Timing is everything. Just this weekend, Mike the Canadian claimed in the comments that, at least in Canada, internet usage surpasses television viewing. While it's possible that Canadaian viewing habits are vastly different from American viewing habits, an article today from AdWeek by Chris Rohrs, president of the Television Bureau of Advertising, shows that here, that's just nowhere near the truth.
Pardon me if I mention a few inconvenient facts that have surfaced in recent weeks. First, Nielsen reported TV viewing is at its highest point in history. That means in the entire 59 years since the company began compiling time-spent statistics, the numbers have never been bigger. To be more specific, the latest data shows the average American household, per day, spends eight hours and 21 minutes in front of the television. Men spend four hours and 49 minutes watching, and women spend five hours and 25 minutes. And teens, that demo that we "lost" to Facebook, YouTube and the iPod? They spend an average of three hours and 27 minutes per day watching television, and that's also an all-time high.
Then there's the study conducted by Ball State's Center for Media Design on behalf of the Council for Research Excellence that was released in March. It's been called the "largest observational look at media usage ever conducted."
Some key findings: 99 percent of viewing in the past year was done on a "traditional" television set; less than 5 percent of TV viewing was DVR playback; and YouTube, Hulu and all other Web/cell phone media accounted for less than 1 percent of viewing.
While the study indicates that computer usage has supplanted radio as the second most common media activity, TV remains the dominant medium for media consumption and advertising. The Ball State findings affirm the Nielsen data: The average American adult is exposed to five hours and nine minutes of live TV each day, almost 15 minutes of TV via a DVR device and 2.4 minutes of video on the computer.
There are also some interesting findings in the article for those of you who think advertising doesn't work. But as the article ends, "Nobody watches television anymore, except for everybody."
And what if instead to say “internet will kill TV ” ( evidently not true ) we say “internet will be more likely an additional source of businness”?
This could be a win win situation for everybody and avoid that type crusades (we have in Europe) against internet ….
I think it’s two things. Firstly, we don’t have the saturation of high-speed Internet just yet that would be needed to turn the tables significantly. There are a lot of people who decide that they can’t afford to shell out $30-$60 per month for high speed service, and anything they really need requiring it they can get with their work computers. (mostly files, booking trips, etc.) Secondly, it’s a generational thing. The 18-34 and 18-49 markets aren’t important because of their sheer numbers. They’re important because they have more disposable income (mostly the lower end) and are influenced greater by advertising. It also happens it’s more likely for the 18-34′s to be more tech savvy and not be encumbered by watching shows through traditional methods.
Now this argument will almost certainly be different if we were to talk again in even 5 years time and we have more of the early/mid baby boomers leaving the planet, but for now it doesn’t really surprise me that traditional TV viewing is still dominant.
“less than 5 percent of TV viewing was DVR playback”
At first glance, that seems odd – it seems that most primetime shows get 20% of their audience from DVR viewing. What that really suggests, is for every hour of primetime show viewing, audiences watch three+ times as much “wallpaper” television – news, morning shows, late night talk shows, the least worst option on cable, etc.
I’m not sure if this says good things about the primetime advertising model – if I want to reach 18-34 Females, I could pay the CW’s ad rate… or just air the ad on MTV, where I know it is three times more likely to be seen, at a lesser cost.
And no, television isn’t dead – but large share shows probably are, forevermore.
P.S. Does this post really invalidate Mike’s claim? All he has to prove is that the average Canadian household (not person, household) spends more than 8h21m on the internet per day. Counting work hours, that is an easily achievable amount.
We are talking about real hours viewed? i think they dont consider the people that keep on their television while doing something else; the television is always on even while people do housework, surf internet etc…
I dont think that internet is above television now, but i for sure think that nielsen have all the interest to play with those numbers and the networks to accept such a thing
Tom, you’re essentially correct about DVR playback for broadcast prime-time shows, the average amount of 18-49 adult demo viewing by DVR is 20% or more for new episodes.
However for cable shows (which are >50% of the prime-time audience) the DVR viewing percentages are much lower. When we used to see some cable DVR data only a handful of cable shows (among thousands) got above 10% of viewing via DVR. And non-primetime TV of all flavors is very lightly DVR’d currently.
Judging from my own habits, I suspect that quite a few shows are recorded but are never really watched. Or if they are, it is days or even weeks later, and the ads are skipped right on by. Many hours I tape are never viewed, just recorded over later.
So I basically have to agree that the “live” TV dominates viewing. Internet may make some inroads, but until everyone has the ability and the inclination to transfer the shows from the computer over to the 40+ inch HDTV, but even this won’t make too big a dent in cable and broadcas numbers. At least for some time.
Huh, and to think that I haven’t seen a commercial this season!
AD, good thing part of this wasn’t coming from Nielsen, then!
Tom, Mike the Canadian was claiming that internet video was surpassing TV viewing, from what I could tell. Perhaps I misunderstood him. No one seems to have reported the total internet usage from the Ball State study, but the last study I could find from the US put average internet usage at 27 hours a month. Not everyone has jobs where they are on the internet all day.
AD, i don’t think it matters. If the TV is on during housework, then advertising is on during housework. Which is also the reason the volume is louder on commercials and is the reason you see more hard sell advertising during the day. Nobody’s expecting you to be 100 percent engaged in their commercial during “I love the 90′s” reruns.
Err, yes, to be clear, I meant that the “wallpaper” shows were simply the least worst live option – little to zero DVRing involved.
And in a second clarification, I did not mean that the average MTV show gets three times the rating of the CW show – just that the 18-34 viewer will watch ~three wallpaper shows for every CW show.
