A previous blog post demonstrated that spot saturation frequently exists at the end of promotional campaigns, as each successive promotion reaches fewer and fewer new viewers.  The same viewers see the promotion over and over again, while desirable viewers on other channels fail to see the promo even once.  The blog post showed that by swapping saturated spots across networks, unique reach could be significantly increased for those spots.

A recent study expands upon this analysis by considering audience targeting in addition to simply maximizing unique reach.  Also, spots are swapped across four programs instead of just two.

We started by selecting four MTV Networks programs with large numbers of on-channel promotions in August 2009, and identified each program’s target segment among the 25 Simulmedia genre-based audiences, based on past viewing behavior of the segments.  We then selected specific saturated spots in each promotional plan and swapped them to another of the channels in order to maximize reach into the target audience.

The programs, target segments, and destinations are as follows:

 We then calculated the increased reach into the target audience for each program after the swaps had occurred.  In each case, the swapped spots reached at least twice as many previously unexposed viewers in the target segment compared to before the swaps.  In the case of the promos for How’d You Get So Rich, the swapped spots reached 17 times more new Honey I’m Homers than they had before the swap.

In addition to the significant increase in targeted reach, the swaps also led to a significant increase in gross reach, with all swapped spots reaching at least 24% more new viewers.

The ultimate goal would be to create a system that allows us to quickly calculate the marginal benefit of swapping any spot with any other spot on any network, as opposed to first having to select a finite number of channels for the analysis.