NBC Rewind, NBC’s streaming video site, got some good news this week about audience engagement. Recent research has concluded that 94% of NBC Rewind viewers tend to stick around for the entirety of the NBC episode they choose to watch.
Marketers should be seeing green with this opportunity. Keeping online viewers engaged for longer than 3 minutes was a great challenge in the past. But sites like NBC Rewind and Hulu are proving that people’s attention can be held for longer durations of time. And, if people are sticking around for longer periods of time, that equates to more advertising opportunities.
I, for one, am a huge fan of online programming for several reasons. One is that I don’t have cable, so I can watch many shows that I wouldn’t be able to otherwise. Another reason is that I can watch shows whenever I want. And still another reason is that the advertising is not labor intensive. There are usually 3 commercial breaks while watching a show on Hulu, each containing only one 30-second commercial, so it’s nearly impossible to jump out of your chair and grab a drink without missing a piece of the show. In other words, not watching the commercials becomes more inconvenient than watching them.
I really see online Television viewing as a medium that will keep growing and expanding. The faster marketers can adapt, the better they will be suited to the online viewing environment that so many people are turning to already.
