Using AI to help ITV deliver more impactful commercials to increase show viewing
Analysing viewers’ conversations to inform future marketing initiatives for the UK’s longest running commercial network.
Understanding needs
ITV, partnered with our sister agency, STRAT7 Researchbods, had been running ITV’s Insight Community, The ITV Village, for over 5 years conducting ongoing research with thousands of viewers to collect reactions to commercials. These valuable comments were being underutilised. Which begged the question: was there an opportunity hidden within the vast piles of unstructured data? The answer was undoubtedly yes. By combining each member of ITV’s community viewer information (demographics, viewing habits, etc) with insights from the unstructured data we were able to help ITV understand how to appeal to different audience types.
Connecting data
We extracted 40,000 mentions and created a searchable data dictionary of shows to search through the unstructured text. We applied topic modelling to group together the different areas of conversation, as well as analyse the precise language used by viewers to build a rich picture of what appeals to different types of audience.
Driving change
We uncovered five high level topic areas in the 40,000 open ended responses. These areas included music and soundtracks, the quality of acting and talent, and creating new impressions. These topics were then profiled against ITV’s shows and audience demographics to spot opportunities on how to position shows in future commercials. This research identified a shift in attitudes around generating strong first impressions.
Rigorous evaluation of which shows generated more reaction from viewers and factors which drive engagement provided clear direction on prioritising shows.