The TV Agency

So I've left ITV and finally joined the dark side. I've set up my own specialist TV agency, we all knew it was coming, well except for me it was always an idea but here we are, the restructure at ITV Regional Sales or as it's now known Business Development (Nations & Regions) was too good an opportunity for it not to happen.

So I've been thinking what should I write for my first blog as the newly formed TV Agency? Maybe some shameless promotion? ..... Maybe or I could just stick with writing about why TV is so great. So it's been a while since I wrote my last blog so maybe just a quick update on where things are.

2011 was a busy year in the world of TV. Lots of great programmes, Downton Abbey was one I had missed then caught up on both series just after Christmas on the DVD box set I had won at work. A bit gutted it wasn't an iPad but in hindsight glad I've now caught up and boy it was worth catching up. Definitely my favourite programme of 2011 and glad to see that although on the overnights Downton Abbey might have lost out on Christmas Day to the BBC but on the consolidated audience figures they actually hammered the BBC, a first for ITV.

Then there’s all the lovely new technology. Some very interesting things going on at SKY with their set top box, a partnership with Zeebox, so keep watching this space. I could keep going on either way it looks like TV is back on the up!

Anyway just a short one for now but check out my website www.thetvagency.com it's still in progress but you can now watch some lovely adverts.

TV, always the centre of attention

So I’ve just been reading another great article on the effectiveness of TV from the highly reputable Millward Brown, here’s the link, http://www.millwardbrown.com/Global/Blog/Post/2011-04-18/It-s-a-360-world-but-marketers-can-ill-afford-to-leave-TV-out-of-the-media-mix.aspx with a great response by Tess Alps.

 

I often have this debate with my clients that when measuring the effectiveness of TV you have to look at everything not each media individually. This is why you would never find TV being sold on a Per enquiry deal because it will always increase your responses across all the Media you use, even after the TV campaign has finished. I’ve looked after in the past some national DRTV advertisers spending in excess of 10 million a year, and they always looked at the whole picture and is the reason TV was always their lead medium.

 

In fact recently I was having a conversation with a DRTV advertiser and we were discussing his cost pre response for TV and how it was the highest of all his media but he also said that when he wasn’t on TV all his cost per response went up massively and so he couldn’t afford to drop it. I even had to stop myself from laughing when he still tried to tell me that his Google cost per response was so massively cheap compared to TV. Yet when I asked how he bought it nationally yet he only had responses from his TV regions, how he could contribute the cost of response to Google when it was quite clear that it was because viewers were responding to the TV ads, just not through his TV measurement of a free phone number.

 

It just goes to show, if you’re not looking at the whole picture you’ll miss the point. TV is still the most watched Medium and most engaging but that doesn’t mean viewers will respond in the traditional way of calling a free phone service, or may not even respond immediately, but when they do respond it will be because the viewer has remembers the TV advert or that they saw them on TV, and through that they have a higher opinion of that advertiser through brand fame and as TV is still seen as the most expensive medium even though the reality is quite different.

PVR’s or Personal Video Recorders the so called nemesis of the traditional TV spot or so we’re led to believe.

I’ve just been reading this great article on PVR’s and thought I would share it with you all.

 

http://www.tvgenius.net/blog/2011/04/08/dvrs-impacting-viewing-habits

 

I come across this a lot when chatting to advertisers for the first time about TV and it’s great to see that once again the death of TV has been exaggerated. I could put money on the fact that at some point in a meeting an advertiser would say to me, “But people don’t watch the ads anymore, they just fast forward them, that’s what I always do”, even though previously they’ll have just said to me, “I love the new Compare the market ad, makes me laugh every time” and then I have to remind them but didn’t you just say you saw the new compare the market ad? So you must watch some ads?

 

It’s quite common that people have an impression of themselves and how they interact with the people and world around them, that isn’t necessarily the reality. I remember when I was still in sixth form many years ago and fancied myself as a Physio and so had been given a work experience at the local hospital and it was there I first learnt this observation.

 

We had a patient who had fallen down some stairs, when we asked what had happened he explained how he had been minding his own business and lost his footing on the stairs and fell. The Physio made notes and put them down but I noticed at the time they used a section on their notes that referred that this was the patients account of what happened, when I asked why they differentiated that it was the patients version of events they told me that it was because it was often the case that people will tell you what they think happened but not what actually happened as in this case the patient whom we had done blood test etc on had actually been drunk at the time of his fall and so most likely had been the result of their injury.

 

It’s the same across anything in life often our impression of an event is not actually the reality, it’s not that we purposefully lie of exaggerate it’s just our memory is selective and so we don’t necessarily remember every thing that happens over the course of our day, otherwise our tiny little heads might explode.

