LONDON, UK — In a world of new streaming TV services and video apps, typical executive grumbles pertain to “fragmentation”, “complexity” and the difficulty of understanding viewer behavior.
But what if there were a glass-half-full way of looking at the struggle to understand viewers’ cross-screen media behavior.
In this video interview with Beet.TV, Radha Subramanyam, President & Chief Research & Analytics Officer, CBS Corporation, says complexity can be a joy.
Richer stories
“The question is, ‘Is the job of a research leader harder or easier?’,” she says. “I would say that it’s incredibly more complex
“But that makes it incredibly more fun. It’s actually more fun to deal with the multiplicity of data sources, to triangulate them and tell a richer story of the consumer, than to have one place or one system spit out a number for you.
“So it is taking all of our intellectual prowess and a good degree of time and effort, but also makes the job much more rewarding and fun.”
Linear is alive
When Subramanyam does that triangulation, what does the story tell her?
Subramanyam says traditional TV, while it has evolved to offer digital products, is still big – but often over-looked.
“What we find, in the case of CBS, is a good 70, 75% of viewing is the same day,” she says.
“The overall ecosystem is not just healthy, it is growing, while there’s a strong linear and live play as well.”
Re-inventing TV
It’s more than that. From her vantage point at a company which has rolled out a series of products for digital viewing, Subramanyam says: “TV remains in good health.
“TV works, people love watching TV and there are a lot of myths about younger people not watching TV and so on which are quite false. They just may be watching them differently.
“TV completely supremely works as an advertising medium and delivers ROI for advertisers. It’s a medium that always reinvents itself.”