A new report from Nielsen Analytics reveals that advertisers and television programmers are finding new and more lucrative advertising opportunities with broadband video and paints a fairly vivid picture of the broadband consumer.
The study determined that the use of broadband video actually extends the reach of traditional TV and that broadband consumers are young, affluent, highly educated and tend to have high speed Web access virtually 24/7, making it an integral part of their lifestyle.
The study, “Whatever, Whenever, Wherever: How Broadband is Redefining the Economics of Television”, was authored by the head of Nielsen Analytics and completed in partnership with Scarborough Research.
As TV viewing habits change, Nielsen is taking numerous steps, including this research project, to anticipate the needs of its advertising customers, who long placed commercial on a short list of traditional broadcast TV network shows. One of those efforts is a new audience measurement service for video-on-demand, while another is a database that covers the relationship between TV and Internet use that it developed with NetRatings Inc.
Nielsen’s said the phrase “Broadband Video,” is also known as Web video, Internet video or broadband television, and is defined as “streaming video fed from a web site.”
“By researching controlled broadband access, this study concludes that programmers have the opportunity to create new revenue models to benefit content owners and their affiliated stations” said Larry Gerbrandt, general manager and senior vice president of Nielsen Analytics.
“Such ad-supported models are uniquely adaptable to the broadband environment and are potentially superior to existing models because they can take full advantage of the digital environment,” he said. “With broadband streams, for example, fast forwarding through commercials can be disabled making it more likely the consumers will watch the spots and possibly interact with them.”
Despite growing numbers of prime time television shows being streamed (or pre-viewed) on network Web sites, or the increasing popularity of user generated content, there has been no measurable negative impact on traditional television viewing, the report said.
Video on PCs and iPods actually is expanding the audience of traditional TV programs, supported by the fact that total TV usage was at a record high in U.S. households at 8 hours, 14 minutes a day during the 2005-2006 TV season, according to Nielsen Media Research data.
Household viewing has risen more than an hour a day over the past decade – or more than a half hour more per person.
“Advertisers and programmers using broadband have a unique advantage in the increasingly competitive advertising world,” said Gerbrandt. “Ad models can be customized and managed in a broadband environment, and interactivity can be embedded into the program in such a way as to enhance engagement which does not take viewers away from the enjoyment of the program.”
Broadband Video Advertising Models
There is a general consensus, Nielsen said, that viewers prefer short Web-served ads, though the market is split between 15-second and 30-second pre-rolls per program segment. Furthermore, because broadband video offers levels of interactivity and viewer engagement not possible in a traditional TV spot, that argues for a higher CPM.
But television – especially the ad-supported kind – works according to a very different revenue model, and systems such as broadband streaming and downloading, could represent a new frontier to be explored and exploited, according to Nielsen.
Meet the Broadband Consumer
According to Scarborough Research, a local market consumer research company, broadband consumers tend to have high-speed Web access virtually 24/7 – at work, at home and increasingly across an array of portable devices such as laptops, PDAs and mobile phones.
While only about 9 percent of U.S. adults report spending 20 hours or more a week on the Internet, this number nearly doubles, to 17 percent, among those with broadband access at home.
There is a strong correlation between education and Internet access, and the same holds true for broadband connections. Of the roughly one-third (33 percent) of U.S. adults reside in households without any Internet connection, 69 percent have only a high school degree or less.
The comparable percentage for those in broadband households is one-third or 33 percent. Of all U.S. adults, almost a quarter (24 percent) have a college degree or greater.
This number increases to 35 percent among adults with broadband Internet access at home. Moreover, the overwhelming majority of those with post-graduate degrees have an Internet connection, and most of those have a broadband connection.
The study reaches the following conclusions, which, when combined with statistics, paint a valuable picture of the broadband consumer, along with purported behavior.
Broadband consumers are upscale. According to Scarborough’s findings, 17 percent of consumers have an annual household income of $100,000 or more, compared to 28 percent of those with broadband connectivity. Less than a quarter (21 percent) of all consumers live in homes worth $300,000 or more; but the figure is 30 percent for those consumers with broadband in their household.
There is a clear generational divide in broadband adoption. The 18-34 demographic represents 34 percent of those with broadband connectivity in their household. Though consumers 55 and over are less likely than their 18-34 or 35-54 counterparts to be broadband customers, broadband penetration among this older age group will likely increase. The 35-54 demographic is currently most likely to have home broadband access (45 percent).
The Nielsen Co. www.nielsen.com
NetRatings Inc. www.nielsen-netratings.com
Scarborough Research www.scarborough.com
