TiVo Plans £4m Marketing Campaign For July

TiVo plan to launch a £4m cross-media campaign in July to promote its personal TV service (see Personal Video Recorders To Offer Tool For Advertisers) which allows viewers to digitally record up to 40 hours of TV and then replay it whenever they choose.

The campaign will be managed by the group’s newly appointed advertising agency Bates UK and will focus on standard TV channels and press with an additional online element. The bulk of the advertising will be aimed at primary target audiences in the UK of 18-24 year olds and families aged 35-45 and will be supported by other marketing activity as part of the group’s £8m marketing budget for 2001.

The brief will be joint managed by BSkyB, TiVo’s UK sales and marketing partner. Product manager at BSkyB Matt George said: “We are now concentrating on how TiVo will help consumers overcome their frustration with television and allow them to improve their viewing. The campaign will focus on new lifestyle benefits for TiVo subscribers.”

Launched in October last year the personalised TV system allows viewers to create their own interactive viewing schedule. A personal video recorder (PVR) costing around £400 can automatically record specified programmes which can then be paused, rewound or watched in slow motion. Subscription to the service costs around £10 a month.

The new look TiVo website is due to be launched this week following extensive redesign by Razorfish. The site offers more consumer information and an online demo.

The group announced a revenue increase of 42% to $3.2m for the last quarter and as of May 24 has a global subscription base of 200 000.

BSkyB: 020 7705 3000 www.sky.com Tivo: www.uk.tivo.com

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