The biggest of these changes is part of Google’s new strategy, who with YouTube have put their stake firmly in the video-on-demand ground by commissioning original content from a range of programmers, all set to debut with independent channels later this year. Some of them are already seeing airtime on the web, such as Vice’s music channel Noisey, which was made available to the public recently. A look at the list of original content creators YouTube have lined up reveals some other interesting names such as the Bowery Presents channel, which aims to livestream concert shows and more intimate artist performances, and content from more well-known media companies and brands such as the Wall Street Journal, the Onion, Red Bull, Jay-Z and Slate. However, the channels that are likely to have more loyal audiences are the niche ones such as one specially targeted at a younger, Hispanic, bi-lingual audience called 123UnoDosTres and one targeted at mothers, called Café Mom. Robert Kyncl, a senior executive in YouTube, said in a recent article in the New Yorker that niche channels are likely to be a success because they give the audience a more immersive experience, a point of view that is tough to argue with. He cites the fact that web channels have very low costs, unlike TV channels that need a 24.7 programming loop and a transponder to get their signals up on satellites.

The New Yorker piece, well worth a read, also quotes Forrester Research which says that by 2016, half of all households will have wi-fi devices, and as people will then start choosing web channels over TV channels, the only way for networks and cable companies to grow will be for them to buy these web channels. Clearly YouTube is taking their strategy very seriously: they already have the YouTube Next Lab, a company created when YouTube bought four-year-old web television company Next New Networks last year, just to coach content creators on best practices.

Web channels like the ones YouTube is planning to host will also pique the interest of advertisers, as longer format TV shows like those currently on Hulu get considerably higher CPMs than most of YouTube’s current videos, which are not more than a few minutes in length on average.

Internet video is also predicted to eat at TV’s traditional hold over advertising revenues. In fact, Accenture’s 2011 Media & Entertainment High Performance Study interviewed a range of broadcasters and revealed that their biggest challenge in the next 12 to 24 months will be identifying new monetization models, as well as the fact that in order to face the future with best foot forward, they will need to focus on the multiplatform consumer – all proof that YouTube is being quite smart with their new strategy.

The US seems to be leading the charge in online TV and video – recently, Netflix debuted its first original online TV series there (in the UK, the BBC has picked up TV rights for it, though it is strictly online-only in the US). The Huffington Post also announced just two weeks ago that this summer will see the Huffington Post Streaming Network come to life, a site that will initially have 12 hours of new programming every day, rising up to 16 hours a day in 2013.

It’s certainly going to be an interesting space to watch. Sit back and reach for the popcorn, all from the comfort of your sofa.

According to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Timeline is a way to better present “the story of your life.” The same will hold true for brands. With the announcement this week, it’s time to start preparing your brand for this important change.

After the transition, when someone looks at your Timeline, he or she will be able to see summaries of the most important events/ stories/ promotions/ etc in your brands history. You’ll be able to feature (or hide) “Stories” (events, images, and other details) in order to create what you feel is the best representation of your brand. Since your brand’s history no longer starts with the day the company joined Facebook we encourage you to go back and add events which weren’t previously on Facebook. Timeline will help brands establish themselves and their heritage to better represent the business and purpose.

We believe the real reason Facebook is pressing so hard on Timeline now is to prove to app partners like Slacker, Payvment, TripAdvisor, TicketFly, Wall Street Journal, Airbnb, and others, that this is a real platform. They have to prove the ecosystem has just as much relevance as platforms such as Android, Windows or Apple’s iOS. As Facebook’s growth has slowed in the U.S., and with the pending IPO, the time to strike is now. Google is raising the stakes in the platform space, consolidating services and boxing out Facebook and Twitter. If Facebook does not pull its users in closer and make sure they spend as much time as possible on Facebook, sharing everything they do, those users could share everything elsewhere

What are the implications to Marketers?