 

And when it comes to advertising, thing’s are no different. TV advertising in my view is the most memorable form of advertising yet if you asked people if they watch the ads they would generally give you a variety of answers from Yes (my personal favourite) to No I fast forward them, yet if you asked the same people who said no what their favourite advert is that they saw recently they would easily in the same breath recall an advert.

 

It may be that sometimes they do fast forward the ads, that’s when they’re actually watching a recorded programme, because remember you can’t fast forward live viewing, at least not yet. But because they do it sometimes it creates a false impression to themselves that they always fast forward the ads when that not actually true.

 

It’s also worth noting that due to TV being measured by BARB they now account for PVR viewing. Meaning if you fast forward an ad break you’re not classed as a viewer, and advertisers only pay for those who view the ads. So recently I might have said to a local advertiser, “500,000 saw your first advert go out on Tyne Tees last night” That means 500, 000 adults watched the ad, anyone else who fast forwarded the break made a cuppa etc were not counted as a viewer. SIMPLES.

TV advertising production Costs? How long is a piece of string

One of the first considerations when thinking about advertising on TV can be production. It’s easy to start thinking that a commercial even a basic one might cost you 20k or more. And to be honest 20k can go very quickly if you gave that as a budget to a production company.

 

But that’s the key, when you start to think about advertising on TV the budget should be relative to your advertising spend the worst thing you can do is not give a budget as the production company will come back with options varying for all types of different budgets some of which may make you spill your morning coffee all over yourself.

 

I normally recommend roughly 20% although sometimes when you have a client spending only 4k on their advertising you may want to be a little lenient and maybe allow for a little more. Not that I’m saying you can’t get an advert made for £800, because you can, I’ve made some myself but you should also take in to account how much you plan to use that advert, if it’s going to be used once a year for maybe the next several years I would probably take that in to account. Or for example you’re testing TV for the first time but if successful you then plan to use the advert for the next six months. Again I would take this in to account and base the budget off the six month planned spend and maybe not the test campaign spend.

 

I sound like I’m trying to sell you production for an advert but I’m not, it’s just production is a major contributor to whether your TV campaign will be a hit and become talked about and famous or not. It’s also the one thing we don’t have control over when planning TV campaigns, the weight and time of the year and price etc could all be great but if the ad is lacking then you could be throwing your money away. The advice I always give my clients is to research it. Ask your customers what they want to see when you advertise. Are they interested in offers or quality, do they need to know your web address or your store address? Is this a good opportunity to rebrand? A mixture of TGI data with some bespoke research would be money well spent, the temptation is to not do any research because of the added cost but if you make that mistake it could cost you in the long run.

 

But back to the cost of an advert, it really is, how long is a piece of string? You can spend as little or as much as you like but really it’s common sense. A TV campaign regionally for 20k that is only going to run once should only have a budget of 4k. You’re probably thinking you’re not going to get a lot for that but you would be surprised. Obviously you should also have to be realistic you’re not going to be making the next Curry’s ad with R2-D2 and C-3PO but you can get an ad that works, looks good and would be something you can feel proud of. For 4k you could make a high end graphic ad, using 3D graphics perfect for maybe a one off sale to promote some specific products (using high end photographs) plus some nice 3D animation to make it come alive plus music and a Voice Over. Or you could do a live action advert with nice sweeping shots of your store, even some actors, although probably only a few not quite to the scale of the Talk Talk ads, again with some nice graphics promoting prices plus a Voice Over and music. It would be tight but it can be done and has been.

 

There are ways to bring down costs even further such as paying actors, Voice over’s and music in relation to the amount the commercial is on air but I would always recommend a full buyout so that you’re not hit with repeat fees because actually what often happens is the campaign is so successful you decide to run the campaign again or you would like to put it on your website etc, all of which would be subject to repeat fees.

 

So next time you’re thinking of making an ad, research content first, set a budget limit and then contact a reputable production company with TV advertising experience. I say with experience because anyone with a camera can say they’re a production company but it doesn’t mean they know how to make a TV ad. The easy way to tell is ask them if they’re Clearcast registered. If they don’t know what you’re talking about walk away……. very slowly.

 

Locally I regularly use Corona Films, 3 Point Media and Dene Films. All of which have a vast experience in making TV adverts. If you’re not sure which one to go with, speak to all three, a competitive pitch often brings out the best ideas for the best budget.

