FEATURE: 2012’s biggest TV advertisers

Jonathan Chambers, AV manager at media planning and buying specialist Generation Media, looks at how much impact publishers and platform holders have had on TV advertising so far, how this year’s investments stand up against 2011 and who the top advertisers are…

TV remains essential to games and consoles advertising, having taken a 58 per cent share of 2011’s advertising spend (Source: Addynamix). It is also an indicator of the health of the market, with changes in retail sales seemingly closely aligned to fluctuations in TV advertising.

The latest available data (up to April 15th) reveals that 2012 TV activity is currently down 32 per cent year-on-year. This is despite there having been an identical number of campaigns on air (67), with each one having significantly less exposure than in 2011.

There was a 21 per cent reduction in the number of campaigns on air (39 vs. 31) in March. Since campaigns received lower backing in 2012, this resulted in a 58 per cent year-on-year reduction in individual TVRs. One TVR is one per cent of a target audience.

The table above gives us an insight into the largest campaigns of each month, and also the year thus far. January is currently the only month to produce a year-on-year uplift in TV activity. This was driven by titles that focused on health and fitness, with New Year’s resolutions firmly in mind. Chief among these was Ubisoft’s Just Dance 3, which achieved a 14.1 per cent share of all games and consoles TV advertising.

The Top Ten advertisers (see below) year-to-date have accounted for 88 per cent of total games and consoles activity.

Nintendo has been the largest TV advertiser in 2012, with the total amount of time its commercials on air being the equivalent of 8.4 days.

However, it could be argued that the firm’s TV presence has been somewhat diluted across its large number of campaigns. Nintendo has the lowest average TVRs per campaign of the Top Ten advertisers.

Conversely, Sega has focused all its activity on the one campaign, Mario &?Sonic, achieving 314 TVRs. This is 369 per cent greater than the average Nintendo campaign.

Mind Candy may be a surprise entry into the Top Ten, but following heavy backing of Moshi Monsters it is now a serious contender in the battle to grab kids’ attention when it comes to online gaming. However, with its advertising aimed primarily at children, its higher TVR level belies its spend.

The Kinect campaign has achieved the highest number of TVRs year-to-date. Further analysis of its targeting reveals why this is the case. Focusing on younger audiences can be far more cost efficient, resulting in greater bang for your buck.

Mass Effect 3 on the other hand has arguably been the biggest release of 2012, yet recorded less than half the number of individual TVRs of the Kinect campaign. It is, however, the most adult profiled and of comparatively higher cost.