• News feed content, not to be confused with ticker updates, is displayed based on an Open Graph algorithm that factors in the popularity, recency of the post, and the user’s activity history. Post compelling and engaging content more often to increase visibility.
• Historically, Open Graph only applied to websites and pages. With the new timelines, it now applies to applications/apps. Apps are now more interactive and integrated into the social
  networking experience. In a nutshell, user’s networks will see their app activity in their tickers and it may appear in newsfeeds and on timelines depending on usage and settings.
• ‘Likes’ instantly appear in friend’s tickers. Make sure you are asking users to ‘Like’ your brand page. With the help of customized landing pages you can also generate and qualify leads.
• Users ‘Check In’ when they visit a business’s physical location. ‘Check Ins’ are displayed in a user’s ticker for their entire network to see. List your address on your page, as this feature is only available to businesses that list physical addresses on Facebook.
• Brands can feature stories or links on their timeline. This means the content will appear in a large rectangular box that occupies both sides of the timeline increasing the content’s visibility to the user’s network.
• Applications allow users to feature their activities (ie. listening to music, reading a book, watching movies, etc.). Rethink your App strategy as Apps update when used and activities are displayed in the network’s ticker.
• Frequent posts increase your content’s visibility. B2B marketers must also remember that Facebook is always accessible so the standard work week does not apply. Make sure you are engaging prospects and customers after work hours and on the weekends with useful content.
• Users can choose to display a large cover photo at the top of their timelines above their profile pictures. Check out how Mountain Dew is taking advantage of timeline cover photos.
• The ticker displays user activity to everyone in his or her network. This can work for or against you. Be engaging and monitor social activity.

Likes:

Timeline is a shift from a chronological posting of your activity on the platform to aggregated content displayed by relevancy via Graph Rank. Consequently, stories posted when users like your brand’s page may not be shown as the top story on their profile pages for long. Brand likes will be collected together and displayed as a group within the time period the actions were taken. This means that they may drift down the page and be shown with older content. In the same vein, because it is much easier to explore a user’s history on the timeline, older likes will be uncovered as a user drills into past months and years in a way that wasn’t possible before.

New action buttons – “Want”, “Own”, “Cooked”, etc.:

In just two years, Facebook’s “Like” button has become an Internet staple, deployed on more than 2.5 million websites, with more than 10,000 additional websites integrating with the social network each day. But just recently, Facebook members have a new stable of 60 social applications that allow them to tell their friends that they also “Want,” “Own,” or “Cook” something. Facebook and its partners hope the new social apps will trigger an explosion of new sharing by users, tightening their relationship to the social networking company, and ultimately bolstering Facebook’s revenues.

Sponsored stories:

Though the number and format of sponsored stories has not changed on the home page’s news feed and ticker, the number of these promotions appearing on the timeline page has dropped (at least for now). With the addition of the timeline, only two or three sponsored stories will appear on the right hand rail of the page. This seems like a paradox because the amount of time people may spend perusing timeline pages might increase compared to the old profiles, simply because there’s more to do. If anything, promotions on profile pages become more valuable as a result and garner more attention and exposure. This could also be a plan from Facebook to reduce the inventory on the page and increase CPM’s associated with the sponsored positons.

Graph rank:

For a long time, Edge Rank has been Facebook’s algorithm for determining relevancy and filtering the content shown on users’ news feeds. Graph Rank adds open graph to the equation, including factors like how often you or your fans interact with content posted by an app. This rewards apps that are popular by pulling them to the top of the feed and highlighting their use.

“How often will this app be used?” is a question we should strongly consider when designing apps. Apps that only publish stories once (for example, when you first use them) will be less valuable to brands because they are less likely to earn high Graph Rank and will tend to drift to the bottom of the pile. Apps like Spotify, which continually update based on social graph behavior will drive greater user interaction and relevancy in Graph Rank.

