Live Internet Television

I remembered the other day that Fox hosts full episodes of Hell’s Kitchen online, and that I kinda like the show. Ditto Kitchen Nightmares. Dunno why I didn’t watch on Hulu instead, habit I guess. If I associate a show with a network, it’s more intuitive to just go to their site, still, for me.

I loved watching the episodes as usual but two (or, 2 1/2)  things spoiled the fun:

1. There was a lot of buffering and choppiness and if you know anything about Chef Gordon Ramsay and kitchen culture in general, you know half the words are bleeped out anyway. So, to lose more is a hardship!

2. When I used the rewind in an aggressive way I confused the player and got a black screen that I could not snap out of. Ugh.

2  1/2. I was aggressively using the rewind because I was trying to see a Tostitos ad again. Yes, I was trying to watch more advertising than was being thrown at me.

Sound insane? I agree. But, these Tostitos ads were REALLY good. Quiet, set in the chips aisle, with gorgeous-but-normal people musing int heir heads as they consider a chips purchase. The scripts are funny and surprising but quiet supermarket and lack of speach makes them authentic and actually quite pleasant to watch. Especially after all the yelling by Ramsay and crew! The sad thing was, the Tostitos ads are no longer to be found anywhere in the shows, it’s just promos for Fox now. I  may have done this to myself by clicking the “close” x on the bottom of the letterboxed full screen when it said Tostitos (see screenshot above). Hmmm.

Disappointment aside, I will say they ads are very short and sparse for the content and that is really nice.

According to the Marketing Sherpa 2009 Video Marketing Benchmark Guide, ad clutter pushes consumers to go to great lengths to skip advertising. Smart advertisers make their ads more appealing, shorter, and better targeted to avoid becoming clutter.

Advertising paired with online video will need to be less cluttered to be more successful. Advertisers are able to target online audience so scientifically now that the rates should justify a lighter load of ads. Quality over quantity is a winner for all concerned.