Virgin Media begins advertising campaign for TiVo

Virgin Media Press release:

Virgin Media today unveiled the first advertising campaign for its next generation Virgin Media: TiVo® Service. Promising to be the best way to watch TV, ever, the TiVo service combines the live TV schedule with catch-up TV, a huge library of on-demand programming and popular web-based applications alongside a market-leading personal video recorder. With a simple way of finding great content and intelligent recommendations based on a household’s telly habits, the new service makes it easier than ever for Virgin Media customers to discover new types of entertainment they’ll love.

Virgin Media’s multi-million pound ad campaign is fronted by Marc Warren, star of Hustle and Mad Dogs. Created by DDB UK, the campaign involves TV, digital, print, retail, experiential and social media, beginning today with three ten-second TV spots and a raft of print ads which highlight the hugely positive reception the Virgin Media: TiVo Service has enjoyed since it launched in December 2010. The campaign continues on Saturday with Marc Warren featuring in three 30-second TV spots, exploring the TiVo service’s simple solutions to the increasingly complex choices facing viewers today. Set against a clean, white backdrop, Marc is faced with a carousel of spinning TVs, catapulted screens and falling TVs, before demonstrating the TiVo service’s ability to search through a wide choice of programmes to find your favourite shows quicker than ever; avoiding clashes by recording three shows whilst watching a fourth; and making sure you never miss the start of your favourite series by setting a WishListTM, providing the viewer with the ultimate control of their TV.

Nigel Gilbert, chief marketing officer, Virgin Media, said: “Virgin Media is leading a much-anticipated revolution in the way people enjoy their favourite shows and our new advertising campaign is focused simply on the great stuff on offer from our new TiVo box. We know the features and functions our customers have already fallen in love with and are making the most of a fully integrated campaign to cut through the noise and highlight these stand-out attributes. We’re inviting people to take a look at our brilliant new service and interact with TiVo’s iconic ‘thumbs up’ and ‘thumbs down’ buttons online to discover even more.”

Guy Bradbury, creative director at DDB UK said “We’ve developed a campaign with the necessary depth for Virgin Media’s new TiVo service. The campaign sign-off of ‘We think it’s the best way to watch TV, but what do you think?’ invites the audience to interact with the campaign, showing the confidence Virgin Media has to engage with consumers which comes from the game changing nature of the Virgin Media: TiVo Service itself.”

From Saturday, Virgin Media’s campaign will invite people to visit www.virginmedia.com/tivo to explore an interactive video journey and discover more of the TiVo service’s next generation features for themselves. From a 1TB hard drive, able to record up to 500 hours of content, the ability to scroll back in time and through the past seven days on the EPG and the ability to rate shows with thumbs up and thumbs down buttons and receive recommendations based on a viewer’s preferences, visitors to www.virginmedia.com/tivo can interact with the site and give their favourite Virgin Media: TiVo Service feature a big thumbs up.