TiVo Advertisers Gain PayPal Payments

TiVo’s previously provided their advertisers and partners the ability to sell products to us DVR subscribers, but come this fall instead of mailing an invoice, linking an Amazon account, or sending the Dominos guy, they’ll now be able to complete transactions via PayPal:

TiVo Inc. and PayPal announced they have teamed up to provide TiVo users with the ability to purchase products featured in interactive advertisements on the TiVo user interface through PayPal, the faster, safer way to pay. This integration creates a new opportunity for advertisers and brands to connect with TiVo users and to turn their 30-second spots and interactive TiVo ad placements into actionable purchasing opportunities through a one-time account link.

Just because you build it, doesn’t mean they’ll come. While The Next Web touts this as “frictionless” TV shopping via remote, I’d say PayPal is anything but. More pointedly, I’m not convinced there’s a significant audience that will purchase products or services in this manner… and don’t imagine TiVo’s prior partner campaigns of this nature fared well. But, hey, maybe I’m wrong. And advertising will become so successful that they’ll follow in Amazon’s Kindle footsteps by offering a TiVo Premiere With Special Offers that does away with recurring service fees. It’s worth a shot!

12 thoughts on “TiVo Advertisers Gain PayPal Payments”

  1. Considering all the past partnerships which no longer exist (Yahoo, Dominos, Amazon (non-video), Lexus, etc), I wonder how long this PayPal partnership will last?

  2. “Considering all the past partnerships which no longer exist (Yahoo, Dominos, Amazon (non-video), Lexus, etc), I wonder how long this PayPal partnership will last?”

    I’d buy a Lexus if it had a TiVo built into it.

    Transparent windshields are overrated. I’d rather watch the teevee as I drive.

  3. Not seeing much of a need for that either Dave.

    Here’s what it comes down to:

    1. There aren’t that many products that fall into the category of “impulse purchase” and many of those that do are less than $10

    2. Of the subset defined above, a smaller percentage have no options, e.g. no color or size or shipping method to choose from. Because as soon as you get past the one-click stage, there’s no real advantage.

    3. “Jennifer Aniston’s Sweater” – the notion that people will see something on a character and then buy it during the show- is just an ad agencies wet dream. They might buy it after the show is over or when they are done watching TV for the night, but there aren’t a whole lot of people who have the impulse for impulse shopping.

  4. I’ve been contemplating the PayPal announcement for quite a few days. Like everyone else, I’m scratching my head as to why this makes any difference. TiVo already has my credit card info on file, they know my address, etc.

    That’s not always the case. Take Virgin Media for example. Adding PayPal gives the consumer another “trusted” avenue for payment and fulfillment of impulse purchases. Perhaps they don’t want the purchase added to the Virgin Media monthly payment.

    For retail TiVo users, they may have purchased lifetime a long time ago and may not have a current non-expired credit card on file.

    To add to this story, a different blog post from PayPal makes my point even clearer. I’ve added bold or italics to emphasize my point.

    https://www.thepaypalblog.com/2012/06/consumers-trust-paypal-for-mobile-payments/

    Consumers trust PayPal for payments

    67% of customers surveyed by Shopvisible had used PayPal or an alternative payment method for mobile transactions, while only 33% had chosen to pay by credit card.

    Today commerce happens any time and everywhere, on mobile phones, tablets, televisions […] the simple and secure functionality of our payment services to wherever our 110 million users and thousand of retail partners worldwide want us to be — online, offline and on connected devices everywhere.

  5. I took the liberty of trimming the cut & paste, Sam, as I know I don’t like when people take my entire posts and Google doesn’t take kindly to duplicated content.

    As for me, I don’t have a whole lot of faith or trust in PayPal and see them as a necessary evil. I’d much rather pay via credit card which has more consumer protection built in. Beyond that element, I find their web site tedious. On the shopping side, there’s not much I can envision a TiVo advertiser selling me through a 10′ interface. I won’t reiterate Alan’s points above as that covers the sentiment.

  6. Thanks for trimming the post! I looked for the repost policy on the PayPal blog but couldn’t even find a mention. I did notice the copyright symbol on the bottom right after closer examination! :)

    Believe me, I agree with you that its unlikely for me or most consumers I know to buy something through a 10′ interface. Its probably more likely that I would click on something within the TiVo app on the iPad.

    Expanding on this, even Facebook has the challenge of monetizing the mobile interface. The TV interface is even more challenging.

  7. “Like everyone else, I’m scratching my head as to why this makes any difference. TiVo already has my credit card info on file, they know my address, etc.”

    If TiVo were to enable home shopping via that method, it would really freak me out. I don’t want to buy stuff via my TV. Of course, if I did, I now have the ability to do so via PayPal. So everybody wins.

    On the scale of TiVo news, this rates about at the level of Chumby…

    Copyright 2007 – 2012, Chucky.

  8. The key is finding the right product and audience. Few people will click the remote to by Jennifer Aniston’s $400 sweater. But if TiVo exclusively focused on selling Pillow Pets during Dora (for example) I suspect they could turn a nice profit on this.

  9. The ability to set up season passes for recurring purchases or wish lists for products would be cool.

  10. I prefer Paypal for paying online – I’ve had several credit cards compromised by online vendors (they saved my credit card number, but shouldn’t have)

    Sure, the bank cancels/reissues the card, but it’s a PITA.

    I already pay for all Woot! purchases & Netflix with Paypal, would be nice to be able to pay for Tivo monthly charges with Paypal as well.

  11. And, see, I’ve had similar problems with PayPal. The most recent, I was effectively tricked into signing up for a recurring fee. By the time I found out about it, PayPal said it was beyond their time frame to handle and the vendor must. After a long and contentious call with the vendor, they agreed to refund the money. But never did. Also had some bad experiences with them via ebay. When it’s working, it’s working. But they don’t operate the way the credit card folks must. Given the lack of protections, I advise folks to not link a checking account. Like I said, for me it’s a necessary evil. And, as Chucky implied, this is a minor announcement in the scheme of things even if/as options are good.

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