Does The Mobile TV Market Need A Makeover?

Does The Mobile TV Market Need A Makeover?

by Amy Vale

Mobile TV is a hot topic right now. It isn’t hot because it’s something new in the marketplace; it’s hot because it poses a unique opportunity to reach consumers where they are at any moment. But is it reaching its full potential? Pricewaterhouse Coopers predicted that the number of people viewing mobile TV in the U.S. will grow to 52.5 million in 2015, a significant boost from 17.6 million in 2010. Mobile-TV ad spending in the U.S. will grow to $1.4 billion in 2015 from $370 million last year. It’s clear that Smartphones and tablets are, and will continue to be, the catalyst for new innovation and growth with mobile TV.

However, despite the exponential growth of mobile across a wide range of industries in recent years, fewer than 25 million Americans watch video on mobile devices today, according to IE Market Research Corp. For broadcasters and networks, mobile TV presents a great opportunity to reach consumers who want to access television content on multiple platforms.

As I’m sure you know, mobile TV refers to television watched on a mobile device. It can be a pay-TV service broadcast on mobile phone networks, received free-to-air from regular broadcast or a special mobile TV transmission format. Some can also download TV shows from the Internet, including recorded programs and podcasts which are then downloaded and stored on the mobile device.

According to the Harvard Business Review, the growing adoption of Smartphones allowed users to watch as much mobile video in three days of the 2010 Vancouver Olympics as they watched throughout the entire 2008 Beijing Olympics- an increase of 564%. As of January 2012, 120 stations around the United States are broadcasting using Mobile DTV. These numbers paint a very clear picture. Mobile isn’t disruptive to the traditional TV market; it’s additive and can extend the reach of a TV campaign to places and times where users would otherwise not have access to it.

A few years ago most people believed that Mobile TV was going to keep growing exponentially. According to a Report Linker study, in 2008 the general consensus was that the mobile TV market was going to grow at a rapid rate with a staggering 50-55% CAGR. By the end of 2008 there were around 75 million estimated users in the mobile TV market and 45% of them were reported to be South Koreans or Japanese.  Over the past year, however, critics have revealed that Mobile TV isn’t growing as fast as they would hope and needs a significant overhaul if it is to stick around and be truly successful.

We cannot reinforce enough the importance of the user experience and handset style for the success of mobile TV. This is one of the major challenges. Power consumption and memory of mobile devices itself are two critical issues.  Reports are saying that current memory capabilities available are not suited to long hours of mobile TV viewing. Many operators are offering mobile TV services, using 3G streaming, but these are constrained by lack of coverage, relatively poor quality of service and 3G capacity limitations. Another issue is that a large number of mobile phones do not support mobile TV due to the actual interface and users may have to purchase new handsets with improved wider LCD display and user interface that support Mobile TV.

The Mobile TV industry requires content specifically tailored for watching television on your mobile device. People need to realize that watching television on your phone is a completely different experience than watching it on an actual television. There is a need for more mobisodes, that is mobile episodes which are shorter (3 to 5 minutes), modifying the content to suit mobile TV.

There are two mobile TV trends to keep an eye out for in 2012. The first is “TV everywhere,” which is the idea of getting a library of TV content to users across multiple screens. And the second is using mobile as a second-screen experience – users watch content on a primary TV and tap into their mobile for an additional experience. If you look at highly-rated television events like the Super Bowl and Olympics, brands should be looking to mobile to complement their TV campaigns. Mobile doesn’t have to take eyeballs away from these TV campaigns; it can be a smart, engaging and “secondary” way to reach those TV viewers. But, this is where broadcasters and networks still have a long way to go in how they perceive mobile. Once they see it as an “additional” tool in their marketing wheelhouse, it’ll be interesting to see what types of innovation and creativity will occur.

Finally, we cannot continue this conversation without considering mobile measurement. We know consumers want to, and do, watch content on their mobile devices and tablets. But do they prefer 30 or 60 second advertisements? Do they typically watch mobile content in their homes, or while outside the home? Do users prefer and recall shorter clips better than longer advertisements? Understanding these factors and identifying where mobile TV is working, and where additional improvements need to be made, will be crucial in mobile TV forward over the next few years. It will also give television broadcasters and networks a sense of “comfort” that mobile doesn’t have to compete, or take eyeballs away from their TV campaigns. It’s additive and should be tapped into if they want to see their advertising revenue rise exponentially.