Category Archives: television

adserving, broadcasting, distributing, television, viewing

The Netflix Spark: Why the arrival of the SVOD platform heralds a more even distribution of the future for everyone

so yesterday as I was meandering along the freeway in Melbourne I heard the most startling comment on the radio. a contributor to the city’s 3AW station was talking through the highlights of the evenings TV schedule – and suggested that because TV was ‘out of ratings season’ there wouldn’t be much to watch that evening … she gave a special shout-out to Nine who “bless them, were treating us to a new episode of Person of Interest”.

that broadcast TV networks take their foot off the pedal whilst out of season in order to hold new content back for the weeks when ratings is once again tracked is one thing – but for it to be such a consumer-facing matter of fact took me by more than a little surprise. this after all isn’t an industry conversation or debate, but a public radio station – openly discussing the fact that a TV network was “treating” the audience by actually offering them something new to watch.

this rather startling starting point underlines the extent of the firestorm now fully smoldering in the Australian TV market – the spark for which came courtesy of Netflix. on November 19th, after months of rumours and speculation, Netflix finally announced (with timing naughtily designed to crash Nine’s AGM) that it would launch in Australia in March 2015. the response from local Aussie players had been in development for some time. in short:

  • Foxtel, who arguably have most immediate disruption to face, have revisited their pricing strategy across the board and in particular halved the price tag of Presto (their SVOD or Streaming Video On Demand service) to $9.99. in addition they’ve partnered with Seven West Media who will contribute programming to the service from next year.
  • Nine and Fairfax’s joint forces have combined to create the $100m SVOD service StreamCo – with the consumer-facing platform brand Stan. Stan has subsequently announced deals with CBS, BBC Worldwide, MGM and SBS (who will bring their world movies to the party).

all of which leaves us with a three horse race between Netflix, Presto and Stan right?

wrong.

in fact it’s barely the beginning.

there’s Quickflix, Fetch TV, the individual channel catch-up services, Ten have yet to pick a dance partner, the ABC’s iView and of course YouTube – which in July accounted for over 1.5m content streams, reaching almost 11.5m people (source).

taken together there’s increasing volumes of views being delivered to the 50% of Aussies who watch online content. the numbers are already big … according to Nielsen in July there were 2.7bn streams (and that was down on June), and time spent streaming is increasing – up to around 8hrs per person per month generating 6.5bn minutes of streamed content.

and Netflix is still three months away.

the impacts of all this will be significant; in the immediate term there is undoubtedly going to be a firestorm for views and scale – brace for plenty of press releases in the first quarter of 2015 about content deals, views and reach. in the medium term this will play out in a battle for content – with many shows already locked away in local deals, there will be fierce competition between the platforms as distribution rights cycle into play.

the long-term implications will be two-fold. firstly, with increasingly fragmented and diverse platforms and viewing services, advertisers and their agencies will increasingly rely on programmatic solutions to build reach quickly. in addition many advertisers and ad agencies will finally be forced to break out of the ‘advert’ model – using instead platform-neutral content strategies that can adapt to content and context more quickly – generating more relevance for brands’ comms. think native content in video form.

the second long-term implication will be the long-overdue radical shift in viewer expectations. more choice, more freedom to choose what we watch and where, how and when we watch it. this future has been a long-time coming, and has been with some for much longer than others  … as William Gibson so magnificently put it, the future is already here – its just not evenly distributed.

strap in people … because what’s coming is a radically more even distribution of the future – a future in which the idea of being “treated” to a new episode of Person Of Interest by a network, may by as incredulous as the very idea of tuning in to a broadcast network in the first place.

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broadcasting, measuring, phdcast, television

Surviving the Crucible: Why We All Need to Calm Down, Back Off, and GIve Wake Up A Fair Go

in the latest PHDcast Nic, Stew, Zee (we’re still experimenting with the nickname – bear with us) and I talk Melbourne Cup brand activations Twitter’s flotation, the point of branded urls, strategy job titles … and the first week of Ten’s new breakfast show – which it’s fair to say has been watched very closely … by Adnews, B&T, and via a Mumbrella ratings game and by an article or two in the SMH.

