... use two or more social media platforms on at least a weekly basis.

Elucidates Viacom Media Networks evp/Chief Research Officer Colleen Fahey Rush: "Our objective with this research was not only to understand what drives our audiences to social media, but also to see how their social media activity impacts viewing behaviors."

"At Viacom, we're focused on creating social experiences that continue the conversation off-screen and deepen the relationships between our fans and their favorite shows and characters."

The study indicates that viewers engaged in an average of ten TV-related activities on social media platforms on a weekly basis, including:

• Interacting with friends and fans (72%)
   
• Following/liking a TV show (57%)
   
• Sharing or recommending (61%)
   
• Watching full clips and trailers (61%)
   
• Searching for info and show schedules (66%)
   
• Gaming or signing up for freebies (49%).

Of twenty-four social media activities tracked, three distinct types of motivation for TV-related social media use emerged:

• Functional (searching for show schedules, news, exclusives)
   
• Communal (personal branding, connecting with others)
   
• Playful (gaming, entering contests).

Of the countries included in the study, Viacom found that viewers in Brazil embrace TV-related social media activities the most frequently, while those in Germany are the least likely to do so.

Read the original unabridged Viacom article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... a product of the imagination.

But with $3.25 million in initial financing from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, change is afoot.

Mr Kaplan will join the Lear Center's director of research, Johanna Blakley, as a principal “investigator” for the new enterprise.

Kaplan spoke last week about the futility of counting page-views, “likes,” and retweets when trying to figure out whether an opinion piece, a documentary film or a television show actually moved anyone.

“Those measure how many people saw something,” he said. “That’s not the same as an outcome.”

Read the original unabridged New York Times article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... the purchase or rental of video or audio content from an internet provider, such as cable television, video on demand or an IPTV video service like AT&T U-Verse.

OTTC specifically refers to content that arrives from a third party, for example Netflix, Hulu or MyTV, and is delivered to an end user device, leaving the internet service provider responsible solely for transporting IP packets.

Worldwide OTTC video revenue continues its sharp growth - with Netflix, Hulu, Apple, and Amazon driving the business.

According to ABI Research, the OTTC market - valued at $8 billion in 2012 - grew at a near 60% increase over the previous year. Continued rapid growth will push the market past $20 billion by 2015.

Much of this will occur as traditional entertainment content providers become more comfortable with new media distributors/platforms.

Comments ABI senior analyst Michael Inouye: “The shift to digital and OTT distribution is accelerating, particularly as content providers increasingly warm up to these channels.

ABI notes that the three biggest markets - North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific - enjoyed year-on-year growth in excess of 50% in 2012.

Read the original unabridged MediaPost article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... the health of the global economy, particularly in relation to the Eurozone debt crisis.

Despite which WARC expects global advertising spend (based on twelve major markets) to increase by +3.0% at current prices in 2013 and by +5.4% in 2014, according to its latest International Ad Forecast.

With the exceptions of Brazil and Japan, all featured markets have seen downgrades to their forecasts for 2013 compared with WARC's November 2012  report.

The Eurozone countries will all see flat or negative growth in advertising spemajor political or sportind for 2013.

Comments WARC's Data and Journals Director Suzy Young: "With few major political or sporting events this year, global advertising spend growth was always expected to be slower than in 2012. The Eurozone debt crisis also continues to depress growth both among member countries and abroad. To offset this, global adspend will be reliant on a solid performance from the US and strong growth from emerging markets."

Read the original unabridged WARC article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... doesn't require users to hit "record".

Instead algorithms learn what viewers like and recommend new shows. The device also offers easy sync with social networks, effortless co-viewing with friends far away, video on tablets, phones and other screen devices, plus seamless integration of traditional TV and web content.

Hypes AdAge: "Now imagine all of that comes in a beautiful box with a front-facing camera and the kind of industrial design that makes you not want to hide it in a cabinet."

Most significantly, however, the device has progressed far beyond the drawing board. It is built and in the hands of a select few secret testers at media companies, agencies and, of course, Intel's headquarters in Santa Clara, California.

As yet Intel has not announced a name, a price or a release date. However, those who have seen the device describe it as a significant advance over any existing cable or satellite platform.

Group M's Michael Bologna has spent several hours testing the box and declares: "I'm impressed because Intel makes chips [and] no one expected them to come out with a product like this."

Notes AdAge: "Silicon Valley has the best interface designers in the world, but until now efforts to apply that expertise to TV have led to false starts like Google TV and other products such as Apple TV and Xbox Live."

But, stresses the AdAge article, no one expects Intel to become a TV power overnight.

Nontheless, Intel TV represents an interesting challenge for cable and telcos, which as of now do not offer TV service outside their own wired footprint. Each new customer who opts for Intel TV is a customer walking away from the "bundle" of services that cable and telcos sell, among them broadband, TV and phone.

