The category is experiencing fundamental shifts in consumer behaviour with regard to anytime, all-the-time video entertainment. As the mobile, on-demand culture evolves and cheaper devices are more accessible, consumers will continue to drive demand for content, making it critical for brands to develop entertaining franchises. Increasingly, savvy consumers will determine what content is worthy of engaging with, while technology and the web will shape the opportunities. With that said, Branded Entertainment is anticipated to remain on a significant growth path as content migrates across all platforms, becoming the new norm.

In our realm, the category has flourished to become hyper-competitive, with limited opportunities and nominal degrees of restrictions (read as 'Wild West'). This space will not be defined as traditional advertising has been, over the past 60 years. Beyond renting audiences from media owners, brands now have the ability to assemble audiences themselves by producing and distributing creative content that is contextually and culturally relevant (read as 'Entertaining'). Instead of interrupting with out-of-context messages, brand narratives flow seamlessly throughout a cross-media content ecosystem. Resulting with consumers that are able to connect with a brand and engage in more compelling and complex ways than ever before.

Comedy is a critical element to emotionally connecting brands with consumers. Partnering with a comedy series provided Toyota an ideal catalyst to create hilarious and unique story lines. In HBO’s, 'Curb Your Enthusiasm', characters are plagued by the antics of a well meaning but neurotic character and his wacky friends. Everyday situations are intensified and Toyota Prius is effortlessly intertwined into the story lines as a supporting cast member. The content connects viewers emotionally and realistically, taking the mundane in life, and spinning cautionary tales of a social assassin, eating chicken, the perils of dating and catching your neighbour's dog pooping on your lawn.

Larry and his Prius have been seen by over 150m viewers. An Emmy, a Golden Globe and a Prius. Prius has popped up frequently on the show for the past 8 seasons delivering, according to global measurement leader iTVX, significant media value and an ROI over 2,748%. This season averaged 1.5m viewers per episode. Now we know, during 'highly enjoyable’ programming, recognition, positive brand feelings and intent increase - not only did we provide (no pun intended) a vehicle for the action, but we left viewers with a smile on their face and just maybe, a new perspective of the things you can do in a Toyota Prius.