Ten-WakeUp-presenters

the context into which Wake Up was born has been unfairly hostile, unduly challenging and way too immediately judgmental. to say that both Wake Up (and Studio 10 which follows it) launched into a crucible is perhaps an understatement, a crucible with multiple drivers:

one, the Ten financial pressure

Wake Up has been given birth by a parent with, it’s fair to say, some financial challenges. last month Network Ten reported a $285m loss and calls for $200m loan over four years to rebuild the product. TV is a cyclical game and networks will at some times be stronger than at others – but there’s no doubt the pressure is on.

two, the predecessor

launched in February 2012, Wake Up’s predecessor was Breakfast fronted by Kiwi Paul Henry, Kathryn Robinson, Andrew Rochford and Magdalena Roze.

Ten-Breakfast-presenters

Breakfast was axed in November of the same year after the show failed to steal ratings share from Seven and Nine. the show also came in for particular criticism of Paul Henry, who I always liked … he was, it always seemed to me deliberately divisive, callous and radically honest – which if you were in on the joke was actually rather entertaining.

whichever way you took Paul Henry, the debate and fate of Wake Up’s predecessor casts a considerable shadow over it’s launch. but in many ways the challenge that Henry in particular was tasked with addressing is the same one that Wake Up faces, that of being different …

the need to be breaking (bad) conventions

because Wake Up is also dealing with the clear and present need to challenge, break and redefine the conventions of morning TV. the opportunity isn’t to be an also-run breakfast show; another desk with other bright shiny people giving away other prize money to viewers just for being conscious and chatting about the latest political non-announcement. rather the opportunity is to create a genuinely different and distinctive morning TV offering … advertisers absolutely want it and there’s no reason to think that viewers don’t want it too.

in many ways I think this a crystallization of Ten’s current predicament: they need to be different enough to create reasons for viewers and advertisers to go with the smallest mainstream offering, but they need to stay mainstream enough to attract the largest possible (monetise-able) audience.

it’s a fine line to tread and its going to take time. time that the industry, with predictable scorning cynical superiority, isn’t looking to give the show and it’s team. it’s disheartening; as Nicola comments in the PHDcast, “I’m really disappointed, again, in the expected critique.  people wanted it to fail … its a week old”.

the truth is that you could have written last week’s commentary six months ago. it was that predictable. time now to step back and give the show and it’s team the time and space they need to craft a third way for commercial breakfast TV in Australia. viewers and advertisers alike need it, it’s our choice whether or not we give Wake Up the opportunity to survive its crucible.

enjoy the PHDcast … here’s team strategy PHDcasters enjoying an awesome afternoon at Melbourne Cup. it is after all the podcast that stops a nation …

PHDcast at the races

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advertising, broadcasting, marketing, mediating, opinionating, television

The Myopia of the 2020 Vision: Why we need a whole load more rational when we debate the merits of Television

Think TV, a marketing initiative of Free TV Australia (the body representing all of Australia’s free-to-air metropolitan and regional commercial television broadcasters), have released the latest in their 2020 Vision series. the episode – the first of series three – see’s industry heavy-weights including Jeff Goodby (Goodby, Silverstein and Partners) and Sir John Hegarty (BBH) discuss (in Think TV’s words) “the importance of broadcasting powerful, mass reaching, messages that connect with audiences”.

its a curious beast. but then communications about communications are always the most interesting of creatures … on the surface this is a straight-forward and very well produced piece of content which talks-up the role and power of TV. but take a closer look and a rather all-too defensive agenda emerges:

some highlights:

“TV is till 60% of what we buy because it absolutely is the best place to be able to tell stories and connect people with your brand” … “we try to use video and television as a way to understand our customer … television is the only place you can do that” Kevin Mayer (Volkswagen of America Inc)

“the use of television is fundamental in telling a brand story and engaging with the audience in an intriguing and interesting way” Sir John Hegarty

“the great thing about TV … is that it allows you to go around the rational objections to a product … you have to find another emotional road to take people along so that they don’t think about the rational stuff anymore” Jeff Goodby

“if you’ve got the funding to do an ad, [TV is] still the one place you can get the biggest change in perception and appeal for your brand” Kevin Mayer

