Google service for advertisers to view viewers may come to UK

chris

Google is considering bringing its TV advertising service, now being tested in the US, to the British market. It would be its first entry into so-called offline advertising this side of the Atlantic.

The company has been working with the United States' second-largest satellite operator, Dish Network, formerly Echostar, on technology that allows advertisers to see how many people are watching their adverts.

In the UK, Google already has a partnership with BSkyB, under which it is the satellite broadcaster's search-and-video technology partner. BSkyB is keen to improve the targeting of advertising.

Mario Queiroz, who heads Google's product management operations in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, said yesterday the company would look at opportunities in the UK TV market if the US trials are successful.

The Google TV Ads service takes information from set-top boxes to calculate how many people are watching which ads. The platform is built on Google's successful AdWords service, which allows advertisers to "purchase" keywords which, when searched for by Google users, will also bring up that advertiser's advert.

The data from the Echostar trials is being compiled and put in a usable form by engineers in Google's London office.

Sky has a long-term partnership with Google under which the latter provides the search feature on Sky.com and email for Sky broadband customers.

Sky sees the more than 3 million people who have a Sky+ personal video recorder set-top box (about a third of its users) as an obvious test bed for such technology.

Google TV Ads is one of several ways in which the company is getting involved in offline advertising. It is also working with US newspaper groups and local advertisers to help small and medium-sized firms place adverts in newspapers. There are no plans to try this service outside the US.