Read the original unabridged AdAge article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... $75 billion, an increase of 14% over five years.

At the current rate, it will be some time before digital ad spending surpasses TV in the USA, though it's expected to grow at a much faster rate (18%) over the next five years.

Advertisers spent an estimated $37.3 billion on digital advertising this year, and are expected to invest $60.4 billion in 2017. (Ad revenues from digital outpaced TV ad revenues in the UK in 2009.) 

Of course, broadcast and cable networks, many of which have built out digital extensions of their own, will partake of some of that increase.

Spending on digital video ads is expected to reach $4.14 billion this year, more than double the amount invested in 2011.

Read the original unabridged Mashable.com article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... placing billboards, advertisements and even truck-sized products in consumers' favorite TV shows and movies.

According to Forbes.com: "The degree of realism that MirriAd is able to achieve makes possible a new reality of advertising and promotion that could be hard [for viewers] to get used to."

Forbes recalls the video in which the Coca-Cola logo that appears behind Tom Hanks in one of the bench scenes in Forest Gump.

Rhetorically Forbes asks: "Did that not seem a tad grotesque? Was the Special K cereal box a little bit too front and center in the Cosby family’s eat-in kitchen?"

But "product placement is not a cutting edge concept, of course", Forbes observes. "Sporting events have used this type of technology for a while now, we see billboards and ads on almost every avenue of any city, and we’re surrounded by marketing almost all the time.

"Just walk through the main thoroughfares of New York, London, Tokyo, Hong Kong or anywhere people congregate. What makes MirriAd’s technology so scary is that it’s quite possible we ain’t seen nothin’ yet".

Should it prove profitable, producers may feel more and more pressure to fill as much space in film and TV scenes with brands, ads and digitally rendered products, cluttering screens with logos and primary colors.

Speaking of which, might politics get into the act as well?

Read the original unabridged Forbes.com article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... single big acquisition that "wouldn’t fit Bertelsmann’s risk profile”.

The company, which last year benefited from the best-selling book Fifty Shades of Grey, currently relies on Europe for 80% of its sales. Rabe, who took office at the beginning of 2012, is overhauling Bertelsmann’s portfolio with a push into music rights, education and emerging markets. 

Says Mr Rabe: “It is our clear objective to grow the company in the next couple of years. Assuming a little bit of tailwind from a recovery in Europe, we expect to grow to €17bn this year and €18bn in the next.”

Bertelsmann’s total global sales grew 4.5% to €16bn last year, Rabe added, although his forecast doesn’t include potential acquisitions.

Operating earnings before interest and taxes from continuing operations will remain at more than 10% of revenue in coming years even as the company invests in new digital products and reorganizes its legacy businesses such as printing.

Read the original unabridged Bloomberg.com article.

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... that whether tactics are digital or otherwise, they'll need to drive positive customer experience and interaction with their brand/s. 

Although companies have been investing in digital marketing for years now, Forrester posits that there’s now "an understanding that on some level, all marketing is inherently digital".

On this basis of this understanding, the forecast predicts that interactive marketing budgets in the USA will account for some $50 billion, or 20% of all marketing expenditures. This trend will almost certainly be replicated in Europe and elsewhere in the world.

Even though companies have been investing in digital marketing for years now, Forrester analyst Corinne Munchbach argues that the attitudinal shift is driven by the long overdue realisation that at some level, all marketing is inherently digital.

As a result, she expects interactive marketing budgets within the USA to account for some $50 billion, or 20% of all marketing expenditures.

Read the original unabridged MediaPost.com article.

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.

... 2.3% increase in 2013 for overall US ad spending - down from the 3.9% increase in 2012. according to an average of spending forecasts compiled by Ad Age.

Comments an AdAge article: "The sports jump is all the more remarkable considering that 2013 is bereft of big events such as the World Cup or Olympics.

"But the bottom line is that in the DVR age, marketers continue to be drawn to live events, whether it's activating massive league deals -- such as National Football League partnerships -- or individual team sponsorships."

 But as they spend more, marketers are demanding more, often making sponsorships part of an integrated campaign that includes multiple channels such as digital.

The upshot is that the deals - which used to be negotiated between a marketer and a team or a league - now involve a multitude of players, including media buyers and TV execs.

Says Jim Andrews, VP-content strategy at IEG: "In the past [such sponsorships] "kind of lived off to the side."

"But now you've got the senior advertising people, brand people, the media buyers in there who are now saying, 'We want to look at that kind of stuff.'

The interest has really risen because they've seen that these type of partnerships really do make a big difference as part of an integrated marketing platform."

Read the original unabridged AdAge article. 

Factual data only is sourced from the original attributed article. The data is then enhanced by additional research and comment.