Originally posted on January 28th, 2008 on www.onlinemarketingmavens.com
First off - Happy Birthday to my blog mate Lisa!!
Secondly, after I published the last post about Web and TV Convergence, I came across more enthralling articles that touch on this subject! As mentioned previously, Web TV has been here in some sense for a long time and continues to grow, slowly but surely. The amount of speculation about this convergence has seemed to blow up recently, and I intend to continue monitoring it’s progress. My reasons being out of both general curiosity and interest in how this will eventually drastically effect my livelihood. I figure if I stay on top of things in can only be for the good!
Ad Age points out that TV interactivity has been around for some time, and is in fact very prevalent. While the definition of interactivity is used broadly here, referring to using select or OK on remote controls, a study done by Harris Interactive found that 66% of those surveyed WANT to be able to interact with television advertising! While this is most likely high due to the newness and novelty of this option, it’s still impressive.
A BusinessWeek reporter ranted last November about the fact that the progress of this convergence will no doubt be hindered by media companies and their fear of control. Later, BusinessWeek referenced it’s own article to predict the reality of this to have 40% penetration within three years. This time, electronics mammoths are said to be encouraging connectivity with features on their high-end TV sets.
In my opinion, consumers will get what they want, regardless of what they are offered on a schedule. Even though Heroes is on Monday at 8pm CST on NBC, people have grown used to controlling the media consumption in their lives, and their appetites for this control will only become more ravenous. In my 5 years working in media, I’ve seen the print newspaper industry decline rapidly. But as consumers lead by behavior, the industry is retaliating by giving the people what they want - easily navigable news, video, traffic, weather, etc., all without the dirty fingers. As it turns out, giving the people what they want in terms of media has been shown to work!
