With a lot at stake, Nielsen has been surveying people to find out how many of them skip commercials with their DVRs and how many keep on watching them.
What they found out was that an average of two-thirds of those that have DVRs still watch the ads. A couple of reasons is that those with DVRs still watch their TV shows at their normal time on TV or some, for whatever reasons, simply watch through them; a total of 40 percent do that.
A further finding that could complicate matters a little more is that people watch the last commercial offered in a break most and the first commercial second; the middle commercials are watched the least.
This data will add some structure to the coming upfront and advertising deals between studios and marketers.
There will probably be a push by networks to get more money out of marketers with this new information. Advertisers could also possibly ask networks to change their way of thinking on the length of commercial breaks; possibly shortening them.
“The cable operators that have the subscribers, the programmers who have the content and the marketers have to get ahead of this,” said Curt Hecht, chief digital officer at GM Planworks, the part of the Starcom MediaVest Group that manages General Motors’ ad buying. “They need to figure out how advertising can remain sustainable and effective in the new landscape.”
A couple of other factors that have an affect the marketing side is that the users of DVRs tend to be in higher-income homes, which is already impacting decisions on whether to market on TV, something VISA decided they won't do with their new Signature Card which targets wealthier people.
Also ads geared toward younger people will be watched less as the data shows that they generally skip commercials more than older viewers.
Networks will attempt to use this data to retain advertisers, as many have been gravitating toward the Internet in increasingly larger numbers. When you think it through though, skipping ads is far from the only reason they're moving that way; it's the increasing adopting of the Internet as a major source of media consumption that is the key driver there.
Nonetheless, there is going to be a huge amount of change and innovation going forward to deal with the changing habits and technology that continually challenges the way things have been done in the past.
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