“there are two things brands have to do; they have to persuade and then they have to promote. digital technology has been brilliant at promotion, but if you’re not out there persuading, you’re not growing your brand … now, you can only do that with broadcast, because you don’t ultimately know where your audience is going to come from” Sir John Hegarty

“advertising expenditure globally is about $500bn a year. about $200bn of that goes on television. now, end of argument, alright?” Sir John Hegarty

“most of the money my clients spend is still on TV. I know that its very popular to think otherwise and go, you know, ‘what’s going on out there, there must be new things that we should be spending money on’ … and we end up spending on TV, just because it turns out to be the way to start something, the way to keep something going, the way to chance people’s minds” Jeff Goodby

“actually the internet kind of operates as an afterthought of the best TV commercials … people run to the internet to talk about them” Jeff Goodby

“as television evolves and becomes more targeted, I think you’re going to see an influx of dollars back into television because now you’re going to have efficiency and you’re going to have scale, and that’s where I think television is going to really see its second coming” Kevin Mayer

“we’re emotional creatures, and television is an emotional medium … it’s the most powerful selling tool advertisers have ever had at their disposal, and that ain’t changing – not for the foreseeable future” Sir John Hegarty

to say that some of those statements are subjective in the extreme is perhaps a bit of an understatement, and you could argue that’s fine if the piece was presenting itself as the subjective opinions of very respected industry professionals … but its not; Think TV’s description of the piece is “forward-thinking industry professionals reveal how television is rising to meet new marketing challenges with great success” (source) … which I actually think gets us into rather dangerous territory … because the success is pretty much ‘people saw my ad’, or ‘we emotionally engaged people’ or ‘lot’s of people spend lots of money on TV so it must work, alright’ …

now it’s easy to say that it’s “just a piece of video” or conversely that “these are the opinions of respected, and very successful, advertising men”, but don’t forget for a second this is just one grenade in an ongoing battle for communications revenues. this is about where brands invest marketing dollars – budgets that are increasingly under scrutiny by the companies that invest that money. and we’re not talking about spare change … the video’s own stats point out that $200bn is spent on TV – I think we’re going to have to do a little better to justify that than because television is “an emotional medium”.

it perhaps is no co-incidence that we receive this gem in the same week that online ad revenues overtook those for free-to-air TV. according to a report by the PwC for the AIB, (available to subscribers here), for the first six months of 2013 our industry in Australia invested $1,883m in online versus $1,805m investment in FTA TV.

the size of your spend isn’t of course everything. but it does count for a lot.

I like television. as a planner I value the role television can play in a plan. it delivers reach, often cost-effectively, and it delivers that scale quickly. and whilst, unlike Kevin Mayer, I probably wouldn’t describe the future of television as a “second coming”, I am excited by the opportunities that critical mass in connected TVs will bring.

but there’s a dangerous myopia in this 2020 Vision. statements like “digital technology has been brilliant at promotion, but if you’re not out there persuading, you’re not growing your brand” (Hegarty) or “the internet kind of operates as an afterthought” Goodby, do far less for TV’s case than embracing and exploring – say – the possibilities presented by digital storytelling and how they will be possible, with scale, in 2020 would have achieved.

a very wise man once told be to never let my strategy show. so when a video selling the benefits of TV says that “the great thing about TV … is that it allows you to go around the rational objections to a product … so that they don’t think about the rational stuff anymore” … I wonder whether we don’t need a whole load more rational as we mediate this ongoing debate.

featured image is a still from the above video of Volkswagen’s Darth Vader spot in Super Bowl XLV

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broadcasting, distributing, mediating, television, viewing

Begun, The Distribution Wars Have: How CBS vs Time Warner is only an opening salvo in the long hard battles to come

so that’s it. we’re at war.

as day three of the CBS / Time Warner stand off dawns, both sides are maintaining that they’re in the right … meanwhile three and a half million Americans are going without Hawaii Five-0.

oh the humanity.

for both sides the equation is clear … for CBS, how much do I need to extract from TW (and other distribution points) to cover with margin the cost of content. for CBS, how much can I justify paying for content given the revenues I can generate via people paying for access to the channels on my network? what else is clear is that we can expect many more of these battles to come.

