Exploring television’s connectivity with interactivity is high on the agenda of J. Walter Thompson (JWT), Detroit. This past Wednesday (3/8), the agency unveiled a live TV campaign for Ford Focus in which viewers were asked to get on the Web and help to shape the storylines of the commercials that played later that same evening on ABC-TV (see separate story, p. 7). Additional Focus ads are scheduled to air live on ABC each of the next two weeks (3/15 and 3/23) and then early next month (4/5). In some cases, director Peter Kagan of Santa Monica-based Stiefel & Company had or will have to work with a cast, crew and agency creative ensemble to turn around a Focus spot within 10 minutes, based on audience feedback.
The Ford effort to interactively engage viewers is akin to the recent "whatever.nike.com"-tagged campaign in which spots started on TV and ended on the Internet (SHOOT, 1/28, p. 10, and 2/25, p. 1). Those three Nike commercials were directed by Johan Renck of bicoastal Mars Media and Stockholm-based Pettersson Ackerlund Renck for Wieden & Kennedy, Portland, Ore.
But beyond the latest live television and nike.com examples, other hybrids are emerging—among the most notable being enhanced commercials, which directly mesh traditional TV with Web properties (SHOOT, 1/7, p. 1). JWT, Detroit, and Ford Focus again figure prominently in this enhanced television medium. During last month’s Grammy Awards telecast on CBS, JWT unveiled an enhanced TV spot for the Focus that ran on local CBS-affiliated stations in the Atlanta, Orlando, Raleigh, San Diego and Washington, D.C. markets. The enhanced version potentially reached viewers in households equipped with interactive Internet-based set-top boxes. Viewers could click on their remote control to receive the interactive enhancement and request further information on the 2000 Focus via e-mail.
The interactivity was facilitated by San Francisco-based RespondTV, a provider of real-time enhanced television services. RespondTV added the interactive layer to the Ford Focus broadcast spot, "Parking Lot," which was directed by Scott Burns of bicoastal Tool of North America.
On standard Web television, when certain commercials come up, the viewer can click on an icon and be relayed over to the requested Web site. JWT, Detroit partner Mike Eckstein noted that in contrast, the Respond TV technology "allows on-screen interactivity to take place simultaneously, within the TV program or within the commercial itself."
Eckstein heads a JWT group looking to find optimal ways to target advertising and to make more relevant info available to those targeted audiences. The Grammy run, said Eckstein, was "designed to test the technology…There’s something like 600,000 people in the country capable of receiving this kind of commercial right now. We weren’t expecting a giant consumer response, but instead [wanted] to prove out the technology and work out the bugs." He was pleased with the results.
"Our view," continued Eck-stein, "is to embrace as many of these technologies as we can so that we can be prepared for when it’s more widespread and the household penetration is significant."
JWT, Detroit, has thus far tested the waters with Res-pondTV as well as Wink TV, which, Eckstein said, offers "a somewhat similar capability to RespondTV." JWT has also entered into a partnership with AT&T Broadband and Digital. Though he wasn’t at liberty to discuss certain projects in detail, Eckstein noted that Ford, Domino’s, and Safeway grocery stores are among the agency cli-ents to experiment in enhanced television.
"There’s a new generation of digital set-top boxes coming out that are Internet-enabled," related Eckstein. "Production capabilities will get to the point where we can send distinctive messages into households or directly to people in more of a mass customized way than you typically find. Down the road, the technology will be there to allow us to send different commercials out on a household-by-household basis."
RespondTV’s technology is Internet standard-based and compliant with Advanced Television Enhancement Forum standards—meaning it’s compatible with most of the new set-top boxes (i.e. WebTV Plus, Liberate Technologies, Power TV, Microsoft TVPAC), except for certain closed proprietary systems. Richard Fisher, president of RespondTV, noted that there are currently some 500,000 to 600,000 households with Internet-based TV set-top boxes in the U.S. That figure could increase to between 25 million and 35 million households by 2004. "The market for enhanced television programs and commercials will be enormous," Fisher contended.
Toward that end, RespondTV has initiated an enhanced television producer program, which is an intensive two-day tutorial for ad agencies, production companies, media developers and programmers. The sessions—sponsored by such platform developers as Liberate, Power TV, WebTV and Microsoft—will teach content providers to produce enhanced TV programming, advertising and e-commerce. Trainees, related Fisher, will be exposed to the necessary complement of tools and services, enabling them to produce such content as "the thin interactive layer that we use to enhance commercials based on what the agency and advertiser want."
Though RespondTV has production capabilities, it wants others to be adept in this area to better meet the future marketplace demand. "We need to grow the community of developers with expertise in creating enhanced TV fare. That [production] is not our core business," related Fisher. "We’re an infrastructure company that hosts and serves up enhancements, and delivers data."
At press time, a pair of two-day sessions had wrapped in San Francisco, with another scheduled for March 21-22 in New York. Fisher envisions a regular slate of producer program tutorials being conducted throughout the year. Thus far, participants include JWT, The Weather Channel, ZDTV, SF Interactive, Home & Garden TV and New York-headquartered R/GA.
Fisher noted that the lion’s share of production companies opting for RespondTV training consists of Internet-oriented shops (i.e. iXL, Atlanta and New York; Razorfish, New York), as opposed to the mainstream commercial houses that produce broadcast commercials. But Fisher sees this changing. "There’s no doubt in my mind that in two year’s time, all the major TV commercials will have interactive enhancements produced simultaneously. … Right now, the interactive houses are trying to make inroads into commercials, but not too far down the line, the established spot production companies will be pushing into interactive enhancements." Fisher credited one established spot production house, Atherton, with being ahead of the curve. "Atherton sought us out and has become well versed [in enhanced television]."
Another company participating in the RespondTV program is Culver City-based convergent media/commercial production company Random/Order Information and Entertainment, which already has a track record in enhanced spots. During last December’s Western Cable Show in Los Angeles, prototype enhanced TV ads developed by Random/Order were unveiled at the Liberate booth (SHOOT, 1/7, p. 1). The work consisted of spots for The Weather Channel out of TBWA/Chiat/Day, Los Angeles, Activision via Ground Zero, Marina del Rey, Calif., and a commercial promoting the theatrical movie Anna and the King.
That movie promotion offered viewers the option of clicking on local theater listings to check out dates and times that Anna and the King was playing; tickets to a scheduled showing could then be ordered via e-mail. If they didn’t want to disrupt the commercial or program being aired, viewers could choose to get the movie theater locations, dates and times relayed to their e-mail to access later.
Random/Order teamed with Santa Monica-based editorial/ design house ARTiFACT to devise the enhanced TV spots. Subsequently, Random/Order acquired a majority ownership stake in ARTiFACT (SHOOT, 1/21, p. 1). The two companies are working toward developing an ad lab where agencies can experiment with emerging interactive forms and develop strategies.
Fisher challenged more ad agencies to foray into enhanced television fare. "Why is it that their clients are calling us directly?" he asked rhetorically. Though he said it would be premature to disclose their identities, Fisher claimed that about a dozen advertisers—sans their agencies—have contacted RespondTV to discuss enhanced spots.
