Industry Insiders Discuss Low Awareness of TV Everywhere

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

By Deana Myers

TV Everywhere is still a long way from extensive content availability and widespread adoption. In the meantime, industry executives speaking at the CTAM Summit held Oct. 14-16 in Orlando, Fla., agree that upping usage among those who already have the service is vital.

Moderator Mark Garner, A+E Networks' senior vice president of distribution business development, analytics and marketing, pointed out that consumer research has recently shown low awareness among those who have TVE. To that end, Parks Associates released a study in June that indicated that just 20% of consumers who have TVE know about it and just 50% of those have used it.

Event programming has had some recent success in raising awareness. NBCUniversal Media LLC's Ronald Lamprecht, executive vice president of digital distribution business development and sales, heralded the Summer Olympics as the most successful TVE event ever. Approximately 10 million authenticated devices, via an estimated 6.5 million subscribers, were used during the Olympics, but the online effort had many challenges. A leading problem was awareness, and many consumers did not have their login or password information.

One key finding from the Olympics was that around three-quarters of usage was in the home. Lamprecht pointed out that this could provide a solution to the credentials problem for some, as cable ops could automatically authenticate devices in the home. Another key stat was that growth over two years ago was enormous — authenticated devices used were 16x the amount used during the 2010 Winter Olympics and app downloads were 6x greater.

While events can help raise awareness and usage, content lacks in other areas. David Purdy, senior vice president of content with Rogers Communications Inc., revealed that Rogers has wireless rights to about only 30% of its content, so it does not offer a comprehensive service. Right now the service is on a best-efforts basis, which makes it difficult to market to the consumer. He said consumers are unhappy to see that old seasons of a program are available on Netflix Inc. but not through the cable company.

HBO GO offers all of its original series in their entirety. Jeff Dallesandro, vice president of digital domestic network distribution for HBO, said HBO GO's "vault" approach and the strong customer loyalty to the channel raises awareness. He believes HBO GO has greater awareness levels than the overall industry, with more than 40% of customers aware of their HBO GO service.

Content availability differs between broadcast, cable and premium. Purdy suggested that this is confusing for the consumer. Another problem that will need to be addressed is discoverability. Frans Vermeulen, FreeWheel's senior vice president of revenue and strategy, pointed out that 20% of current commercial load is dedicated to promoting other network shows. If the same is not available in the TVE environment, then how will consumers find new shows?

Although there was agreement among industry executives that TVE is necessary for future relevancy, linear is the way most consumers view video today and accounts for the majority of revenues for networks, according to Lamprecht. Dallesandro also noted that HBO GO usage is greatest during its biggest linear viewing period, which is Sunday night when popular series such as "True Blood," "Game of Thrones" and "Boardwalk Empire" are on the air.