New planning tool, hybrid measurement system, replay ads: the changes in TV advertising

The Electronic Media Interest Group (IGEM) organized a focused event on the "Future of TV Advertising".At the virtual event, industry representatives presented the extensions of TV research and TV planning.

The majority of TV usage is live at the time of broadcast. But the share of time-shifted TV is steadily rising slightly. New advertising formats in time-shifted TV, the so-called replay ads, maintain the relevance of TV advertising as Alexander Duphorn, CEO of Goldbach Media, pointed out. TV broadcasters, marketers and distributors developed three advertising options, which are only triggered by an action of the viewers, as Frank Zelger, CEO of Admeira pointed out.

The "Start Ad" is a five- to seven-second spot that cannot be skipped at the start of time-shifted television. The "Pause Ad" is an advertising medium that starts when the pause button is pressed and is charged from ten seconds of use. The "Fast Forward Ad" appears when you fast forward and lasts a maximum of 130 seconds.

The replay ads can be played on 32 national and regional TV distributors. On the broadcaster side, 28 TV stations such as 3+, TV24, TeleBärn, but also RTL, Sat.1, ProSieben and many more are participating. Other stations, such as those of SRG SRR, are still being clarified, according to Frank Zelger.

Replay ads are planned and handled in the same way as linear TV advertising, and they are reported as part of Mediapulse's TV currency. Since the replay ads are short, regionally selectable and cannot be switched away, and also receive a high level of attention, they are priced in the highest segment of TV advertising, according to Alexander Duphorn.

Increased granularity of usage data

Dr. Mirko Marr, Head of Research & Development at Mediapulse, presented the conversion of the TV currency, which is to take place by mid-year. The hybrid measurement system increases the granularity of TV usage data and maps TV usage in a higher resolution. To this end, the anonymized data from around 200,000 Swisscom and UPC set-top boxes will be converted into personal usage data and integrated into the existing TV currency.

This results in a more stable representation of the increasingly fragmented TV usage. On the one hand, this means that the long tail of smaller TV stations or off-peak times can be better identified and analyzed. On the other hand, three out of four advertising blocks, which were previously reported with zero viewers, now receive a more precise value. This directly increases the predictability and stability of TV advertising.

More intuitive and faster: The new EvoAd planning tool

Lastly, Olivier Schmid, partner at Zauberküche and head of training at AGFS Arbeitsgemeinschaft Fernsehwerbung Schweiz, presented the new TV planning tool EvoAd. The tool is now being launched and is undergoing intensive training. The booking opening for the second half of the year is already scheduled to take place in the new planning tool. Since EvoAd is much more intuitive and faster than the existing software, hardly any changeover difficulties are expected on the tool side. However, agencies will have to adapt internal processes in parallel. Test data from the new hybrid TV measurement can be analyzed in a second version of EvoAd from the end of April, so that TV planning can also prepare for the currency change in the middle of the year.

The whole event, ordered by IGEM president Stephan Küng, can be seen at www.igem.ch/tv be viewed.