Mobile is the new... CANVAS. It’s how we express ourselves and receive the expression of others.
Mobile is the new... ROMANCE. Wallet and smartphone - two things we hold in our pockets - pressed up against each other - really quite intimately - and for many of us in this room, it is our stately task to take them to the third date. General: What have been the best approaches to mobile monetization in your experience? More specifically: 1. Cross Platform - How to combine TV’s broad reach with mobile’s ability to get personal - 85% of us sleep with our phones within 2 feet of our heads - According to BBDO’s CMO, the vast majority of us touch our phones first thing in the morning (rather than the person sleeping next to us) 2. New opportunities for advertisers? (Carriers)
Mobile is the new... NEW DIRECTION. Up - whereas Copernicus looked to the heavens for inspiration, we now look to our smart screens as a source of awe and guidance Down - the gravity of the worlds events and the reflection pools of our own lives are tracked in minute increments within the confines of an app Left & Right - our political opinions are questioned and emboldened by the insights we receive and express via mobile browsers North Star - beyond simple GPS, our smart devices guide us in virtually everything that we do - they are beacons that lead us in one direction or another allowing to gauge the literal temperature outside as well as the figurative temperature of the relationships inside our work places, our homes and our social institutions Astrophysics or Natural Law - in the end, we orbit our devices just as satellites orbit the earth - feeding information (images, statistics, patterns of behavior) back and forth in a rarely interrupted LTE dance. Someone recently asked me what's next? What comes in the PM - post-mobile? And I laughed to myself a bit and replied, well it's probably just more mobile. I mean, it's not like Samsung is going to invent a 2 lbs 70" LCD flat screen that we will tote around under our arms, stopping every so often to catch Sportscenter. No, instead we will see further fragmentation and then consolidation on mobile/tablet screen sizes. JZ recently said that it's not like traditional linear advertisers treat a 63" tv differently than a 25" screen... Ultimately, it's just more of the same. At some point an ad will no longer be linear or digital or tablet or mobile... It will simply be optimized by the mode and medium of content access.
Mobile is the new ... PERIODICAL Apps like these (Flipboard, Zite, etc) have become an amazing canvas from which mobile readers paint the " new " periodical . The question then becomes: how do we migrate these media grazers into enthusiasts for dedicated sites (mobile, online or otherwise). It's an intriguing and exciting opportunity, to be sure.
Mobile is the new REMOTE. There are over 600,000 apps - and when you remove all the versions of Angry Birds and With Friends - there are over 100,000 opportunities for you to sit back and tap your way to convenience. Consumers have short attentions spans. How do you tap in? General: How do you balance entertainment and utility via mobile to keep it? More specifically: 1. Second Screen - cases where we are using apps as the LITERAL remote. 2. Tune in - more generally social + mobile is the place where you hear about new shows and where the conversation happens around tentpole events
Mobile is the new LABORATORY. Experimentation is a good thing. Some things work, many do not. What a decadent opportunity to embrace all things mobile to help define the next best approach, philosophy or case study. We can learn a lot about ourselves by looking closely at our mobile behavior. How we interact with the world and reinforce what’s important to us. Whether through augmented reality or app-based reminders, we navigate the world more and more through a digital lens. General: From Spike to Vh1, from MTV to Country Music Television, VMN supports a healthy diet of programming for a multitude of audiences. What have been your learnings when applying customization vs. standardization? More specifically: 1. There are numerous options when it comes to mobile: SMS, MMS, 2D Barcodes and Audio Tagging, Apps, Mobile Web, Mobile Video and Rich Media, Augmented Reality... where do you draw the line between sampling new technology and defining a corporate-wide path of adoption. [JZ Note: We have a prescribed way we evaluate new platforms... and that is through testing.]