there are two constants … content and people. and its the changing and evolving relationships people have with content that’s causing disruption, instability, and war: War between the factions that create content and those that distribute it. the current siege of Time is only the current battle in the early years of a war that has a long way to go.

the origins go way back and the early battles have already been played out. battles like the UK’s independent production sector versus the country’s commercial channels, or the ongoing rumblings between music labels and Spotify. and at the start of last year Rupert Murdoch – via Twitter obvs – dramatically accused Google of being the ‘piracy leader’ of silicon valley.

the war will only get hotter from here on in. to understand why you need only follow the money. PWC’s annual Global Entertainment and Media Outlook 2013-2017 uses like-for-like, 5-year historical and forecast data across 13 industry segments in 50 countries to compare and contrast regional growth rates and consumer and advertising spend. this is the picture it paints for the coming years:

“Consumer demand for entertainment and media (E&M) experiences, fuelled largely by the adoption of broadband and connected devices, will continue to grow and we expect this growth to follow a similar trend to GDP development across the forecast period 2013-2017. However, given the shift towards digital media — typically lower priced than its physical counterpart — we anticipate spend to lag behind GDP growth.

The global E&M market will grow at a CAGR of 5.6% over the next five years, generating revenues in 2017 of US$2.2tn, up from US$1.6tn in 2012. Within this overall figure, all three sub-categories — advertising, consumer spend on content, and access — will continue to grow, but at varying rates.”

Source PWC Global Entertainment and Media Outlook 2013-2017

two really – really – important points. one, because of the shift to digital media, spend on E&M will lag behind GDP growth – the pot is shrinking in relative terms. two, whilst spending is anticipated to increase, the future isn’t evenly distributed:

“Consumer spend shifts from content to access: The rapid growth in spend on access means that there will be a shift in the share of overall global E&M spend from consumer spend on content (from 47% of the market in 2012 to 41% of the market in 2017) to consumer spend on access (from 24% of the market in 2012 to 30% of the market in 2017).”

Source PWC Global Entertainment and Media Outlook 2013-2017

shift is spending, in real terms, away from content and into access to that content (spend on advertising is holding stable). we’re getting used to paying not for content, but instead for access to that content. whether its Spotify versus iTunes, or HBO’s Emmy and now Cannes credibility, it’s the distributor-networks that are currently strategically placed to gain the most.

but the thing is that the really big changes haven’t even started yet … there’s still a ton of inertia in TV advertising investment – big brands still, I think overly, rely on TV networks to get 30″ messages in front of people. reach is important, but its a necessity not a strategy for communications planning. brands have played for a long time now in being content creators, but they’re only just learning the power of being their own distributors …

new deals, new bargains, new negotiations … emerging between people and how they get access to content. if the old currency was attention through broadcast interruption, then the new currency is data through increasingly direct connections with people. the war was heating up without most major brands shifting even the smallest fraction of resource from broadcast advertising to creating and distributing content directly to people. the dual consequence – more competition for time spent with content and further reduced ad revenues – will see more than the three-day siege of a cable company.

there will be winners and losers, but perhaps the most notable victors in the coming war will be brands. marketing teams that successfully establish and then maintain direct relationships with existing and potential customers by creating and – crucially – distributing compelling and entertainment content.

cry havoc people … the dogs have slipped.

featured image via AP, and the following for no other reason than because I can 😉

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broadcasting, content creating, distributing, experiencing, phdcast, popping up, television

PHDcast 02.08.13 – its not the ooh laa la edition of the PHDcast as we talk TV, The Power Inside and Magnum Pop-Up

Player not working? click here to listen on Audioboo

morning PHDcast listeners. Nic was in the hot seat this week for the not-the-ooh laa la edition of the PHDcast. bien sur 😉 … awesome job Disco

much of the debate this week was in and around TV watching – how it’s changing and what the implications are, especially for brands. I wrote about some of the aspects of this in my post on Friday, but it’s worth dwelling on a point Stew makes at the twenty minute mark around people watching programmes not channels. I think that’s true but I also think its not quite as clean cut as that, and as the CBS / Time Warner stand-off enters it’s second day – leaving 3 million American’s without shows like Hawaii Five-0 (I know) – it’s clear that there is much more to come as the distribution wars heat up.

also on the cast we got round to talking about the Magnum Pop-Up Experience hitting Sydney. following the success of the store in other cities, the ground floor of Westfield in Sydney’s CBD has for the last three weeks been the latest place to get the pleasure pop-up. you get to design your own magnum … white, milk or dark chocolate plus plenty of toppings, all for a mere $7.

as I say on the cast, it’s a phenomenal example of a brand pulling the trick of landing marketing that gets people to pay for its own existence. and the fact that people are queuing up for it is proof positive of the indulgence for which the brand is known.

