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LAS VEGAS — Media’s challenge today is not in getting audiences to consume media — they are consuming more media than ever before — but in grabbing and holding their attention. Even more challenging? Holding audiences’ attention at scale, which is something that today is done best by major live sporting events like the Super Bowl or March Madness, and live breaking news like the devastating wildfires that ravaged Los Angeles in January.
“People are spending a tremendous amount of time consuming media, but in an ever-increasingly fragmented way,” said Paul LeFort, managing director, local TV client services, Nielsen.
Panelists at TVNewsCheck’s Programming Everywhere event here on Sunday, April 6, discussed the strategies and techniques they are using to keep audiences’ attention focused on their platforms. These can be anything from designing simple but sticky user interfaces to keep viewers in the ecosystem to deploying algorithms that understand user behavior, launching content across multiple owned platforms, and, finally, simply producing content that authentically engages the viewer.
Content providers recognize that they are asking viewers to spend their most valuable commodity — time — with them and so they have to make it worth audiences’ whiles. Moreover, if viewers aren’t happy with the experience or information they are getting on that particular platform, it is easier than ever to go elsewhere.
Audiences Still Watch TV — Lots Of TV
Viewers are still spending plenty of time watching television. According to Nielsen, a combination of live, time-shifted and connected TV occupies the majority of viewers’ media-consumption time.