What do marketers need to consider when launching on Timeline

Page design/ Cover Photo:

The Cover photo is like your website header — but one that offers flexibility and that you can easily switch out whenever you like. You can use photos, promotional messaging, arty shots, product imagery, or whatever fits your messaging cadence and brand persona. Be creative, the brand can use any photo as the Timeline Cover. If brands want to design something unique, the dimensions are 851 pixels wide by 315 pixels high.

Subscribe button:

Fans have always been able to subscribe to your feed. Now your fans, and even non-fans, can hear from you too. By enabling the subscribe button on the brands profile, users will be able to get updates in their News Feed. Users can use the Subscribe button to choose what they see from friends and others in their News Feed. For each person, you could hide all game stories, see just photos, limit updates to life events and more. With the Subscribe button, you can choose which of their updates you get. Only people who allow subscribers will have a Subscribe button on their profile. If you don’t see the button, you can’t subscribe.

Structuring posts/ Adding to the timeline:

Go through your brands past posts and decide what is going to stay and what should be minimized. Make important posts longer and more prominent by clicking on the star icon in the upper right corner of the post that says Feature. That post will then span the whole page and not be collapsed by other posts nearby, thus becoming more prominent on the page and driving more awareness and engagement from your audience.

Additionally, you will want to add significant Life Events to your Timeline. This will help brands establish themselves and their heritage to better represent the business and purpose. Word of caution, don’t add them all at once because they will post updates to all your fans and will potentially look like spam. Add just one or two a week.

Apps:

The extended role that Apps can play on Facebook is a dramatic shift within the new Timeline-driven, Open Graph enabled Facebook. Apps now create an enhanced ability to drive participation with your brand that can spread to friends of your fans through their news feed, through their ticker and around verb-driven actions that can differentiate your brands. Washington Post and Spotify were among the first to implement around this opportunity and the impressions and engagement that has been created around “listening to” and “reading” their content is massive.

In the Facebook ecosystem, brand amplification can only come from genuine interest, and that means that brand apps must become bigger brand vehicles by being more visible and interesting and integrating a participatory option (as with Spotify) for the user and their friends to play with.

Feed:

One of the biggest changes to the layout is a control feature at the top right-hand corner of each “story.” This feature allows a user to “unmark” a story as their “top story,” regardless of the date. Facebook then takes this information, and over a period of time, programs things in such a way that it automatically (and smartly) edits a person’s feed to reflect this pattern. Since users are then empowered with more control over how their news feeds look and feel, brands with less engaging content will have lower visibility in users’ interaction on their brand pages—if any.

You need quality content, and you need time. If the new Facebook is calling for more updates a day, you need valuable content that is worth posting. Simply updating for the sake of infiltrating feeds won’t cut it- that’s when users will mark you as spam. But if you’re strategically posting remarkable content, then they’ll like, comment, share, and love you for it. Brands need to allocate more time to posting and monitoring the content than before to make this happen effectively.

When posting to the feed, test the waters by posting your content at a different time every day, for a week or two, to identify at what hour your posts perform best. Check Facebook Insights to analyze when you had the most success, and post at those times. According to AddThis, a bookmarking and sharing service, most users click on content two minutes after content is shared. If users are clicking that rapidly, you have to ensure you’re posting exactly when your audience is on Facebook. Otherwise, they’ll likely never see your content.

The old rule of thumb for Facebook was to post regularly, but not more than once a day so that each update received proper attention while simultaneously not being spammy. Posting once a day in conjunction with the Ticker and EdgeRank algorithm means that your post only has a short span of time during which people will likely see it. However, don’t let this lower the quality of updates. When a user sees your messaging in their News Feed or Ticker, and navigates to your page, they’re likely to see all of your other content. While we don’t necessarily recommend posting every hour unless you have a large fanbase on Facebook and are creating high volumes of content, the point is, once a day isn’t going to cut it anymore.

From the zip to the paper clip what this show demonstrated was the 4 key steps that lead to these ingenious yet comprehensible ideas.

