The Social Path

A new metric for ad success: Keeping eyes away from apps.

This past Sunday, I once again had the pleasure of being the "voice of AdFreak" on Twitter, as I live-tweeted about the Super Bowl ads for Adweek's blog. (I also made occasional contributions to the magazine's Super Bowl liveblog itself, which you can read a transcript of here.)

Amid the frenzy of tweeting about ads in real time, I became hyperaware of how the game and its celebrated commercials kept or lost my attention. When the game grew dull, I was able to cram in more online updates. When a great ad surfaced, I stopped typing and stayed glued to the screen.

I wasn't alone, as you can see in the chart above from analytics service Flurry, which tracks data from more than 160,00 iOS and Android apps. The graph shows how many mobile apps were being opened during every second of the game.

For example, during downtime, smartphone users would fire up the Twitter or Facebook apps to see what friends were saying. When the game got intense (or Madonna took the stage), phones went dark and the TV took hold.

Certain ads obviously drew in viewers. I was one of the millions who couldn't look away from the mysterious movie trailer that ended up being for the board game-inspired "Battleship." Coke's polar bears kept people away from their phones, as well.

There's so much insight to be gleaned from this data, though mostly it just illustrates two points:

• Major television events have become national social experiences, giving us all something specific to talk about. Short of major world events, what else these days brings together so many diverse voices into the same conversation? Whether it's the Grammys or big game, TV's biggest moments are unparallaled in their ability to get people talking in real time.

• Attention comes at the cost of discussion. This creates a tough challenge for the entertainment industry. You want your TV show to be a nationally trending topic on Twitter while it's airing, but you also want viewers paying attention, right? A viewer's natural inclination will be the chat during commercial breaks, which means there's never been more pressure on advertisers to keep eyeballs on the screen and off the phone for just a few more seconds.

Which leads us to another fascinating implication of this data: We might be witnessing a new metric for TV ad performance. Most advertisers simply look at a program's audience size and claim the impressions as their own. But this chart clearly shows that attention waxes and wanes, even if the audience never leaves the room.

Will your favorite brand's next TV ad be enough to keep people engaged, or will audiences find their eyes drifting down to the dreaded second screen?

David Griner is the Director of Digital Content for Luckie and Company and contributing editor for Adweek’s blog, AdFreak.com. You can reach him by e-mail or on Twitter.

The Super Bowl: Now playing on three screens.

A diehard Green Bay fan will be watching the Super Bowl.  A commercial comes on.  After watching, another one airs, but this one doesn’t interest him, so he pulls out his mobile phone while walking to the kitchen to get another plate of wings, typing in a URL or becoming a “fan” of a product he just saw advertised. Then, he sends a text message to his buddy in Pittsburgh to share the experience, along with a healthy serving of trash talk.  In Pittsburgh, his buddy goes online and Googles the advertiser.  He find the website along with the Facebook site, Twitter, campaign sites, etc.

TV. Mobile. Text. Search. Web.

All while getting a plate of wings.  Welcome to Super Bowl XLV, a marketer’s Shangri-La.

It has been happening for years now, but in the current marketing environment we are seeing an emphasis on digital media on behalf of advertisers.  Examples like the scenario above are the reason marketers will be using their big-budget Super Bowl spots as a springboards to digital experiences in social, mobile  and Web.  Why?  Because this will create an ongoing and transferrable relationship with the brands which will extend far past the game.  Marketers know that in order to remain relevant, they need to create an experience that will include three screens - TV, mobile and PC.

So how will those watching the Super Bowl see evidence of this? It may be obvious to some but routine for others.  When watching ads this Sunday, they will find themselves being driven to destinations outside the norm.  They will be pausing their DVRs looking for hidden codes, texting numbers to enter sweepstakes, tweeting in order to effect the outcome of the next spot and telling their friends about it the whole time.  Marketers are relying on consumer behavior and their use of digital technologies to help tell a story that is seamlessly intertwined into the game experience.

But with all the great emerging ways to reach consumers, the one true thing marketers need to keep in mind is to be relevant.  Consumers are smarter than ever.  Developing a marketing architecture that manages to convey the right message in the right medium is the challenge, but the reward is creating an immersive campaign experience that feels as natural to the consumers as getting up from the couch for that second plate of wings.

Chris Zobel is Director of Digital Strategy at Luckie & Company. You can contact him by e-mail.

Photo credit: CarrieA on Flickr