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This week, we continue to dispute the notion that Outdoor is still a ‘traditional’ media by reviewing the range of new technologies introduced by the OOH contractors.

Rather than being replaced by the likes of online and mobile, out of home should sit side by side with these platforms on campaign schedules. Of course this is easy enough to say, but we naturally ask:  ‘how can we achieve what online, the fastest growing medium for almost a decade, is now doing using outdoor?’ Advertisers want the flexibility, targeting capabilities and real-time elements that online boasts. Now outdoor can deliver all three.  

Our first port of call when assessing OOH developments is to consider the impact of digital display. Already, we are able to break down some of the standard barriers associated with outdoor formats: long lead times; fixed in-charge periods and singular, static copy. You only need to take a trip on London’s public transport to see how digital OOH has re-written these norms - Transvision screens are breaking news as it happens, digital 6 sheets are telling me I want a beer during my Friday commute home and DEPs are following me up the escalator to tell the story of the latest film release. Digital OOH has the flexibility to put marketers’ creativity into practice at an affordable cost.

When considering the partnership between digital and OOH, we have to address the developments that have occurred within the wider digital arena. Over the past decade, social media has infiltrated every aspect of our lives. Take the emergence of Twitter - be it allowing us to harmlessly follow friends or D-list celebrities to breaking news stories and causing legal battles, it has made everyone sit up and listen. Digital OOH panels now enable us to live stream Tweets and feeds on a broadcast scale, meaning that even the consumer can get their opinions seen by the public. As well as putting consumers at the heart of the advertising and giving a whole new meaning to ‘word of mouth’, it can all happen in real-time. 

Twitter is now often the first channel of a brand’s communication - integrating this with outdoor allows it to become an integral component of their broadcast message. 

 But live interaction is not just confined to the realms of social media. The recent BEING campaign by British Airways linked SMS messaging with Ocean’s impactful digital screen at Eat Street, Westfield. Passers-by were greeted by the 15 foot high HD screen at Westfield showing two holiday makers asking them to guess where they were in the world at that moment. By texting in questions to get hints from the pair, shoppers were encouraged to guess the location and win a holiday. Certainly not a brand new (or complex) competition metric – but in the context of real time on a huge, public digital panel, it made for a fun, live conversation with people on the other side of the world that people wanted to get involved with. Add some shots of the enviable sunshine, a few performers with steel drums next to the screen and two people waving at you in their swimsuits and it creates a pretty impactful campaign.

http://www.oceanoutdoor.com/ocean-news/news/live-interactive-campaign-takes-off-for-british-airways/

Bringing things back to ground level, another technology acronym attracting buzz is NFC. While much of the fuss is around the ability to make quick payments with retailers and public transport at the touch of a bank card, the same technology has also been implemented into OOH. The amount of NFC-enabled consumer devices quadrupled last year compared to 2011. As a follow-on to the QR code, NFC goes one step further in that with just a simple tap you can access rich media content, voucher codes and mobile bookings to name a few. Advertisers have already jumped on this opportunity, yet in the next year it is predicted to fully take off. 

While most of the examples you have probably seen are linked to a poster panel, the technology can be used almost anywhere. And it is not just us marketeers who are getting excited about this. In a survey carried out by Posterscope and Clear Channel, 84% of those who have used the technology enjoyed the experience, while 72% had told friends. The key challenge for this technology is educating the consumer - 60% of those with NFC-enabled phones do not realise they have this technology.  2013 will be an interesting year to see if and what will reduce this number.

Ultimately, outdoor has come a long way and it will continue to adapt and evolve. It creates new boundaries and makes room for a whole raft of media firsts for brands to lay claim to. As the middlemen of the process, keeping abreast of the new technology means we can explore some truly engaging and clever opportunities as an agency. Key to remember will be that the buck doesn’t stop with the media world – and as with any campaign, if the idea doesn’t offer a value exchange for the consumer, it is a wasted opportunity.

Having a blog for your business has become commonplace across the insatiable infinity of the Internet, but for some the reason may not extend further than ‘everyone else has one so I should too’.

In reality, blogs are a great way for your business to assert itself as an industry expert and provide genuinely interesting and useful content for site visitors, as well as maintaining a steady and prolific online presence.