1. Innovation
2. Production
3. Evolution
4. Inspiration

For example the invention of the humble tea bag was supposedly a coincidence. In 1908 Thomas Sullivan, a tea trader sold his tea in silk packets, which allegedly some of his customers dipped in hot water to test its quality. In 2007 tea bags made up 97% of the British tea market and we now drink 165,000,000 cups of tea a day!

Another interesting object was the simple canning jar invented in 1892, which was used to preserve food before fridges came about. Even now that we do have the technology the canning jar is seeing a resurgence and is still immensely popular today as consumers desire authenticity and see it as a symbol of quality home-made goods showing how good ideas can last a lifetime.

So how can we come by great ideas ourselves? Some of these great inventions came to together by accident or after failed attempts at making something else. Some came together through collaboration with others, and building upon other peoples work. And some just needed a spark of inspiration from the world around them: so come get inspired, get out of the office and come to the next Inspiration Session!

P.S. The exhibition was not only designed as a walk through tour but was also tailored to be fully experienced on the Internet, so you can still check it out: http://www.hidden-heroes.net

With temperatures dropping below zero and forecasts of heavy snow all over the UK, what better way to spend an evening than with a cup of tea and a film.

The latest addition to my collection is Final Destination 5. A Blu-ray with a twist. The Warner Bros title is the first film in the UK to include an Ultraviolet digital copy.

Ultraviolet allows consumers to store all the films they purchase in a digital locker and lets you play them on any connected device. With Warner Bros, Sony Pictures, Fox, Universal and Paramount together with the biggest TV manufacturers backing the consortium, Ultraviolet is set to revolutionise the Home Entertainment market in the next couple of years.

For now, there are just a few titles available with UV rights and Flixster is the only UV compatible service that can be used to stream titles in your collection.

All major UK retailers including Tesco and Amazon are said to be supporting the initiative and it is likely that in the future every DVD or Blu-ray we purchase, online or in a shop will have UV rights with it and it will be possible to use even more services to stream or download the content on a PC, Mac, iPad or Connected TV.

Tesco have recently launched a similar initiative with Blinkbox, their online movie service. Customers who have bought a physical copy of selected titles are then given access to an online copy on Blinkbox. This service will be complimentary with UV and could contribute to get consumers used to the concept of storing films in a digital locker.

Admittedly you do have to create a Flixster account and an Ultraviolet account in order to start using the service but the process was quick and easy for me and I had my copy of Final Destination 5 streaming on my iPad and my PC at the same time with no visible delays.

Apple and Disney are the only big players that are not currently in the UV consortium although this could easily change once consumer demand for Ultraviolet services grows.

It turns out the forecasts were right and the streets are now covered with snow. With a fresh cup of tea and a brand new DVD waiting I am now ready to press play.

For more information on Ultraviolet visit http://www.uvvu.com/

Author: Salvo La Rosa ( via @salvolarosa)

Sorosh Tavakoli, Founder and CEO, Videoplaza

Videoplaza apparently raised $12 million for its multiscreen ad sharing platform just yesterday. The founder spoke about the following themes in video advertising:

a) Audiences will be cross-platform: they are no longer just via the TV, but use the mobile, tablet, PC, all in very different ways

b) Trading will be automated and sophisticated: agencies will need to have a buy-side and a sell-side strategy. The audience (considering a majority of them will be hard-core fans) for a show like Desperate Housewives may be willing to sit through 2 or 3 pre-rolls before a show, but the audience for something like the X-Factor will not. (In my own experience, if it counts for anything, this is true. I remember sitting through plenty of pre-rolls when Hulu launched in the US because I just had to watch Arrested Development).

c) The advertising ecosystem will be polarized: Traditionally, advertising is heavily skewed towards TV (to put it in perspective, global ad spend on TV was $160 billion, compared to $4 billion for online in 2011. Mr. Tavakoli is of the opinion that this split will change with the rise of mobile use, tablets, and of course connected TV. He says people by nature don’t really want to watch their favourite shows on linear TV (for example, at 8pm on a Wednesday) – they want to be able to watch it when they want to and they have this option with digital.