A different take:
“As much as 20 percent of all TV viewing in the US now happens online, says a survey released this week by Integrated Media Measurement Inc. (IMMI), supporting other recent research which also indicates that the Internet is fast turning into the top choice for many.”
http://tinyurl.com/r4m5dp
I am not sure where Mike the Canadian got his info -( my friends in the great white north haven’t been able to substantiate his assertion yet)- nevertheless, internet usage versus TV internet viewership do not necessarily correlate.
I would hope this article finally puts to rest the notion that DVR or internet viewing is somehow paramount for any network to consider while they determine the fate of a TV series. It has been implied and stated in numerous articles that ‘live’ viewership is now, and for the foreseeable future, is all that can be used to determine who is watching what. It is obvious that many don’t like this reality but it is time to face the music and deal with it.
Mike, the survey you link to seems to be a self reported study. Maybe it’s just me, but I put a bit more faith in a study that actually monitors what people are doing, breaking it down into 10 second increments, rather than trusting people to report what media they use correctly.
From the article: “Nobody sits and watches a television program anymore.” Well that depends on your definition of “sit and watch!”
These surveys and reports are never really clear on dedicated viewing versus “wallpaper” or multi-tasking. To me, the aforementioned “sits and watches” quote implies dedicated viewing. By this definition, I “sit and watch” about 2 hours of TV per week. However, if I were surveyed or people-metered, I would “watch” about 45-50 hours per week. This is because I am a TV wallpaper junkie. I don’t find it as easy to use internet viewing as “wallpaper,” as I don’t have a remote mouse that I can use from anywhere in the room
.
More importantly, I would say most of my veg-out time is spent simultaneously watching wallpaper TV while web surfing (including video). Anecdotal evidence shows I’m not alone in that behavior. This particular website is a major factor in the multi-tasking
. I also use TV, video/music downloading, and social networking simulatenously. But in Nielsen metering or the Ball State study, how would such behavior be figured?
Are people watching more TV than ever? Most likely. Are they “sitting and watching” in a dedicated manner, or are they multi-taksing? That’s a pretty important question, IMHO.
TV is dead…Long live TV!
First, I’d question the sources. Nielsen makes its money from TV networks and, as far as I know, not a penny from the internet. Same goes for quoting from the President of the TELEVISION Bureau of Advertising or Adweek (guess what “ads” they mainly report on).
Second, Tom makes actually a good point. Everyone that isn’t in the marketing profession hyperventilates about ratings, but ratings are not as important as demographics (the physical) and psychographics (the mental). It is for this reason that some shows (like Family Guy) can charge a premium. It is why cable TV networks are able to turn a profit. Very few products can be marketed to everyone. The overwhelming number of products and services are best marketed to a niche and that’s where a show’s demographics and psychographics can sell it to advertisers.
Third, us marketers are still trying to figure out this new world we live in. The explosive growth of the internet and computer gaming being the two biggest ones. Made doubly hard by old timers heading marketing departments that just either “go with what’s proven” or “don’t understand kids today”. Those marketing heads who are young (if by “young” you accept 45-year-olds like myself) are looking where to better spend our ad dollars. Where I can get the most bang for my ad buck and reliably get that bang. We experiment. Right now I (thus the company I work for) is looking into sponsoring a few web-series, we’re talking to a coming-soon massively multi-player online game about product placements (and even in-game billboard advertising), we’re about to start advertising on popular blogs, and the list goes on and on. Where we are cutting back on is TV advertising. It just doesn’t deliver the bang-to-buck explosion as much anymore and has been in steady decline for over the last two decades. And we would be doing this if there was a recession or not. Things are changing and us advertisers have to change with the times.
will the ratings be delayed today?
Tv isn’t dead if it is! this site wouldn’t exist or wouldn’t post ratings.
I watch TV by choice for quality and internet TV if I miss a show, want to rewatch or see a show that competes in a timeslot. Internet is convient, but usually its choppy or poor quality and sometimes it just lags. This is even more so during peak usage. Yes you can argue that I just need a better connection (2 Gig/768 UP), but thats more cost to what has become my free DVR source. As internet TV gets a larger chunk you will see more commercials on it and or a higher per month cost for bandwidth to view it. There is no free lunch. Shows need revenue to produce shows. We will just be replacing Cable for another form of cable. Those that use others connection via wireless will see greater security as people have to pay more for bandwidth and thus they will monitor usage more as a result. As internet becomes more of a need than a want to more and more people, like cable became, then the cost will go up guaranteed. So transferring TV to internet will come at a price so enjoy it while its cheap.
Julia
The survey is not self reported. Here’s the methodology used by IMMI
Sample
IMMI has recruited a random sample of 3,000 teens and adults in six key Designated Market Areas (DMAs): New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami, Houston and Denver. Panel members are provided with a cell phone running proprietary software that tracks their media consumption. The panel is designed to provide accurate data for live television, delayed on television and Internet exposure for a sample of persons aged 13 to 55 in large metropolitan areas. For this paper, IMMI drew the data from all or some of its panel.
Weighting and Statistical Tests
Data is weighted for age and gender for the source DMA. In most cases, data from DMAs is aggregated to report on the total panel exposure. When DMA data is combined, weighting is applied to the entire set to balance age and gender with national demographic data from the US Census Bureau. All findings in this report are statistically significant at 95% confidence.
IMMI recruits panelists through random sampling following industry best
practice.
Panelists receive mobile phones equipped with proprietary IMMI software.
In exchange for the new mobile phone and subsidized phone service, panelists
make the new phone their primary mobile device and carry it with them at all
times.
The phones take regular samples of ambient audio and convert these samples
into digital signatures. Once uploaded, the signatures are compared to
signatures created from ongoing monitoring of media delivery sources. By
matching these signatures, IMMI couples media broadcasts with individuals
who are exposed to them and develops a comprehensive media consumption
profile for each panel member.