 

www.coronafilms.co.uk

www.denefilms.com   

www.3pointmedia.com

TV Advertising, the hardest step to take

Moving on to TV is often the hardest thing for an advertiser to do. It seems like your spending so much money (even though it's similar to the Radio campaign they would have normally booked and you haven't actually increased your budget size just moved it in to a better medium). They then worry but will people still remember me after my campaign has finished, (even though they'll reach probably five times the amount of people they've reached previously). Will my footfall go through the roof? (Even though they've spoken to other advertisers who it's worked for and they say yes).
As you've probably guessed the above are actual questions I've been dealing with recently for a new advertiser and sometimes no matter how much you hold someone’s hand and give them as much info as possible, sometimes you just have to take a leap of faith.
I say leap of faith but really when you're moving on to a medium where it has proven to be the highest ROI, on average £4.50 for every £1 spent, it's not really so much a leap but a trip in the right direction.
But for some reason TV seems to be the hardest medium for taking that step to try it out. Even with all the evidence to back it up. And you would think with all the positive news surrounding the resurrection of TV (It actually never died) it would be even easier to take that step, just check out this recent article by Arif Durrani. http://community.brandrepublic.com/blogs/takemetokansas/archive/2011/01/30/have-you-tuned-into-the-success-of-tv.aspx
But thankfully the industry body representing TV advertising recently released their answers to the 10 most asked questions and it proves to be a great read. So if you're having difficulties taking that first step read these answers and see if it settles your nerves.

Download now or preview on posterous

Thinkbox_MS_brochure_FINAL.pdf (2273 KB)

TV advertising, Online’s greatest friend!

I was just reading this great article courtesy of Matt (Light Reading) Riches called “your Web metrics are wrong” by The Ad Contrarian.

Link to article 

http://adcontrarian.blogspot.com/2011/01/your-web-metrics-are-wrong.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+blogspot%2FaDYs+%28The+Ad+Contrarian%29

 

And it’s something we have long know about in the TV world but it’s nice to hear about it from someone not in selling TV.

It’s very easy an advertiser to get caught up in the numbers. Numbers are important they control everything from currency to measurement; we pretty much rely on them for everything in our day to day lives. So it’s easy to get caught up in them when you’re looking at the results of your campaign and trying to work out where the best return came from. And it’s a common mistake to group different media separately, TV, Radio, Online, Press, Outdoor, Mail outs etc. What is often forgotten is the relationship between these different media. There have been many studies on how TV works well with other media. Below is a great link to some Thinkbox research on how well TV and online work together.

http://www.thinkbox.tv/server/show/nav.1019

 

But when you look at them separately Online would show as the most cost effective medium, but that is because viewers saw the TV advert and where directed to go online. It’s a common mistake in measuring DRTV campaigns. I have a few big clients who are very well known solicitors and we often chat about these sorts of results. The client will talk around cost per response for their TV being higher than anything else but their Google search results are so cheap it’s unbelievable. Then I’ll say but surely people searched for you online because they saw the TV advert. For example with this particular client they bought Google ad words nationally yet they only got responses in the Tyne Tees TV region which they bought. So surely when looking at the cost per response they should be combining numbers. I mean even Google have admitted themselves the power of TV and online.

 

“You may not believe this but last week I stood in front of a major media agency and 50 or so of their clients and sold TV.

 

I told them that TV & search are highly compatible & that money should be taken from below the line and pushed back into TV alongside (obviously) massive growth in search.

 

This is a common theme of mine as we see huge spikes in query volume following TV exposure both editorial & ads.”

 

Mark Howe, MD Google Media Sales

     

So lessons to be learnt, numbers are important but they don’t always tell you the whole story. I always tell my clients to look at relationships between their media not as individual.

 

Just realised telling the whole story is becoming a theme of mine; maybe I should change the name of my blog.

Has the Death of TV been exaggerated?

I was reading this article by Sarah Shearman about video views in the UK for this month which ITV did pretty well in, coming in at no.4 in the UK for video ad properties. And it got me thinking about how online advertising was always citied as the death of TV advertising (among with many other things, it changes yearly) but in fact it's been quite the opposite. Online has increased TV viewing. 
The recent success of "The Only Way is Essex" and Downton Abbey were partly because of the availability to catch up online through the ITV Player. I'm sure I saw a stat come thorough the office saying both programmes had over a million viewers each online after the first week so when you add that to the TV viewing figures its starts to look very good for TV. Especially when you consider most digital programmes in the UK do less than a million and in fact sometimes even the bigger channels struggle to deliver more than a million, in fact last night Men of Rock was new to BBC2 at 9 pm took an audience of 1.5 million.
I guess what I'm trying to say is TV is far from dead. And when you think of TV viewing you have to look at the bigger picture to see what's really going on. A lot of competitors always point out to the decline in audience on ITV1 shown through a nice chart showing our viewing figures over the past 20 years (although last year it was up). But what you have to remember is that our viewing figures don't just come through live TV now, but our +1 service or our digital channels and our viewers through ITV.com (which didn't exist 20 years ago). In fact if you added them all together the combined audience we can deliver is very impressive still. 
So next time you plan a TV campaign remember that TV advertising doesn't just come through your TV but your computer too and soon the two will merge back together again with IPTV's and new services like YouView.  
Link to Sarah Shearman article below.
http://www.brandrepublic.com/news/1049465/UK-racks-6bn-video-views-month/