ITV’s new advertising initiatives

Jon Block, Controller of commercial digital products at ITV introduced a series of new advertising initiatives around ITV and ITV Player at Future of TV Advertising Forum.

Ad Explore is a rich media overlay, where users can explore the advertised product and service. It keeps people in ITV Player, allowing the user to explore during the ad break. Results for this initiative so far are very positive for the broadcaster, with advertisers seeing nearly eight interactions per 100 impressions.

Ad Play is a multiple choice question about the product or brand. Viewers get to answer questions about the advert, and a correct answer is rewarded by allowing them to stop the advert. After four exposures, correct message attribution reached 96%. Research around this technique asked viewers what impact they thought these quizzes had on the advert, with the following results: More enjoyable 70%, No Difference 24%, Less enjoyable 6%.

Ad Save allows users to save an advert for when they have more time to watch it. It basically allows a one click mechanism to bookmark the ad, with Block describing it as “interaction without interruption”.

Ad Sync provides second screen synchronised content on a tablet or smartphone. For example, in a recent Rimmel campaign, content appeared on The X Factor app at the same time as the advert was shown on ITV1.