Online overtakes TV as largest sector

Picture courtesy of the guardian


The big news of today has to be the online overtaking television to become the biggest advertising sector in the UK market. Not only is this news evidence of the ferocious growth of the online industry but it also points to the UK's pioneering position on the worldwide map as the first major economy to see this shift in power happen.

The milestone marks a watershed for the embattled TV industry, the leading ad medium since the 1960's when it so famously became the channel of choice above press for many of the major brands of the day. The resulting years have produced iconic ads, characters and national institutions yet it's dominance has been eroded by the ongoing fragmentation of the media landscape and move into an increasingly mobile and digital world.

Should we really be as surprised as many of the media news sources seem to be? afterall, we've seen these macro trends for sometime now displaying TV viewing in the traditional, family in the living room setting, decline year after year. My feeling is that we shouldn't - it's a largely predictable news story when it's taken into account how many hours individuals spend on the two media channels. It would be wrong however to see this news as 'bad' news for the TV industry - afterall it is simply not the case that we can draw a clear line between what is TV and what is online. If you are to look at a popular TV show now - it will start on one of the two channels but converge across both to where that audience is. it will take in TV channels, interactive websites, twitter feeds, facebook pages, youtube channels, sky+ offerings and additional red button extras.

In this respect advertisers have never had so many options, surely that's not a bad thing, it's just rather daunting and therefore requires very careful planning and expert opinion to ensure marketing budgets reach the right audiences at the right times with the most relevant message.

visualising data

there has been an explosion in the amount of data visualisations coming through at the moment, have to admit I've found almost all of them via people cleverer that me on twitter.

here are a few of my favourites. got me wondering when we're going to start see the cleaner end of these designs being used in the world of brand communication.

three interesting sites to check

flowing prints

geopanch

good.is

hugh de winton

(oh) dear lily

Dan Bull's brilliant reposte to Lily's recent anti-piracy rants.

The content, channel, tone and mash up choice are all the evidence you need as to why Lilly's arguments are so futile in todays environment. As Dan says, it's about readjusting your sails and letting the wind (read audience) take you.

if you google 'lily allen piracy' this video is second up on the organic listings, there you go the power of the web - if only lily understood this (but then again she surely does?)



Hugh de Winton

start with nothing

i think this is a really interesting thread and could be a very positive step for the ad industry if adopted. i previously wrote about it here...and here

Context, Value & The New Marketing Economy

View more documents from Helge Tennø.

courtesy of helge tenno

A great starting point for any activity should be the notion that the communication / idea / campaign / product or service that the brand is trying to communicate is completely valueless until placed in the correct context. When this relevance is achieved, only then is value created.

the key bit here though is that it's no longer exclusively up to the brand to place the brand in the right context, it's a collaboration with the audience. If that initial idea isn't strong enough then ideas suddenly have to get shoehorned into channels and lose credibility

If we always started with this approach, I think we'd see a lot less intrusive or irritating brand communication. The very thing that serves no purpose to anyone and erodes trust in brands across the board.

hugh de winton

alex bogusky on planning

5% - not such a bad stat?

There have been quite a few misleading and confused headlines recently talking about how only 5% of those surveyed would pay for online news. This stat is automatically talked about as a paltry, minute percentage that won't even get near to saving the newspaper industry from the impending doom. My viewpoint is that the future is brighter than that being portrayed should these stats be correct.

3 points:

- It's as if there was an expectation that people would say they were happy to pay for something that they currently get for free. Of course that was never going to be the case. We shouldn't be surprised in the slightest by the stat.

- 5% is actually a reasonable amount and could potentially create a viable model if there is enough extra value / content behind the paywall. 5% of 2 million unique users is 100,000.

- The BBC will always be a player in this debate. It's presence has create a need for innovation from the newspapers, all we've got right now is aggression and bitterness mainly from the father and son combo over at Newscorp.

Hugh de Winton

87 cool things

Paradox of choice

An experience whilst shopping for jeans, inspired Barry Schwartz to explore the concept of 'choice' and it's effect on consumer satisfaction.

In brief, he concludes that consumers are less content with their purchases, and with life in general, due to the plethora of choices that they are forced to make. The implication being, that if you are not happy with your choice, as a consumer, you feel it is your fault. You could have done better - you should have made a better choice. Ironically though, society still lauds 'choice' as a positive thing. People go to stores because they have a large selection, or wide range.

The result of this disconnect, he reports, is that the likelihood of people to participate in / act on something is directly proportional to the number of decisions that they have to make in order to take part, whether it be buying a product or opting in to a service. The more choice, the less the response.

From an action point of view, does this mean that a product has to give the impression of giving consumer choice, but in actual fact, make the decision for them? If this is the case, then it suggests that branding is as important as ever. Also, any assistance in store is invaluable, supporting the strong role that BTL still has.

Although a consumer might think they appreciate the full range of sauces in the supermarket, they're only ever going to leave with Heinz Ketchup.

Ed

digital to physical

You can probably tell by now that I'm a fan of blogs. I read a load of them, write my own and seem to find myself evangelising about them during times when I really should be doing other stuff. It's an online platform but my thoughts exist across every platform, there feels as if there is some of this stuff (well a few bits) that deserve ink and paper and a greater sense of permanance.

If twitter is a constant stream of babble, self promotion and the occasional nugget and the blog is the work in progress, inviting the wider audience to collaborate and improve, the book represents an invite into the physical finite world of stability and permanance. This move from the digital to physical creates value, it's the LP compared to the MP3. For aslong as we talk digital we need to remember the spark that can be created when these same ideas can be transported into the physical world.

As our world becomes increasingly digital, this is an area with ever increasing potential. As the cloud fills up and our shelves empty I think there will be a nostalgia for the days of piles of records, books and other stuff that seemed to define you.

Here are a few sites / stories / ideas on the subject

- Blurb.com - site allowing bloggers to transform their hard work into a beautiful looking book

- top blog it's nice that turns blog into mag

- Springwise spots a trend to create personalised magazines

Hugh de Winton

Nice try but it aint dying, it's changing

I posted recently about all this apocolyptic chat going on amongst those willing on the death of 'advertising'.

It might make a good headline and fair enough who doesn't want to have a rant about the amount of bad advertising out there but announcing the imminent extinction of something like this is ridiculously far fetched.

Now I know this article from jeff Goodby is in Ad Age but take the time to read and digest it. We just all need to calm down a bit and work out what's important.

Goodby has written this as a response to Garfields 'Chaos Scenario' - well worth a read. In fact, Garfield reminds me of some of the characters featured in Jon Ronson's wonderful book 'them'

I guess the theme is adworld isn't dying, it's changing and most importantly this change has made advertising a very exciting place to be for the very large majority of people who work somewhere within it.

Hugh de Winton