Watching You Watching Them

NBC wants to know what you feel about their programming. Really feel. On a deep, involuntary level. That's why they've set up a panel of people to watch fast forwarded commercials while hooked up to all manners of scientific apparatus.

The hope is that by learning the body's reaction to ads, NBC can find ways to cram more advertising into your world. It's another attempt by television to make up new ways to combat the shrinking viewer audience.

They're not so concerned about the message, as they are the medium. If they can raise the value of an audience, or at least double the viewable inventory of ads, they can maintain their profit levels.

If only they had an easier way to know whether an ad was working.

AdSymetrix is that easier way. Simply Tag Your Ad and let AdSymetrix track and monitor the responses. It's a lot easier than wrapping someone up in sensors and hoping.

Maybe This Will Work

NBC has decided that the reason you're fast forwarding through commercials is because they aren't live enough. So, starting this week they've taken another page out of Uncle Miltie's book, and started doing live commericals during the Tonight Show.

The hope, as you're probably well aware by now, is to garner additional audience by offering something more interesting than regular commercial fare. Whether it makes you more inclined to watch, or more importantly buy, whatever is being promoted has yet to be determined.

Ultimately, it's a gimmick. NBC hopes that you'll be intrigued enough by live content to want to pay attention to their advertiser. The advertiser hopes that too.

The only real way to wash away the hope and replace it with results is to understand how your ads are working for you. AdSymetrix makes it easy. Simply Tag Your Ad and let AdSymetrix track and monitor your results. Then you'll know whether the risk of a live ad is worth anything to your business.

Cross-Media Promotions - Good For TV, What About Your Business?

Every year, during May Sweeps, the Today Show sends their host Matt Lauer to a handful of strange and wonderful locations and goads the viewing public into caring about his travels.

This year, NBC and various advertisers are hopping on the cross-media bandwagon and utilizing various interactive devices to allow you to play along at home while Matt braves the wilds of wherever he's going.

If you watch this year, you may see how these kinds of campaigns that use various media can create positive results. Impressing upon the potential viewer all the many ways that Matt can be watched could send more people to view Today, and help increase their ratings (and thus the cost they can charge for advertising). The key, at least for today's conversation, is to look at how cross-media promotions could work with your business.

NBC has it easy, they just want you to watch their show. Your business demands a higher level of responsiveness from your interested potential customers. AdSymetrix helps you understand the success of your advertising campaigns by giving you the tools you need to monitor the responses you get from any ad in any medium. From website to telephone pole, you're able to know who, when and where your audience is responding to your ad. And from that you can learn how to best connect with your customers.

Give AdSymetrix a try, Signup is free.

Bringing Advertising Into The Show

ABC is looking backwards in an attempt to look forward.

This week, the network is looking at ways to blur the line between advertising and television programing. The hope is that by integrating advertising - or at least by finding new ways to integrate - they'll be able to command high prices from advertisers hoping to reap the rewards of having so many people watching their messages at the same time.

The problem, as any TiVo owner will shout, is that viewers don't watch television for the commercials, but for the program. As technology advances, the ability for the user to get just what they want from their hours on the couch means that commercials are losing viewers in huge numbers.

The solution, at least one of them, is to look back at the way television was when it first started: blatently commercial. Rather than have many sponsors for each individual show, you'd have the Texaco Star Theater where Milton Berle brought vaudeville to the masses. Whether this means that What About Jim will become an ongoing commercial for anti-depresents is unclear. More likely you'll see storylines that include products and companies, similar to the way that The Office and Staples have become so inseparable lately.

Of course, the question for advertisers is whether this is worthwhile. AdSymetrix is positioned to help answer that question. Signup with AdSymetrix and see how your ads are working. Why wait for ABC's meetings to end, sign up now, it's free.