Paul Wright, Chief Digital Officer, OMD UK

Paul gave the audience a view of how an agency deals with clients in digital and how they are open to trying any new technology that makes sense for their clients. He said clients are pretty smart, they know how many people they can reach with digital but equally they know that TV is important as well. Also, he said OMD gets calls from media owners – up to 50 a day! – and none of them realise that they may just not be right for OMD’s clients.

He also said that depending on who the client is, their digital strategy may be weighted towards content or context. McDonald’s for example are more keen on building the brand online, whereas for someone like EasyJet obviously click-throughs and actual sales are much more important.

He said that despite the reach of TV currently being so much more than digital, digital was much more complex; OMD work with 265 different platforms in digital (where various Google and Facebook platforms are counted as one each), compared to 4 in TV. OMD apparently use econometric models to improve their work in digital. They use technology to reduce duplication and avoid buyers sourcing inventory from the same place. They don’t believe in Last Click Attribution, where people are bombarded with the same messaging till they finally click through and then the media owner is rewarded for that. They are more keen on providing the right content. He said that data is absolutely important but for an agency the question is how to make best use of the client data, not just audience data.

The video market is increasingly becoming more complex:

a) Broadcasters (ITV, BBC, Channel 4 etc.)

b) Portals (Google, MSN etc.)

c) Video publishers (Videojug etc.)

d) Online publishers (Times Online, Cosmopolitan, Metro etc.)

e) Gaming (Miniclip etc.)

f) UGC (Facebook, YouTube etc.)

g) Video technology platforms like Tremor Video

h) Video exchanges like SpotXChange

i) Demand Side Platforms (DSPs) like Tube Mogul

Clients are happy with re-formatting their TV ads into pre-rolls as it doesn’t require them to reinvent the whole ad. Increasingly they will pay more attention to digital for the quality of interaction: they’ll want to know if people are watching whole ads vs. skipping after a few seconds and so on. OMD is testing content that helps them work better, and so open to anything. They are technology-agnostic, and currently testing DSPs. They’re also paying attention to people’s perception of ads to make sure the right content is being served.

In case you didn’t know, Google is apparently launching their own BARB-like audience panel this year. I did some research and found more about this on the ISBA site, if you’re interested:

Google is funding a multi-million-pound planning tool to help brands understand consumer behaviour across TV and online media. The internet giant is working with WPP-owned research firm Kantar to build a panel that will measure TV and online media habits from a single source.

Kantar will recruit a 3,000-strong panel, representative of the UK population, by the end of 2011, with data and measurement analysis promised to the industry by 2012. The aim is to provide brands with a planning tool where they can benchmark the reach and footprint of a campaign that would run across TV and online. It aims to help them understand how leveraging spend between TV and the web can impact consumer interaction through a single source, rather than by fusing together two sets of data.

Google has discussed its initiative with all of the UK’s major trade bodies involved in media measurement including the IPA, the IAB, ISBA, BARB and UKOM. It will look at how its initiative will complement others, such as the IPA’s Touchpoints.

Paul Wright concluded with what he thinks 2012 will be about for digital advertising:

1. Quality content

2. Well-targeted audiences

3. Use of technology to make buying efficient

4. Proof of effectiveness

Maria Cadbury, General Manager, Adconion UK

She spoke about Adconion’s proprietary technology. Adconion is an independent global audience and video content network.

Emi Gal, CEO, Brainient

He spoke about the rising importance of interactivity in video ads: interactive pre-rolls generate 300% higher CTR than non-interactive ones. With technologies like Zeebox, he mentioned that it will be possible to build interactive ads into apps, and drive sales. Brainient is working with clients like ASOS to implement interactive ads on their site. Zappos, for example, saw a 30% increase in sales by putting videos on product pages.

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All in all, some food for thought here and there for people working in the media industry, especially digital.

