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Imagine watching TV and being able to
instantly purchase a product that was just advertised. Be it a Priceline deal
or a Dyson vacuum cleaner. Just by clicking on a small icon blinking at the
bottom of the screen. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you tCommerce.
A few days ago, I was talking to a
friend of mine about a project they were working on for a case competition
sponsored by Disney. Something to do with how to make television more
interactive the way Hulu or Netflix is. And it got me thinking. How do we make
it more interactive when it comes to leveraging payments?
When you think about it, television
is probably the only screen right now where you cannot press a button to buy a
product. I don’t count Smart TVs in this mix as they too require you to buy
something through the Internet and not directly when viewing an ad on TV. And I
see this changing in the next few years. It has to.
The rise of tCommerce
Advertisers spent upwards of $80
Billion on television ads in 2012[1].
Advertisers would spend a lot more if these ads could be more measurable and
effective. And by effective, I mean translate into instant sales. I see this
happening in the next few years, possibly earlier. It will be the advent of “tCommerce”. But to get there, what
does television need to become? The
answer lies in the question “Why do you watch Hulu?” Or Netflix? Or Youtube
for that matter? There are primarily three reasons:
1. More Convenient
The convenience
of on-demand television shows or in the case of Youtube, the convenience of
on-demand video-clips of cute cats and people doing the Harlem Shake.
2. Better Product
Hulu and
Netflix now produce their own shows. Shows that are not available anywhere else.
A lot like television networks. So you go there for the product.
3. Better Experience
When you watch Hulu, you can instantly
share a video if you like it. You can comment on a particular episode.
Instantly Hulu.com allows you to choose the advertisement that you want to see.
It customizes your experience.
 |
| A mock-up of a priceline ad that allows you to register for a call from a priceline sales agent |
So…Televisions already have the product.
They are already working on getting the on-demand part in place through smart
TVs and set-top boxes. But what if they now made your ad experience customized?
As you are watching the ad, the screen flashes
with an icon on the bottom right asking you to click there if you want to order
the product immediately? You have your home address and credit card information
saved on the set-top box, much like you have it on amazon.com. You just click
on the icon, confirm your identity and…well, that’s it. You ordered yourself a
product without having to go online later or do anything else.
For advertisers, this will be
revolutionary. It makes TV advertising a lot more measurable. It makes the ROI a lot better.
It spurs impulse purchases. It limits the need to advertise across mediums. And
that’s what the next wave is going to be. tCommerce.
Is it a new idea though? Not really. Bloomberg Businessweek carried an article on March 03, 2011 about it. According to In-Stat, BSkyB has been using something similar for over a decade making upwards of $325 Million annually through gamblers placing bets on sporting events. Just goes to show that the possibilities are endless.
We will be discussing more
of that in the coming weeks. Watch out for it.
I like the idea and it can be extended to a lot of value-added services and benefits. But we need to think about what we need on the technology side and payments side to make this possible. If we need the buy-in from a lot of players with different incentives, this may become difficult to implement.
ReplyDeleteFurther, if the technology is available, they can also use it to gather "actual" TRP ratings just like Pandora does - if you like this show, click the "Like" button, else click "Unlike" or "Thumbs Down", etc. This might or might not be a big incentive for the media production houses??