It seems obvious to me that few people would watch TV commercials during DVR playback (and likely you too, astute blog reader!), and in the 10/22/08 prime update by MAGNA (page 4), there are more numbers demonstrating it. The numbers I've taken from the report below show the Live Program rating, the Live+3 Program rating (including average program viewing within 3 days of the initial broadcast) and the C+3 Commercial rating (which reflects viewing to the average commercial minute up to 3 days after the initial broadcast).
While DVR playback increases average program viewing between 7-20% in the 3 days after initial broadcast, only in the 12-34 age group do more people watch commercial minutes in the 3 days after airing than during Live broadcast, and only a 5% increase at that (compared to a 20% increase in program viewing). In the other age groups the additional program viewing resulted in either no increase or a reduction in the amount of commercial viewing. So that DVR viewing isn't adding any commercial viewing to their shows. And while the brodcast network PR departments would like you to believe that DVR viewing ads value to their shows, advertisers aren't paying for those DVR viewers.
5 Network Average Ratings (September 22-28, 2008)
| Age Group | Live Program | Live+3 Program | C+3 Commercial | DVR Commercial Viewing (C+3 - Live) |
| 12-34 | 2.0 | 2.4 | 2.1 | 0.1 |
| 18-34 | 2.3 | 2.7 | 2.3 | 0.0 |
| 18-49 | 2.8 | 3.2 | 2.7 | -0.1 |
| 25-54 | 3.2 | 3.7 | 3.2 | 0.0 |
| 50+ | 4.4 | 4.7 | 4.2 | -0.2 |
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Nielsen TV Ratings Data: ©2008 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved.
Wow. I’m kinda surprised that it’s actually the older demos that have figured out the whole “Wait 20 mins to start watching a program before starting the DVR’d version.” Or does this mean that the older demos are just more likely to channel surf during commercials?
Julia, my guess is the latter — especially because older people are more likely to be watching TV.
What about product placements: Chuck had Madden 09, TSCC has a new car in every scene, Knight Rider uses a mustang(center of the show), Supernatural with the impala (granted its old but still a chevy) and a scene with the ipod, and those are only a few. Advertisers are hitting you over the head with their products in the tv shows, that seems to conteract dvr viewings
Mandy, and those product placements are purchased differently than 30 second commercial spots. I’m not sure how they’re purchased exactly, but I imagine there live+7 DVR viewing matters more. That said, revenue-wise product placement is but a tiny fraction of 30 second commercial spot revenue.
Mandy, I agree with Robert. Today product placement is tiny relative to traditional commercial spots. My guess is that changes over time.
But what about the degree deodorant product placement add that was in Eureka. It was just as obtrusive as the Madden spot on Chuck, a whole episode was focused around it. And it is one of those commercial products that don’t cost as much, unlike the impaglia and Madden ’09. I think the traditional commercial spots are coming to an end. Maybe not so much advertisers have jumped on the bandwagon at this point, but once a ratings company like Nielsen decides to document the average amt of sales in relativity to add placement, I thing the trend would really take off.
I dunno. I watched *every* episode of Eureka last month — all 33. I don’t really recall the degree placement so I’m guessing it was just in the background and not discussed so for me it wasn’t obtrusive at all. (I’m guessing it was in the next to the last episode where there were episode where there was an artificial sun in addition to the real one heating things up?)
I didn’t find the Madden story line obtrusive either. It was in your face since it was written into the story line, but it was done so in a way I liked (I didn’t think OMG, WTF!?).
I’m not sure how that worked out for Degree, since I’m in the target market and didn’t really recall it. It’s been well over 24 hours, but it has been for Madden and the iPod in Dean’s Impala and I do recall those.
Product placement will pick up, and I have no doubt that companies will be willing to pay more if their products are actually written into the story lines, and there’s little doubt that DVR usage will spur even more product placement.
Robert, Are you serious? In the first episode of this season Eva Thorne brought in boxes marked “Degree” and actually said that budget concerns meant they needed a corporate sponsor. Zane’s lab was plastered with the Degree logo, and they mentioned in every other episode that he was working on ideas to “over-engineer” something for their corporate sponsor. In the episode with the second sun, they had a complete storyline based on how the new ingredient for Degree kept Vincent cool and dry. It even “protected” Carter and Zane when they rubbed it on themselves and survived temperatures that melted the tires on the Jeep.
