AMC plans to start selling six-second ads during its hit zombie drama “The Walking Dead”
By Shannon Bond | Financial Times
The 30-second television ad has been dethroned. As US television networks face growing digital competition for marketing dollars and viewers’ attention, they are selling shorter ads. The result? Thirty-second spots, long the industry standard, now make up fewer than half of all US TV commercials.
In the first six months of 2017, 49 per cent of US TV ads clocked in at a half minute, down from 61 per cent in 2014, according to data from researcher Nielsen.
The decline has come as networks air more 15-second ads (36 per cent this year compared with 29 per cent in 2014), more 10-second ads (5 per cent compared with 2 per cent) and more non-standard ad lengths.