Mobile is the new CIGARETTE. Being alone in a pub or restaurant is a lonely experience. But with a phone in our hand, we seem industrious and indispensable (I’m closing a million dollar deal), we attain the illusion of popularity (I'm connected with a world of friends), we achieve what we always aspire to among strangers: an air of mystery. I’ve recently heard that on average, we check our smartphones more than 40 times a day.. so maybe mobile is the new chain smoking... General: How do you keep the audience focused on your content when there’s so much digital noise out there? How do you consistently feed the fix? [JZ notes: 1. We design experiences to get consumers in and out so they can quickly scratch that itch during mobile “breaks” (short bloggy content works, daily show app is headlines) 2. We assume that people are viewing our content in a public setting (we fade audio on video clips in)]
Mobile is the new NANNY. We all assume multiple roles in our lives: you, for instance, are a Brooklynite, a commuter, a father, a husband, a son, a brother, a mentor, a friend, an adjunct professor, a boss, an employee, etc. Most likely, VMN has content that speaks to you in each of these capacities. For me, as a father, I know that the Dora ABC’s app and the Team UmiZoomi app on my son’s iPad offers a near-instantaneous solve for any fussy moments. I’m sure you could volunteer similar war stories as a young father. General: But as a media industry leader, how do you embrace this next generation of content enthusiasts? [DG note - this may be where where JZ can talk about how the tablet (and even the Pantech device you mentioned that sells at Walmart for a steal) are growing exponentially, and how tablets are the screen of choice for kids bc its their size and they own it and control it... and for kids, having something that is theirs is important]
Mobile is the new MAKEUP. The assembly of apps on our phones are reflections of our personality...how we connect with the world around us. Participatory media is a mainstay. Viacom Media Networks has a trove of tentpole events - the school calendar is bookended between the MTV Video Music Awards and the MTV Movie Awards (which aired this past Sunday). General: How do you reinforce interactive opportunities when connecting to your audience across such divergent demographics... in the case of politics, Comedy Central’s Indecision 2012 coverage to Nickelodeon’s Kids Pick the President telecast? [JZ Notes: 1. Our consumers see sharing our content as making a statement about themselves - the newest bands from MTV, the funniest clips from tosh.o, the most incisive political criticism from Daily Show or Colbert 2. They also want to use mobile to effect TV (our consumers tweet directly at the cast and those who don’t respond are dead to them)]
Mobile is the new BIG SCREEN. I’ve worked with your teams in some capacity for almost 6 years, and consistently, I feel there has been a mobile-first approach, not just a mobile-me-too approach. General: Are we past debating whether mobile is still an appropriate part of the digital mix and if so, is multiscreen an absolute requirement? More specifically: How do you continue to innovate and embrace multiscreen and what are some things we might see down the road?
Mobile is the new DISTRIBUTION. Every day, an increasing percentage of video content is viewed via mobile devices rather than desktop counterparts. Like TV usurped radio’s market share, and digital continues to dial up the heat on linear programming, mobile and tablet are reaching more consumers with the content they want, on demand. At some point, the entire VMN catalogue will be viewable, via stream or download, on mobile and tablet devices. It is an inevitability. General: How do you prepare for this? Do you start with one channel and ramp to the next tier? More specifically: Talk to me about VMN’s emerging TV Everywhere concept. Where are you and what can we expect going into 2013?
Mobile is the new ... DUH Do we need any more studies talking about how important, relevant, amazing, paradigm-shifting that mobile is?
Mobile is the new PERSONALITY. I think and hope we’ve discussed some interesting topics here - how the established media is beginning to think more symmetrically about mobile, digital and television. When prepping for this session, we chatted about how it’s hard, sometimes, to separate ourselves from this bubble of New York City, where we are all super-connected, where everyone carries a smartphone (if not more than one), where media and branding and advertising colloquialisms are part of our daily lingo. As you pointed out, it is just as important to think about how individuals consider all of these elements outside of our metropolis. Here’s a glimpse (ROLL VIDEO) So before we go to questions, if we leave you with one thing today... it’s not just that mobile has arrived and is dictating culture more rapidly than virtually any communications medium before it... it’s that (NEXT SLIDE)...