I am serious, but save a couple of episodes, I watch all of Eureka on my iPhone. My attention to detail with a show like Eureka is *not* high for most episodes, especially when you can figure out how it ends 5 minutes into the show. Though some of the episodes my attention was much higher, especially in the beginning.
I do remember that Vincent was able to keep cool and dry but completely disassociated the Degree aspect, what role a 3.5″ screen played in that vs ADD, I can’t say.
LOL! I think it might have just been you though. The product placement was only slightly less obvious that George and Gracie’s neighbor giving ad presentations for Campbell’s soup in their living room each episode. (Product placement isn’t new, it’s retro
)
*than* George and Gracie’s neighbor…
Don’t be too hard on Robert. One reason I don’t typically discuss show details on the site is that *everything* would seem to escape my notice.
Really, I can’t talk much either. When I’m watching on TV instead of on my computer, I’m often doing something else at the same time and tend to miss things.
Bill, I’m not sure your analysis is accurate. The Live Program ratings in the first column are actual “program” ratings, not commercial ratings. For example, your Persons 12-34 LP rating is a 2.0. The COMMERCIAL viewing to that show was probably about 95% of that number, or about 1.9. After 3 days of DVR playback, the “C3″ rating is 2.1, so there is an increase in commercial viewing – 0.2 in this case, or about +11%. Of course less people watch commercials in DVR playback – but the numbers show about 33% do, typically.
Kris, I’m not quite sure I understand what you are saying, but I think you may be saying that C+3 is the commercial viewing of DVR watching. C+3 includes the live viewing. Bill’s analysis is correct.
I think I may understand what Kris is saying. to truly do this analysis properly, you need to compare live commercial viewing (we’ll call that “C”) with the C+3 data. That seems to really be the only way to truly know what the difference between live commercial viewing and commerical viewing with 3 days of DVR viewing is. Unfortunately we lack that data.
Kris makes an assumption that the “C” (live commercial viewing) is a number that is less than Live Program. because of the way Nielsen measures the only way I’d feel comfortable knowing that for sure is to see the data, but I understand why Kris makes the assumption.
Kris, after reading your comment, I agree. We do not know the average Live commercial minute viewing. My conclusion only works if it is approximately the same as the average Live program minute viewing.
Let’s see if I can restate what we do know:
1. The average Live program minute viewing and the average C+3 commercial minute viewing are nearly identical in each of these age groups.
2. If you assume that the average Live commercial minute viewing is less than the average Live program minute viewing (which seems reasonable), then it’s that difference (whatever it might be) that is the magnitude of commercial viewing in DVR playback within 3 days.
Ah, okay, I see now. But what we can see from these numbers, without the help of actual “C” numbers, is that numbers other than Live+Same Day are pretty useless. Even if there is some commercial viewing going on, the numbers we see daily will be approximately the number of people who the advertisers care about.
Two things Bill:
1) Nielsen minute by minute reports (only available to their clients) show that Live Commercial viewing averages around 90 to 95% of the Live Program viewing due to flipping and tune-out – always varies by show and by Network (on many cable networks it’s less).
2) The funny thing is this Nielsen’s measurement is flawed, but the best anyone can afford. Commercial viewership is WAY below 95% of the program #’s. The truth is that of the total viewers to a commercial break (let’s say measured as 10MM), approximately 40-50% of them (or 4-5MM) are either partially inattentive (checking on dinner), completely inattentive (heated political conversation), or out of the room (bathroom). No one’s #’s reflect those reductions – unfortunately having someone in the living room of Nielsen’s 10-15,000 households, taking notes on what they do every minute of viewing, isn’t really practical or affordable.
And Julia, the # of commercial viewers after 3 days of DVR playback (C3) is what the advertisers care about, but Live + Same Day or Live + 7 Day program ratings show the true viewership of a program (which the programming guys care about).
Kris, what I’m saying is that the C+3 is about the same as the Live + Same Day, on average. (Or maybe even just Live.) So therefore when fans of failing shows get excited about DVR viewership being high, it’s rather pointless. The numbers that are important to the businesses will be about the same as what we get to see every day. Does that make sense?