TiVo has seen the future, and the future is TV-commerce.
The company is introducing a "product purchase" option, which lets TiVo subscribers buy stuff on Amazon.com as they watch TV. If it works out, it could bring impulse shopping to a whole new level, assuming it's intuitive and easy enough to use.
Subscribers can shop on TiVo through a "swivel search," which lets people buy products (DVDs, books CDs) related to a search for a specific title, actor or director, or a related title, actor or director.
There will also be a "product purchase" option on the TiVo delete screen, so after a show ends, TiVo subscribers will be given the option to delete the show from their hard drives, and at the same time, they'll be given the option to buy products that were promoted or featured on the show.
"We expect more television advertisers will be interested in [the latter] option," says Evan Young, a director of broadband services at TiVo. "If I see a book on The Daily Show that I think I might want to buy, right now I'd have to get up and go to my PC and look it up. Now [customers] can buy it immediately."
Although the terms of the partnership were not disclosed, Young says it's a revenue-share agreement.
"I can say that we work with Amazon similar to the way many of their affiliates do. We participate on a revenue-share basis, but I can't disclose the exact terms. But one thing worth mentioning is that Amazon sells TiVos, so we're motivated to sell Amazon services, and they're motivated to sell TiVo services."
It's not an exclusive arrangement, though, and it's fair to expect both Amazon.com and TiVo will hop in bed with other players. "We're always looking at ways to expand shopping options for customers," says Heather Huntoon, a spokeswoman from Amazon.com.
TiVo's Young says the company may introduce other commerce partners, but at the moment the focus is on Amazon. "We're looking to create some initial success with Amazon. They're already a partner of ours, and they have excellent customer service."
And although TiVo hasn't tested the shopping service yet, Young is already hopeful that the initiative can be expanded to include in-program product placements and other ad arrangements.
"We're interested in talking to programmers as well as advertisers to enable more impulse buys when it make sense," says Young.
The announcement comes just a few weeks after TiVo CEO Tom Rogers made a desperate plea to programmers to get their act together and to start thinking about new ways to monetize TV content online.
"We are very worried for the industry," Rogers wrote in a letter to shareholders. "Because we do not believe as a whole that it is responding urgently enough to the massive dislocations these new dynamics will create ... Easy commercial avoidance in the next two to three years will create such an overwhelming challenge to the economics of television that it will rock the very foundation of the industry. It may well make what the newspaper industry is going through today seem like a minor tremor comparison."
Product placement is widely expected to play a more prominent role in commercial television in the future -- the key question is whether TiVo takes a more active role in making those deals happen.
Image: Courtesy TiVo
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