TiVo lets viewers purchase products from Amazon

TiVo on Tuesday announced it has teamed up with Amazon to offer buyers the opportunity to buy items associated with the shows they're watching via their TiVo remote. The new Product Purchase feature gives television advertisers to promote products sold on Amazon.com via in-show pop-ups that are related to mainstream TV shows. The feature would not only allow the possibility of viewers purchasing products featured on shows, such as a new album or book of a guest on a talk show such as Oprah.

The feature will be available during both live and recorded shows on TiVo's broadband-connected Series2, Series3 and TiVo HD Digital Video Recorders. Technically, any product seen on TV and carried by Amazon can be purchased via the service, whether or not advertisers think to merchandise it, as users can go and search for the product themselves via TiVo's Universal Swivel Search. The Search allows users to find products associated with specified shows, movies, actors or directors.

The service launches today on several shows that include The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Ellen DeGeneres Show, The Colbert Report and Burn Notice. A linked Amazon account will be charged for the purchases with a PIN code providing an extra safeguard against accidental (or fraudulent) purchases from the set-top box. [via Zatz Not Funny]

Filed under: industry
Other story tags: tivo, advertising, Amazon.com, marketing, merchandising