis, chief global analyst for Millward Brown.

“We probably pay more attention to doing that than we do when watching a regular TV program,” Mr. Hollis said. “You’re sitting there saying, ‘When is the program coming back on?’  You are actually attending to it.”

Of course, some people don’t need research to give an opinion. Here is what Zane Safrit had to say about that quote:

So, you’re saying that fast-forwarding through an ad reflects a more engaged viewer than one that watches the full content of a show at its normal pace….huh. That’s like saying if a partner hangs up on me they’re more engaged than if they remained on the line listening. Just by the act of hanging up, they are engaged to some degree….that’s so pathetic.

Well, Zane. pathetic as it may seem to you, for a few seconds, the person who hung up on you was more actively engaged with what they were doing than they would have been if they’d been listening to you and twiddling their thumbs or reading their e-mail. And for a few seconds, the person fast-forwarding through the ads is actively attending to what is being shown on the screen. Asked to comment on the matter, Erik DuPlessis responded in typical laconic style, “People never fast-forward when they are asleep in front of the TV.”

Much of the research conducted on DVRs suggests that if, when focused on the task of fast-forwarding, people happen to see an ad which they have previously watched at normal speed, the ad will trigger the same emotional response.

Please note—this only happens when people have seen the ad before, not when they are viewing it for the first time. The human brain is always “on” and the immediate emotional response to any stimulus is faster than conscious thought can keep up. So when we see images which we recognize, they trigger the same “remembered” emotional response even though we may not be able to consciously appreciate what is being shown and said at the time. After the event, if we choose to reflect on what we have seen, we might remember more details about the ad, e.g., “Oh yes, that was the caveman ad for Geico.” If the ad has never been seen before, it will not evoke the same coherent response, but individual scenes will still trigger something.

Further evidence that people are paying attention comes from research conducted in the U.K., in which DVR owners were over 80 percent more likely than VCR owners to say they stop and look at ads when fast-forwarding. To do so, they obviously have to recognize ads they want to see again.

Now, presumably Zane was just voicing his opinion without any real facts to go on. That would not be the case for Jason Maltby, president and co-executive director for national broadcast at MindShare North America who was quoted in the same New York Times article as saying:

 “You’ve created a message that in theory requires 15 seconds or 30 seconds to get that selling message across. On a high-speed DVR, 30 seconds gets pushed down to 1.5 seconds with no audio. It just wouldn’t work.”

Both Jason Maltby and Steve Sternberg, executive vice president of audience analysis for Magna Global, voiced their concern over the validity and projectability of physiological measures of ad response. Steve stated, “I can’t imagine the logistics of actually buying and selling commercial time based on physiological responses,” while Jason put it somewhat more pithily, “I would say I’m not ready to jump on cost per perspiration.”

I am sure that the logistics of using biometric data to buy and sell ad space will win out. We are not going to see Nielsen panel participants wired up to watch TV. But that does not mean that fleeting fast-forwarded exposures have no effect. Particularly for advertisers who are trying to establish an emotional connection with viewers, repeated exposure to fast-forwarded ads will help to reinforce positive feelings about the brand, provided, of course, that people remember which brand was being advertised, and that the ad actually has the desired effect.

NBC’s biometric test does not prove that ads viewed in fast-forward mode are effective; all it proves is that they can evoke an emotional response. It does, however, bolster NBC’s case that such exposures are doing something. As Zane suggests in his post, the acid test is whether fast-forwarded ads generate a sales response.

What do you think? Will advertisers decide that a fast-forwarded exposure is worth something or stick to their guns? Let us know.

Tags: Millward Brown, Nigel Hollis, DVR, fast-forward, fast-forwarded exposure, Erik Du Plessis, Louise Story, attention, engagementt

This entry was posted on Monday, July 9th, 2007 at 2:06 pm and is filed under Media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site. Print this Page