Taking the effort to create and maintain a blog can have a whole host of advantages, many of which can build on themselves once a foundation is laid. 

A blog demonstrates that you know your industry and there’s no better way to validate yourself as a business by sharing knowledge and opinion. It shows that you are confident and proud of what you do and helps lay the groundwork of trust with a potential client or customer. Consider the flipside - there’s nothing sadder than visiting a website and seeing a blog post from 3 years ago, still sitting there at the top of the page and collecting dust. If you don’t care, why should anyone else?

Connecting (and courting) with potential customers

Blogging is all about sharing. If your content is genuinely helpful and interesting, your readers will want to transmit their own opinions in the comments and may even propagate your content through relevant social networks. All blogs make it easy for people to share content and more often than not will have social media buttons that people can click on, sending your post on its way to countless screens around the world.

Alluring the mighty algorithms

Of course, there is a more technical advantage that comes with a blog, as long as it’s regularly updated. Fresh content will get the attention of search engine algorithms which will send their cyber spiders crawling to your website to index the fresh content. Not only will this help with your organic website rankings in search engine results, your overall online visibility will improve and it will also give you some great opportunities for internal linking to channel visitors (both human and algorithmic) through other pages of your website.

It’s easier than you think 

The best part about all this is that blogging is really easy! Most websites come with easy content management systems which means you can add new posts with just the click of a button. It may seem time consuming, but in reality a good blog post doesn’t need to be more than 350 words as any more may cause readers to lose attention. Keep things simple and snappy in easily digestible chunks. 

There are all sorts of simple plugins and tools that you or your web developers can install which means you can put new posts up on a whim and still enjoy the benefits. If you don’t have time to write the posts yourself, why not empower an employee to give it a try – not only will this keep the flow of content coming, it will make them feel more integral to the business as a whole and let them flex their creative muscles. 

A blog gives you authority, presence and a human touch – rule your niche and get blogging!

‘Traditional’ media – what does the label mean today? Historically ‘Out Of Home,’ in the form of billboards and paper posters, is the oldest advertising platform around but to call it ‘traditional’ in 2013 would simply be inaccurate.

Along with the likes of TV, Radio and Online, OOH is fast becoming a highly future-facing platform and over the coming weeks, our team will explore some of the innovative developments and what they mean for advertisers and consumers alike.

First, we look at the recent introduction of Wi-Fi to the London Underground. Previously a near twilight zone of tangled underground train lines that have made the otherwise non-stop communications of London – well, stop.

When it was installed, Neil Berkett, Chief Executive of Virgin Media, said: "This is a truly historic moment as we connect millions of Tube passengers to the wonderful world of the internet for the first time ever”. They have since stuck to their promise and from its introduction on the 9^th June 2012, it has amassed 650,000 registered users and 450,000 unique users.

With the growing penetration of Smart phones and Tablets, Wi-Fi on the move is an appealing opportunity for commuters as they look to remain connected – or even just fill time – throughout their journey. As a result, we are now consuming it in a variety of ways and places:

A recent survey has, perhaps unsurprisingly, shown that 65% of people have used it for Social Networking and 62% for checking emails. Interestingly, 15% say they have used it to Google an advert they have seen. While this is not as high as the statistic that ‘1 in 3 Smartphone users have performed a search after seeing a poster in general’,it would suggest that people are beginning to get used to internet on the Underground.

This having been said, it must be noted that Wi-Fi is not yet as natural a process as using the Internet elsewhere. The survey also showed that people are most likely to use Wi-Fi when stationary, with 83% using it when stood at the platform compared with 64% when sat in a carriage. It makes sense when the signal on the platform is currently far more reliable and consistent than in the carriage, a complaint that Virgin will have to overcome if they are to expect customers to pay for the service after introducing it for free.

While some may have become wise to the hotspots and ‘good’ areas for signal, the average user feels more comfortable using it on the platform where they know their signal is strong and they won’t be cut off mid-task. A quick straw poll in the office showed that of the 50% of people who say they have used Wi-Fi on the Underground, only 1 person would be willing to pay, the consensus being that a lack of sustained signal and faulty connections simply does not make it commercially viable.

