Can A Soft Economy Fuel the Shift of TV $$$ Online?
Yahoo expectedly disappoints, Google misses. Everyone blames a soft economy. But when the advertising industry goes into belt-tightening mode, will buyers smarten up or continue to do business as usual?
Online has been looking for that spark that signals our arrival. The sign from above that finally gives us our rightful seat at the table with mainstream media. Its hard for me to believe that we aren’t considered mainstream enough yet to stop calling those ‘other’ media “mainstream.” Same goes for rich media. Is Web 2.0 “richer” media? But I digress.
Some say we’ve arrived. Others say we’re in the first inning of the ballgame. Others use even more vague euphemisms to avoid addressing the issue with any substance at all.
For years, the online advertising industry has touted our measurability and accountability as the advantage we have over those other guys. So when media planners and buyers are taken to task, will the online advertising industry really suffer? Or is this the opportunity we’ve been waiting for to prove that we’re the smart way to spend their very limited marketing dollars?
What marketers will ask their agencies, “How many more (cars/bars of soap/insert product here) did we sell?” And more importantly, will those same marketers ask our TV buying brethren to do the same? I’m sure this is mostly wishful thinking, but I can’t help but wonder if a recession and tightening of advertising budgets isn’t the impetus the media buyers need to shift those budgets somewhere they can “prove” that got their money’s worth.
Lost returns to ABC tonight, and I’m going to Carnegie Hall for “An Evening of Music and Comedy with Family Guy’s Alex Borstein and Seth MacFarlane.” The DVR is set, and I plan on blowing past every single ad, just like you. Or maybe I’ll watch the high-def stream from ABC.com tomorrow, instead of the poorly encoded version my DVR records. But I’ll definitely be reading what fans think about the episode, what every clue means, and speculate about how the season will play out. And I’ll be doing that online. Maybe those ad dollars will follow me? One can only hope.
Tags: , budgets, online advertising, recession
January 31st, 2008 at 6:53 pm
Great post, Corey. I hope you’re right. Though, with tightening budgets, I can’t help but think that buyers will stick to “safe” bets, or at least bets that they won’t lose their job over. After all, nobody every got fired for buying IBM…
February 1st, 2008 at 10:07 am
Thanks, Josh. And I gave a lot of thought to that expression as I was writing. Maybe people should be. As a manager, I want to know that my team is spending our money wisely. What do we get for it? What could we get for it? Prove it.
I know people tune in for the commercials during the superbowl. Why? I’m still not sure. I don’t get it at all, but they do. Still,for $2.7 million for :30, you could reach a whole F^&9ckload of people online with that same commercial, and prove they watched it, too.
GO PATS!
February 1st, 2008 at 2:22 pm
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