Digital experts Jay Hughen, Nederlander; Jason Fahlstrom, Google; and Tim Hennessy, Pandora, spoke on online streaming during EAMC. (VT Photo)
REPORTING FROM HOLLYWOOD, CALIF. — Digital advertising IS traditional advertising, according to panelists at the Event & Arena Marketing Conference. After all, it’s been around a quarter of a century. Yet it is changing rapidly, daily, and the task for the marketer is to stay ahead of trends.
Jay Hughen, Nederlander Concerts, is a digital native in the arena world and his job is “to be as fluid as possible, and ruthlessly efficient – a marketing sniper. There are dozens of digital platforms. I have to figure out which one and what campaign size works well. That’s my daily task.”
Hughen was joined by Jason Fahlstrom of Google and Tim Hennessy of Pandora on a panel on the future of online streaming during the June 10-13 conference here.
The newest variation is retargeting, following a digital consumer with an ad he viewed once on his next landing page. If you pick up that consumer on an artist’s page, it requires approval from the artist or manager, Hughen warned. But regarding retargeting in general, his rule of thumb is to limit retargeting to no more than five follow-up impressions and then back off, lest he be perceived as chasing the consumer.
With 1.75 billion smartphones in circulation in the world right now, mobile devices are the future.
Fahlstrom said of all the time spent online, 50 percent is on mobile devices. “It’s important to remember, 80 percent of the time, when someone is integrating with some form of media, they are actively involved with another device. Think about what you’re doing when watching a TV show; you’re probably also on your mobile device Googling something or on social media.”
Not only do marketers need to reach consumers on every device at the time they might be on that device, but they also need to figure out how video applies.
The main mantra for Pandora’s Hennessy is keep it simple. “Make it a good environment for them to transact. Make it easy.”
Google research suggests 79 percent of live events fans start their research on mobile devices, Fahlstrom said. “We also found that while they are at the show at minimum one of every three individuals is actively involved in searching for information on a future show and looking for tickets.”
That means the trend toward geolocating is critical “having that conversation with the fan while they’re there,” Fahlstrom said.
Less than five percent of Pandora’s total user base is paying money, meaning buying a subscription, so they do not get commercials, Hennessy said. Pandora is about discovery, but it’s also about personalizing the experience. “My 18-year-old daughter never watches cable or broadcast TV,” he said of the prevalence of streaming.
“Everyone wants a personal experience,” he added. “The migration to demand media is significant.”
While it’s well accepted that 18-24 year olds are engaged with YouTube, Fahlstrom added that a recent study shows a 100-percent increase in the number of the older set spending time on YouTube. “I have a 92-year-old grandmother who thinks I upload all these videos to YouTube and she sends me YouTube content constantly. She’s on there all day long,” he said. Digital platforms are not complicated to use, so the shift to online streaming channels among the 55- 64-year-old set will grow.
Platforms can drill down on who the “thumb interaction” consumer is to a greater degree than ever. Pandora asks users for zip codes, gender and email addresses, and can track those users based on that information. “If you look at us as an audience play, you can identify the audience based on that information,” Hennessy said.
Trending artists data is another service in Pandora’s bag of tricks. They know what’s playing, how many are listening, who is listening and what tracks are most popular. “We’re able to go out nine months from now for an advertiser with trending data for an artist,” Hennessey said.
“It’s important to define one or two key performance indicators you want when buying,” Fahlstrom said. “You have to change how you look at it and how conversations are taking place. When you hear digital you think of all these platforms and implementations and how much work it takes to do these things. Those are real conversations happening traditionally in people’s everyday lives. You need to think how each channel interacts with another and how you can measure it across the board.”
That is Hughen’s daily function as a digital marketer. “I could log into 12 dashboards a day to figure out how all my campaigns are doing, but I have to pick a particular metric to figure out how it is successful,”whether it’s an impressions metric, a click-through rate or conversions. He also spends some of his day asking artists for a little bit of participatiom and access to their fans.
“They usually don’t poke me for metrics. If I sell tickets, they are happy,” Hughen said.
A marketer should also look at the point where a user becomes disengaged so they can tweak the creative. There is an eight-second rule, the average attention span of a consumer. And look at where customer touchpoints are taking place and what fans are looking for and attribute that back to each individual platform as to its meaning to that ticket sale.
“We call the ‘micromoments’ that moment when a fan takes an action online, whether it’s a visit to a home page or a shopping cart,” Fahlstrom said. It may not be a full conversion, but there is value to an action learned when a fan visits a site as well, to knowledge of what visiting Ticketmaster is about, for instance.
Panelists advised marketers to choose the right metrics to analyze data. “What is the value of an impression if it isn’t viewable. The impression isn’t measured on the eyeball, it’s measured on the page. The value is the eyeball. You aren’t getting a valuable impression without the customer seeing it,” Fahlstrom added.
Some research suggests 61 percent of people actively watching a video ad on a mobile device are less likely to decide to click out. They are more engaged on a mobile device, he said.
Test, tweak and repeat, the panel recommended. Hughen tests the subject line in an email, and the color of the action button. “Test, test, test,” he said.
Even timing of the email is critical. Early morning seemed to be the agreed upon time for a presale offer complete with password. Sometimes, 5 p.m is the magic hour. It depends on the message and the action desired.
Video content was also recommended, even on the email side, because video content gets people excited and engaged.
Bottom line: Migration to mobile continues; streaming is the future; and viewability is the standard.
And beware of subdomains with your venue name, they warned. You have to be in the digital space, because if you’re not, someone shady might be.
Interviewed for this story: Tim Hennessy, (424) 653-6828; Jason Fahlstrom, (734) 332-6892; Jay Hughen, (323) 817-6107