There seem to be countless ongoing discussions about the second screen. And for good reason. eMarketer predicts that in 2012 about half of all U.S. mobile phone users will own smartphones, and about 25% of all internet users will own a tablet (mostly iPads). Additionally, over 70% of those tablet owners are already using their device simultaneously while watching TV almost daily.
Some forward-thinking content creators are even starting to discuss designing third and fourth screen experiences for their audiences in order to super serve their most influential fans.
Generally these conversations have been very bullish. There are so many ways to foster much deeper engagement with your content when you can give consumers more of what they want within an interactive platform. Providing back stories, deleted scenes, cast and crew interviews, contests, commerce and exclusive access can definitely lead to more and bigger fans of entertainment brands.
But there is one big problem that no one is discussing. What the second screen really represents for consumers is a way to spend time doing something other than watching TV commercials. The more screens we have on hand, the more likely it is that we will find a way to tune out during the breaks in our favorite shows. It’s a simple but scary dynamic – commercials start and we grab our devices.
We often talk about consumer perceptions of advertising. And other than the once-a-year anomaly where everyone actually wants to talk about ads (the Superbowl), it is a generally accepted albeit underpublicized truth that if you ask consumers to make a choice between ads and no ads for the rest of their lives, they will always choose no ads. Even those of us in the advertising industry find ourselves skipping through the best ads on TV simply because ads aren’t the reason we’re watching in the first place. When given the choice, humans prefer to watch their content without being interrupted by advertising.
So while the second screen might be a great vehicle for creating deeper engagement with audiences, more importantly, it is also a device that steals their attention away from the most expensive investment a marketer can make to reach them.
Yes, we can serve ads within second screen apps that are clickable or that can show our videos. And we can do our best to serve those ads in conjunction with what’s being displayed on the first screen in order to mitigate the loss of attention. But we’re still trading dollars for dimes, hoping for a direct response from what are generally smaller, lower-impact ad formats.
The bottom line is that the more we drive consumers to the second screen, the harder it will be to monetize their time and attention.
So what’s the solution? At some point in the future we’ll start thinking more strategically about the marketing value associated with a second or multi-screen content experience. We’ll find ways to make sure that whether an audience is seeing ads on a big screen, a tablet or a smartphone, our advertisers are getting the same or equivalent value for their investment. As the number of options viewers have for consuming their favorite content increases, our greatest challenge will be to find new ways to deliver consistent and platform agnostic value to TV advertisers.
