How to find, connect with and engage Canadian families in your brand story right where they’re most receptive
The Canadian living room is a place that’s at once core to family life, yet being reinterpreted and reimagined by each family member. Canadian families spend nearly twice as much waking time in the living room than any other room in the house, with entertainment and content consumption centered around the TV being the most prominent activity. Combine this with the rapid adoption of personal devices and it’s easy to see that the living room has become a lab for experimental group media consumption—and a fertile, little-studied territory for marketers who want to connect with the Canadian family at rest and play by threading their brand story across multiple screens and touch points in a relevant context and through creative messaging.
To delve into the opportunities for brands to tell their story consistently across all platforms and devices that today reside in living room, Microsoft Advertising developed “The Canadian Digital Living Room,” a top-line actionable guide based on deep, fresh, Canada-specific research outlining how marketers can engage with Canadian consumers along their purchase journey.
Canadian households are increasingly labs for rapidly increasing device use. As a result, despite the fact that TV still rules, there has been a spike in the number of screens of all sizes. For marketers, the biggest opportunity emerging alongside this adoption are the rewards for thinking differently when connecting with the Canadian consumer in the state of rest, play and family collaboration. With unprecedented rates of media consumption by the typical Canadian family, a marketer’s ability to make a lasting impression on a prospective customer is becoming more challenging—attention is fragmented so engagement and innovative media and creative strategies are key.
Media is consumed across a proliferation of devices, not just the family TV set. It’s becoming more interactive and gaming is becoming a bigger component. Social sharing is becoming a fundamental part of family entertainment and changing media discovery as a result. Therefore, marketers face an urgent challenge: media planning needs to catch up to these fairly recent consumer patterns and span the multi-screen reality of individual consumers. Brands need to have the multi-screen ecosystem top of mind when telling their story so that each screen tracks the consumer journey from device to device, with contextual messaging tailored for each.
Despite the dynamic evolution of the living room, it is still viewed by many Canadians with the same reverence of generations past. At 4.3 hours a day, Canadians spend almost twice as much of their waking time in the living room compared to any other room in the house. Family time is sacred and nowhere else is it celebrated more than in the living room. But this gathering has evolved into an integrated ballet of multiple device use depending on activity (immersive vs. multitasking), moving seamlessly from one screen to another, all the while sharing across platforms with family and friends in close proximity and outside the home. Media in the living room today complements this discoverability—not cannibalizes it—and the fluid mobility from screen to screen represents an opportunity for brands to enhance their story by optimizing these devices to work together. Nowhere is this truer than along the consumer journey on the path to purchase. For example, the TV may trigger a need for a product, inciting the consumer to investigate it online, then start a conversation with their network either in the living room or online. The benefit to the advertiser, of course, is higher ROI—exposure to multiple screens correlates to higher brand response (awareness, familiarity and even conversion).
Strategic digital advertising can create personal relationships with brands and initiate conversations and sharing in this powerful space. These conversations can have a strong impact—and reinforcement—in this setting. Having the ability to reinforce brand conversations across all media in this space is essential. As device adoption grows, showcasing digital innovation and exciting ad formats will be vital.
But not all Canadian families are the same
A vital delineation Canadian family experience in the living room is between families with older children (the digital leaders) and families with younger children (the digitally led). The younger the family’s child or children, the more positive the parents consider the impact of technology, whereas the parents with older children tend to report being “dragged along/influenced” by them. This has deep implications on what kind of content is consumed and how it’s consumed, the “gathered viewing” and the receptivity towards screens. Families with older children (11 and up) spend less time in the living room than families with children under 11 years of age despite having many more devices in the living room. Alternatively, families where the oldest child was 2 and under spent the most time in the living room.
How should you take advantage of the Digital Living Room? Microsoft Advertising recommends that you:
1. Embrace: Media consumption is increasing and screen time in the living room is spanning multiple devices. Identify how your audience moves across screens and reach them on rich platforms such as Xbox LIVE, Skype and MSN.
2. Leverage: Canadian families are talking about the content on their screens. Make sure your brand is part of this discussion or create the discussion by leveraging the unique experiences and functionality of the devices in hand. Consider the role of the game console, the mobile device, the laptop and the PC. And remember: the addition of screens increases the effectiveness of your campaign.
3. Customize: Recognize that there are two distinct types of families in the Canadian living room as you employ digital to tell your brand story. This will help you shape you plan across devices as well as media platform such as Xbox LIVE, Windows Live Messenger and Skype. Understanding the family dynamic will also help you create unique and engaging branded experiences.
How can you take advantage of the Canadian Digital Living Room?
Contact salesmk@microsoft.com or your account executive to learn more about the Digital Living Room and the digital media solutions available.