But let us not discount the potential. Research shows that ‘getting something back’ is a major incentive to using Wi-Fi in the London Underground when it comes to engaging with advertising. In an external poll, 59% of people said that, if a poster featured an exclusive London Underground discount code, they would be encouraged to use Wi-Fi and 56% said the same for entering a competition. As such, Wi-Fi is a positive opportunity for tube users – while it could make the arduous journey to and from work a little bit more bearable, it could also be a platform for exclusive offers and content. Critically, it is this interaction and engagement that provides advertisers with a new communication opportunity to converse with their consumer.

London Underground has long been an effective space for the advertiser - it transports the comparatively hard to reach, affluent commuter audience to and from work as well as the tourist and visitor looking for activities and attractions. When paired with the average platform dwell time of 3 minutes and a space in which there is little else to do but browse advertisements, it makes the London Underground a unique platform. With the addition of Wi-Fi, there are now opportunities to fundamentally change poster copy.  Long-copy is arguably no longer needed as downloadable content or the ability to ‘find out more’ is just a click away. Consumer motivations and usage patterns need to be understood in order to develop a best-practice approach but the pioneers are already experimenting and discovering the most effective ways to use it.

Not only has it extended opportunities to communicate with the consumer and changed the way poster advertising can work, Wi-Fi on the London Underground also means that a platform historically light on effectiveness data now has the tools and stats to demonstrate consumer interaction. Before advertisers have had to rely on the likes of exit surveys and anecdotal pre- and post- campaign studies. Now, if used cleverly, they can monitor and track engagement in a way never previously possible, something that we at Total Media, with a strong portfolio of London-centric clients, hold in high regard.

Whilst in its infancy, we feel that Wi-Fi has the potential to be a positive addition to the London Underground for both the consumer and the advertiser.  It is yet to be seen if the service will remain free to users and the connection become more reliable.

We anticipate that it will stay free for the foreseeable future but either way, our belief is that both advertisers and consumers should make the most of it and enjoy the opportunities presented. The tube user’s journey home has become a little more engaging and the advertiser has a chance to be part of it. 

We talk about ‘Connected TV’ and ‘Social TV’ as if it is something new. Maybe it’s about interpretation, but if you were to look at it in its broadest sense, both are actually nothing new at all.

con·nect·ed

  [kuh-nek-tid]  

adjective

1.

united, joined, or linked.

2.

having a connection.

so·cial

  [soh-shuhl]  

adjective

1.

pertaining to, devoted to, or characterized by friendly companionship or relations: a 
social club.

2.

seeking or enjoying the companionship of others; friendly; sociable; gregarious.

Source: www.dictionary.com

TV has always had its arms wide open 

 Being ‘connected’ and ‘social’ is part of TV’s DNA. I used to send my “artwork” (I say that in the loosest sense) to Tony Hart, and tune in each week to Hartbeat to see if my dog/horse (depends on your interpretation) had appeared in the gallery. You could appear on TV on shows such as The Generation Game, Strike it Lucky or my personal favourite Stars in Their Eyes. The fun was trying to guess who Insurance Broker Barry from Nuneaton would impersonate. Peter Kay has famously reminisced about the days we booked our holidays via Teletext. “Booked it, packed it, f**ked off!” and You’ve Been Framed was the original way of sharing your hilarious homemade videos before the invention of YouTube.

For years TV has allowed us not just to watch but be a part of shows, ‘vote for your favourite contestant’, ‘enter our competition to win…’ OR ‘press red for more information’. 

 In our industry ‘Connected TV’ tends to refer to being connected to a Television set via the internet e.g. Smart TV’s. These technological advances have probably not advanced fast enough for consumers, therefore 2nd screening or multi-screening, if you consider laptops, tablets + smartphones, has become the new trend and is enabling people to get even closer to content.

Social media is ‘the unofficial PR machine for TV’

43% of people in the UK have used Social whilst watching TV and very often a show is trending on Twitter before it has even started. Thinkbox’s Screen Life study proved that multi-screening and Social TV is driving people back to live viewing because people do not want to miss out on the conversation or have their favourite show ruined because they read about it on Twitter.

We don’t just talk to the person sat next to us or wait until work the next day, because the next day is too late. We can now sit on the world’s largest sofa and have an instant conversation about our favourite shows. 

TV is still one of the most talked about subjects and this is demonstrated by the fact that 40% of tweets in peak are about TV, 1 in 5 adults have shared TV content on a social site and The X Factor has 6.5m likes on Facebook and 2.5m followers on Twitter.

