FreshNetworks Blog

I was at an interesting breakfast event earlier this week, organised by Rebecca Caroe discussing whether brands should be, could be or even are broadcasters. There were three presentations – one about how the BBC had started to think about their programmes more as events than just shows, one on how brands are personalising their conversations with customers and a final presentation on Honda.tv.

Andrew Howells from Zype talked through Honda’s development as a broadcaster and how they were using TV to create a further channel through which the brand could build the customer experience and engagement. How the brand moved from offering additional content during an advert (of the ‘press the red button to find out more’ variety) to having it’s own channel on some cable providers. The interruption model during adverts, it turned out, was not as successful as expected. The channel that people could view as suited them was more popular.

This observation was an interesting one to me. Before I went to the event I was concerned about the title: Should Brands be Broadcasters. In an environment where consumers have greater choice than ever over their exposure to and their discussion of brands, I think there is a danger of suggesting that they should adopt the purely one-way communication that broadcast suggests. The Honda example is good because they use a broadcast medium to allow and encourage two-way conversation and personalisation. Also, by having their own channel rather than pushing their messages to people at a time the brand chooses they are giving their customers the choice to engage when it suits them.

This is critical. As one other attendee at Wednesday’s breakfast commented – he is inundated with ‘personal’ messages to his email and phone. Brands that think they are his friend. He just deletes them all. This is an example of brands as spam. Something we have been seeing more and more of recently.

To combat this brands need to recognise that they are not automatically friends with their consumers. In fact they probable need to wait for consumers to want to be friends with the brand.

Brands also need to recognise that they can’t just push their messages out to consumers  any more. They need to allow consumers to engage on their own terms so they avoid becoming brands as spam.

Watch Wednesday’s event

If you want to watch Wednesday’s event and see the discussion for yourself, you can see the Qiks here.