Clear Channel Spectacolor (NYC), has created the Times Square Network™ (TSN). The network, a fully integrated, digital-media platform, combined the TV, OOH advertising and live-event elements and the SpectacolorHD giant videoscreen at 47th St. at Duffy Square.
Clear Channel Spectacolor has hosted viewing events this year for President Obama’s inauguration, the Tony Awards and Times Square’s first “Movie on Memorial Day,” among others. The digital screen also supports mobile messaging to nearby devices and serves as an anchor for experiential marketing programs with Website tie-ins.
Harry Coghlan, Clear channel Spectacolor’s president, said, “We knew that we could enable true interaction with its audience, going beyond traditional one-way broadcasts to create true two-way conversations. This network will give any visitor the opportunity to become part of the Times Square experience, and to extend that experience beyond the physical borders of the Square.”
A collection of short-form segments, TSN programming will be broadcast from the SpecHD screen and on a companion website, and will integrate mobile devices and the Web as both broadcast and interaction media.
A studio will generate live content and serve as a production center. Also, a street crew will roam Times Square with cameras, including visitors in what’s happening up on the SpecHD screen; and a companion website that lets visitors experience Times Square before they arrive as well as carry the experience home after they leave.
“We envision fully sponsored programming that puts you, as the visitor, in the center of the action,” added Coghlan. “Whether it’s interacting live with a person in the studio, engaging with a live master of ceremonies via our street crew cameras, or participating in polling or other group content displayed on the SpecHD board via mobile devices.”
Programs would focus on a single personality or popular interests such as food or entertainment. Other programming in development includes game, news and talk shows, as well as segments supporting major product launches such as films or consumer electronic devices.
“As entertainment, we believe this programming has the ability to create a new generation of Times Square personalities,” said Coghlan. “And needless to say, with this kind of interaction, consumer sampling has the potential to be a major, and very high-profile part, of TSN programming.”
Initially, original programming will be concentrated in a particular time of day. Broadcasts are expected to begin in 2010.
Also available from www.tsd360.com are custom, brand-immersion packages, including consumer sampling, that can be tied to any major event, any major holiday or any product launch.
Events can be anchored at any number of Times Square locations – from Duffy Square in the north, to Military Island, to the new “Broadway Boulevard” pedestrian plazas. Sampling locations can be geared toward commuters, tourists, the vast number of business travelers in the Square every day, and any combination of the above.
Packages could include street teams, all permits and a custom anchor activation site to coordinate and capture results.