November 2013 www.tvbeurope.com


How can broadcasters really innovate when audiences are behaving so unpredictably?


TVBEurope 17 IBC Wrap-Up Time to innovate


The IT estate, the cloud, consumer technologies and social media are creating some highly disruptive options when blended with broadcasting — as consultant Russell Grute discovered at IBC


“WHAT’S NEW for you at IBC this year?” That perennial question is posed to trusted colleagues, associates and even competitors, who try to sum it all up with a single snappy and compelling sentence. Replies are of course many


and varied, and it took me a little longer than usual to see what was really new this year, perhaps because “it” wasn’t “at” the show. Nevertheless a burning issue for IBC 2013 and a question that, by the time of writing, over 116 million viewers have asked themselves is: “What does the fox say?” Stick with me. In early September 2013,


while established global player Discovery became Europe’s biggest TV network and US disruptor Netflix announced 36 million subscribers, the more compact Norwegian broadcaster TV Norge was enjoying a foxy global cross-media sensation. A four minute pre-series promo entitled What Does the Fox Say?, featuring ‘Norwegian national treasures’ Ylvis propelled both Ylvis and TV Norge to unprecedented global


notice. Even before the new series was underway the promo had registered over 20 million hits online.


I noticed this not because I


don’t mind foxes and rather like Norway, but mostly because I’m told what to watch by the junior digital natives (my kids) usually via YouTube. I wondered what drives the speed of such success, how did this audience grow so quickly? Apparently, traffic was initially driven by bloggers using Tumblr and Gawker and it didn’t take long for Twitter and YouTube to do the rest. By October, Ylvis were appearing on US primetime network shows, whilst the online audience continues to grow.


Audiences on the move There’s no shortage of new technology at IBC every year and in 2013 we all have to be equally conversant with the full range of converged technologies. The IT estate, the cloud, consumer technologies and social media are creating some highly disruptive options when blended with broadcasting. How can broadcasters really


innovate when audiences are behaving so unpredictably? For example, over the top TV


(OTTTV) addresses viewers using internet delivery, and with personal browsers and devices providing a direct return path, it’s possible to measure changes in audience behaviour right down to an individual viewer. Although OTT currently only provides small revenue for broadcasters, it can influence audience behavior significantly by extending programming and advertising to other screens. Promoters of OTT also contend that media companies that do not evolve to provide an engaging and personalised video experience across all screens will lose market-share and eventually will disappear. If that’s true, then this future vision will also require huge amounts of personalised audience feedback to be processed intelligently. At IBC OTT solutions provider


Ooyala stated that its analytics engine now processes over two billion events every day, derived from nearly 200 million viewers worldwide who watch their video on an Ooyala-powered player.


Russell Grute: The big guys are doing it big and yet, the small guys have every opportunity to do it even bigger


OTT solutions providers at IBC were also featuring generic Google-style analytics and providing specialist data mining tools to capitalise on the intelligence gathered about audience movements. The combination of social media and TV is now known as Social TV. Although predominantly US-based, the announcement of a tie up between Nielsen and Twitter to deliver Nielsen Twitter TV Ratings also caught my eye. To date only the number of tweets and respective Twitter authors has been measurable. A measurement of the audience of people who view those tweets is required for TV networks, advertisers and


agencies to know the true reach and influence of TV-related activity on Twitter. It seems that media companies


achieving broadcast innovation most successfully are those who can now tune into an audience instead of waiting for an audience to tune into them. In many ways this is almost the opposite of traditional broadcasting. By adapting their programming, making it discoverable through rich metadata and by occasionally short-circuiting the schedule using social media, broadcasters who already know their audiences are in good position to really drive TV everywhere. This IBC’s Norwegian foxy


example, although really just a highly original pop video used as a promotion for a popular national entertainment show, harnessed unexpected direct audience recommendation via social TV to achieve over 100 million views in less than a month. The big guys are doing it big


and yet, the small guys have every opportunity to do it even bigger. Whether it’s through original talent, great programming, converged technology or just great timing, perhaps there’s never been a better time for broadcasters to innovate.


Bio:


Russell Grute is managing director at Broadcast Innovation, an independent consultancy in media management for broadcasting and TV everywhere.


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