The British Heart Foundation is a PHD client. We’re working on a campaign for them to raise awareness  of an issue that probably not very many people (including most of us here at PHD, till we started working on this campaign) knew about: the ability of zebrafish to regenerate its own damaged heart cells and recreate new functioning heart tissue.

This scientific fact gives hope that one day, with the help of medical research, we humans too will be able to mend our own hearts if they get damaged – literally and physically of course, not emotionally.

The British Heart Foundation’s Hope Tank is a virtual online aquarium, to raise awareness of their Mending Broken Hearts Appeal and the life-saving research which they fund.

They need to raise £50 million to fund the research – and in as little as 10 years the hope to mend broken hearts could become a reality.

You can help by adding a zebrafish with your name and message on it in the Hope Tank, and spreading the word. You can also watch videos from BHF-funded scientists, read other zebrafish messages, and see who else supports the campaign in your area. There’s also more about the science behind the appeal here.

So do sign up to the Hope Tank and help us spread the word, giving hope to the millions of people worldwide affected by heart failure.

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Several years ago, I knew of a bloke whose pulling technique involved pointing at a woman’s chest as she walked past and guessing her bra size aloud.

If he was in media planning today (and I suspect he’s more likely to be in prison), he might argue that this was bespoke targeting based on an analysis of an individual’s available data.

But, in reality, he was a bit of a freak, entirely lacking in empathy and made people feel deeply uncomfortable.

Media planners would do well to be mindful of the moral of the story in the year ahead: nobody likes a creep.

Because the biggest thing we need to get to grips with in 2012 will again be how best to use the data we’ll increasingly have available. While obviously hugely welcome in opening up exciting new opportunities, it’s the media planner’s responsibility to make sure that data is used for the good.

And, to do this, I believe that media planning should be focusing on three simple things in the year ahead: people, context and behaviour.

People

If media planners remember one thing this year, it should be that there are people behind every number, every click and every cost per action. Not target audiences. Diverse, complicated, emotional people trying to muddle through life the best they can.

It’s more than semantics; it’s a vital distinction. Because target audiences probably don’t care if your sophisticated hyper-targeting follows them all over the internet long after they’ve bought something. People do.

Target audiences spend time on Facebook and so, logically, would want a “relationship” with brands via social media. It’s just that most people seemingly don’t.

Target audiences are ABC1 or 16-34 and all the cliches that come with it (and, by the way, with youth unemployment so depressingly high and the nation’s wealth predominantly locked up with baby boomers, 2012 seems as good a time as ever to question media planning’s preoccupation with youth). People? Well, you get the picture.

Besides, data is increasingly making a mockery of the notion of target audiences, as we see clear evidence again and again that people aren’t behaving the way that demographics or focus groups dictate that they should.

Target audiences (especially those crazy 16-34s) want to adopt the very latest technology as soon as it’s available. People just want things to be intuitive, simple and fun. It’s devices that combine the two that will excite media planners in 2012. TiVo and Zeebox are two to watch.

But, happily, media planning seems to be beyond the stage of predicting that the emergence of one thing will lead to the death of another.

Most media can do most things in some form now, but have advantages over other media in certain contexts. Media planning needs to understand how, when and why people use what and select the right media accordingly.

Which leads us nicely on to …

Context

Like toast without butter, data without context can be dry and unappetising. But data in context is pure media planning heaven.

In that respect, we should all be very excited about mobile. Now, I know we’ve been saying this for years, but if there was ever going to be an actual year of mobile, then 2012 might just be it. By the end of the year, we’re predicted to reach the tipping point where more than 50 per cent of the UK population has a smartphone. These smartphones are basically live context in your pocket and pave the way for precise location marketing, retail payments and relevant content (in the right context and with empathy, it almost goes without saying) on something approaching significant scale.

The challenge and opportunity for media planners is that how brands best take advantage of this is still very much up for grabs, but it’s unlikely to be heavily based around “advertising” as we currently define it.

