iTV Report: Terms of engagement.

More intelligent measurement systems now in development will provide deeper understanding and do justice to interactive TV ads' potency in engaging the consumer, David Fletcher says.

One of the draws of a job in advertising used to be its simplicity. Decide what you need to say; craft an engaging way to say it; find relevant places to stick the ads; strike a hard-but-fair bargain with the media owner; lunch; receive praise when sales go through the roof.

The industry has developed 'science bits' to add rigour to the simplicity.

Groups help to frame the message; clients can 'pre-test' copy to check whether ads will engage; surveys help identify the optimum placement; ad-tracking, sales monitors, call-centres and web-hits justify repeat business.

Interactive TV disrupts this benign straightforwardness. It adds layers of subtlety to a communications model built around a binary stimulus- response mechanism. This is mirrored by the evaluation processes we use, which tend to count responses.

Viewers who press red opt in to a branded communication that allows them to have a different experience. Direct response advertisers aside - for whom counts usually suffice - it's in the depth of engagement with a relevant few that interactive TV's potency lies. Interactive TV is moving beyond brochure requests - it is here that evaluation models most need to change.

Not that either Barb or Millward Brown should worry - there is still a manifest need to quantify the scale and profile of input delivery and consumer out-take. It's the bit in the middle that needs filling out. While interactive TV is growing rapidly, it needs a focus that almost replicates the process we use with linear spots.