“Hashtags are like a camp fire”

Dan Biddle, Head of Partnerships at Twitter, described a hashtag as the “camp fire”. Something we all gather around at one moment in time to discuss a TV show, for example. 

And the strong desire to be a part of a show is evident, with 35% of the Million Pound Drop’s viewers playing along live. 

But isn’t linear TV dead and aren’t people just creating their own schedules now?

In short, no! 

TV is as strong as ever, people are watching an average of 4 hours a day, commercial impacts are estimated to be up this year and in Q4 last year, 90% of viewing was live, therefore only 10% were time shifting e.g. recording TV to watch later via PVRs, +1 channels OR watching ‘on demand’ or  ‘catch-up’ TV. 

Sky+ launched over a decade ago in 2001 and was apparently going to mark the “death of TV” but 12 years on and there has been no detrimental effect on TV. There is clearly still a need to watch TV live and be navigated to shows by broadcasters, friends and followers. Before I digress into the world of VOD, please take a look at the following link which covers this far more articulately than I would:

http://researchthemedia.com/2013/01/22/tv-channels-algorithms-and-the-demise-of-hmv/

Agencies and advertisers need to be brave

Multi-screening is still in its infancy, and only a handful of advertisers in the UK have dabbled. But there are many opportunities to test and integrate TV & Social, whether it is by incorporating TV companion apps such as Zeebox or Shazam, exploiting the relationship between TV & Social or utilising TV as point of sale medium.

Brands can learn a great deal from this social veteran. Content is king and if you give people something to talk about or interact with they will not just ‘like’ you they will love you. 

Tips for a Social TV campaign:

1.)   Be clear about your objectives

2.)   Think about the role for each medium – is TV at the start of the journey to drive awareness or at the end as a platform to showcase a brand’s content?

3.)   Work collaboratively with agencies and media owners

4.)   Create a campaign that will capture peoples imagination or stimulate conversation

5.)   Create an ad that is engaging, emotive or controversial 

6.)   Ensure that the entire consumer journey is simple

7.)   Tailor the advertising accordingly for different devices

8.)   Put the consumer first – introduce them to a new community, give them something they want to talk about, share, win or play with

9.)   Speak to people at the right time and in the right place 

10.)   Always think about “what next?” 

Last Tuesday, Facebook announced Graph Search, a new search functionality on private beta that will allow people to search for people, places, pictures and interests, all interconnected through likes.

First observation about this new search feature is the difference from Google search, which allows you to find webpages interconnected through links.

The result is a neat feature that can help you find unique information qualified by the stated “approval” (like) of Facebook users. Indeed, I can see myself entertained for hours looking for Italian restaurants that married Spanish people like in London. Or dentists that my friends like, if I was looking for one (touch wood).

However, the average Facebook user is not me. And this is the first fundamental problem with this new functionality. The average usage of search engines is basic and straightforward, a mindless act of discovery where people expect to find what they need without much thought involved. Precisely, this kind of insight is what has driven Google to be working on next generation search, the Knowledge graph, aimed at making search and discovery as uncomplicated as possible. Add to this the fact that Facebook is very much a passive, feed-me-newsfeed kind of activity and you start seeing how very few people are going to make the most of Graph search.

Even if people were willing to assemble more complicated queries to find very specific information we still have the problem of the misrepresentation of real life through likes. User’s collection of likes are a random and incomplete set of acknowledgments. In Music, I might have liked Rage Against the Machine because it was the thing to do in 2009, and yet I have not liked most of the artists I genuinely love. In places, I might have checked in at a random place when I was having dinner with friends but not the other 100 restaurants I truly vouch for.

So what happens when you mix together lazy users and misrepresentative information? People will not use the Graph Search just like to some extent, people don’t use Google+ circles. It is too much hassle. It is too early. Don’t make me think! People will update their status to ask what they need and just have a chat about it. Do you still wonder why people keep asking you questions to which Google has a quicker and better answer for?

That is not to say Graph Search hasn’t got a future. Facebook can help and guide people through searches, and business might want to start ramping up their number of likes. This could create a virtuous circle. Facebook is known for smart agile development and proving everybody wrong so they might be able to pull this off. As of now, I am not that excited about Graph search.