More broadly, context will be everywhere in a unique year for the UK. The Diamond Jubilee, double bank holidays, Euro 2012, the Olympics and the Paralympics should not only mean we all have a glass of something in our hand almost constantly this summer, but we’ll seem to have more in common with each other as a nation than at any time for a while. Big, shared, uniting context will be everywhere.

Look out for our old friend “wastage” making a comeback as media planners clamour for mass audiences and universal appeal. Whether this is a one-off gig for wastage or the start of a new nationwide arena tour remains to be seen, but it’s a foolish media planner who underestimates the power of the shared experience.

Behaviour

For media planners, we can expect this emphasis on understanding people and context to increasingly bypass attitude and go straight to behaviour.

With so many metrics now available to media planners, it has never been easier to answer the question of what media delivers in terms of actual human actions.

We can look forward to the development of the language of media planning increasingly mirroring the language of business, as terms such as “eyeballs”, “coverage” and “frequency” increasingly look outmoded.

This, in turn, will place greater emphasis on media planners focusing on the right objective. I believe engagement measures such as Facebook fans will increasingly be seen as intermediate measures at best and a futile distraction at worst, unless planners can quickly articulate what impact this has on business performance (and not just for Starbucks or Coca-Cola).

Finally, we should start to see significant changes to how we undertake media research in the year ahead. Analysing claimed behaviour in desk-bound surveys or focus groups seems a strange way to truly seek to understand behaviour and context. Media planners need to don the metaphorical white coats and goggles, and take an experimental approach to research. We will be amazed at what we might discover.

There has never been a more exciting time for media planning than now, as we continue to marvel at the endless opportunities provided by the new, while enjoying the ongoing miracle of the more established. By focusing on people, context and behaviour, I fully expect 2012 will be another year of wonder and discovery for media planners everywhere.

This article was first published by Campaign Magazine. To read the rest of this year’s predictions on topics including production, content and creativity, visit  campaignlive.co.uk.

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 Author: David Wilding (@drwilding)

The Consumer Electronics Show was in full swing last week. Armed with my loyal Canon 350D, my Ray Ban glasses and a bit of a hangover I also showed up in the outskirts of Las Vegas hoping to catch a glimpse of the latest gadgets and new technologies first hand.

TV seems to come out as the absolute winner of the battle for the living room. Smart TVs in particular are set to finally take off this year with Samsung, LG and Sony all showcasing some pretty impressive models that integrate web based content and apps onto the TV screen.

As Netflix, the streaming movie service launches in the UK it will be interesting to see how Sky will cope with increased competition from Lovefilm and now Netflix right on the main screen. And in the USA the number of subscription based providers of TV content via web is even higher (Hulu, Amazon, Vudu movies, HBO Go) so the competition could get even tougher in the next year if the UK will follow the same trend.

Smart TVs are getting smarter, with Samsung having new models able to videocall and with face recognition technology that customise the apps and the settings of the TV set based on the user that is watching.

Samsung seem to be the only manufacturer offering advertising opportunities in their Smart Hub with an advertiser sponsored location on the top right of the main menu and from the second half of 2012 also pre-roll available on some of the third party apps in the Smart Hub like USA Today.

More interestingly for all manufacturers there is a focus on the ability to communicate perfectly between all the connected devices and screens in the house and on the use Cloud services to store and access files remotely.

Admittedly, this is for now limited to devices of the same brand but new interfaces are coming up that allow consumers to access all their media on all of their connected devices which are not manufacturer specific like the M-GO app, developed by Technicolor. The app would allow, amongst other things, to receive bonus content on a tablet while watching a movie on TV.  Which could be a good opportunity for advertising to get brands closer to the TV content on the second screen.

Multiple screens seem to be the way forward. In a Samsung presentation a very over-enthusiastic American Samsung exec (his catch phrase was “There’s the best and then there’s the rest” ) was showing how easy you could control, from your tablet, the content you want to watch.

You could select a film you’ve purchased or a streaming service you subscribe to and then have it play on the big screen.  Tablets become a way to control what happens in the big screen. And the fact that Sky has just purchased a stake in Zeebox makes me think in the UK the big players are probably looking at this as well.

Tablets on show seemed to be cheaper and more numerous than previous years with many really slick Android tablets coming to the market like the Sony Tablet S that is already available and that is shaped like a book with all the weight on one side and very easy to handle or the new Sony Tablet P that folds in two

An Ultra HD (aka 4K) LG TV model was also quite the sight as looking at the screen was just like seeing something in real life.

LG also had some of the best models showing cinema 3D in a smart TV screen and the thinnest TV with just 4mm width. There were also some glasses free 3D TV although those apparently are not going to get produced in 2012, I guess the manufacturers have to manage to sell the ones with glasses first.

One thing was missing this year though: the porn stars. The Adult Entertainment Expo which traditionally runs the same week as CES has this year been postponed by a week. Ironically this year the adult fair will be hosted in the Hard Rock which is where I was staying. As I write this in wintery London, a vivacious group of porn stars is probably having a great time gambling in the same casino table as I was just a week ago.

Probably with slightly better luck.

Author: Salvo La Rosa  (@salvolarosa )

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2012 will see every man and his dog buying a tablet it seems, with sales set to sky rocket.  Deloitte is predicting 5m+ sales of tablets this year, which means the device is set to become mainstream in the next 12 months.  I am a huge fan of tablets having owned an iPad since my wife bought me one for Christmas in 2010 and I can’t praise them enough.  It’s absolutely revolutionised the way my family and I interact with the internet due to how quick and intuitive it is.  It’s ideal for the everyday internet usage that most of us do, whether it’s reading emails, trawling news sites or watching video, the tablet caters to everything from the casual 2 minute pickup to the fully engaged 3 hour session.  Sure if you want to do something a bit more involving with spreadsheets it doesn’t necessarily hit the spot, but for most of us this is going to be the main way we access the online world at home (at least until connected TVs really get traction anyway!).

Given how enthusiastic I am about tablets, you might be surprised to hear me say that I think the tablet, rather like social and mobile, is a pretty inferior advertising vehicle at present.  Yes there are large, engaged audiences to be had, but the ad formats currently on offer just don’t deliver for advertisers at the moment.   Tablets are different to the other devices on offer today and we haven’t yet found the right approach as an industry to targeting consumers on these devices.  Tablets are on the whole entertainment devices which is a role traditionally occupied by TVs, but they are far more personal and interactive than TVs so ad formats such as pre-roll on catch-up TV apps don’t feel like the right approach.  Anyone who has sat through the sheer quantity of pre roll ads on 4OD will appreciate how frustrating it is.  Tablets are also information devices but don’t encourage the type of depth of information that a PC does and also require a far more visually stimulating experience with a trimmed down user journey.  Quite where advertising should sit in this environment isn’t entirely clear, but what is clear is that it’s not about pre-rolls, MPUs and overlays.

As an industry we are not grasping the nettle on this and pushing for the type of formats that will suit the device.  We should be pushing for highly visual, contextually relevant, engaging, socially connected, entertainment led ad formats that stand a far greater chance of being accepted by tablet users. We should also be looking to meet consumers half way and provide them with the entertainment and information they are after through brand created content/ apps or sponsorships.  Tablets are easier to commercialise than mobiles as the rapidly growing trend for ecommerce on tablets demonstrates, but there are questions over its effectiveness as an advertising vehicle.

This is not to say that this can’t change in the future though.  I believe we will find effective advertising solutions in time, but we have a lot to learn and significant developments to make before sizeable budgets are put towards these type of devices.  History teaches us that every new device ultimately needs new ad formats that leverage the capabilities of the device and crucially they also need different approaches by marketers and their agencies that tap into the way consumers engage with that device.  It may well be that we all need to take a look at our approach before we can really make the most of the huge opportunities presenting themselves to us.

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Originally published in New Media Age.

Author: Nick Ellsom (@ellsom)