Magnum_pop-up Magnum_pop-up_2 Magnum_pop-up_3

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advertising, broadcasting, television

One Screens to Rule them All: why broadcast TV’s comeback is overplayed and how brand content needs to evolve. fast.

two seemingly contradicting reports landed this week which paint very different pictures of the state of play in the evolving world of screen usage and content watching. they both came via Stew … thanks Stew!

first up, the BBC reports the suggestion by Ofcom (the UK’s Communications regulator) that living room TV is “making a comeback”. if a 3% increase in the number of adults who watch their main TV set once a week (91% up from 88% in 2002) represents a comeback, then yes … its a comeback. well done, nice work, props etc.

also this week Omnicom’s (or Publicis Omnicom Groupe’s I suppose) Media Pulse reported a study by GFK which “suggests that millions are moving to the Internet and free over-the-air (OTA) reception … about six percent of U.S. households have completely dropped cable and satellite TV in favor of streaming-only—a trend that’s been named ‘cutting the cord'” (Source).

a new golden age of broadcast, or a digital multi-screen take-over?

both, obvs.

its no secret that screens are proliferating, Australia is at the vanguard of the changes. an Australian Multi-Screen Report from earlier this year from Oztam, Regional Tam and Nielsen indicated that 27% of Aussie homes now have each of the four screens (TV, PC, tablet and mobile phone), up from 16% last year. Smart phone uptake is up 13% YOY to 61%, tablet penetration doubled 2012-2013 to 31% and PVR penetration now sits above 50%.

despite all that though, the same report calculated that time spent with screens are still massively weighted towards TV. the average Aussie watches 92 hours and 29 mins of TV per month, versus 8 hours and 53 mins on the other three devices. TV’s comeback is perhaps overplayed because there’s nothing to come back from … time spent with TV, despite pretty much a decade of PVRability, has remained pretty much consistent.

so what gives? … lots of TV viewing, lots of increase in penetration of new devices, and a whole lot of multitasking and multi-screening. the real limiting factor in the entire equation is nothing to do with screens or even what’s on them … its human attention. it was Kevin Kelly who observed in Wired magazine that “the only factor becoming scarce in a world of abundance is human attention” (source) … it doesn’t take a huge leap to come to the conclusion that the real victim of screen and content abundance will be not brands per se, but those that rely solely on the broadcast interruption advertising model.

more of that on the PHDcast this week, but what all of this points to is the need for connection planning (on screens and beyond) to be done upstream in any brand planning work. integrated content solutions have to quickly become the modus operandi for how we develop communications. broadcast interruption will remain part of that integrated solution for a long time yet to come, but it can no longer be the totality of the solution.

which is why we’ll be seeing a lot more of this in the future.

I’ll leave you to ponder that, and the thought that, far from living room TV making a comeback, its advertising that needs to make the comeback. in the evolving world of screens, only one screen rules them all – whichever one you happen to be watching at any given time. there’s a clear and present opportunity to bridge attention deficit with a new generation of integrated, connected, device-specific content. it’s time for us all to step up to the plate.

featured image via Fast Company

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broadcasting, planning, social media-ising, television, viewing

Welcome to Our World: What TV Execs and schedulers have to learn from Media Planners

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so a very good friend of mine would spend his time as a child working out which TV shows should go before and after which other shows. he essentially played scheduling. he was therefore somewhat destined to grow up to be a media planner (he is now the head of planning at a creative agency, but my point stands).

media planners get to play the most awesome game of scheduling in the world … we get to play with who see’s what, where, when, and in which context they see it – and that’s just for starters.

at first it was planned interruption, but now – depending on your situation and or point of view – we plan content / engagement / context / connections … the point is that we have to decide with no small amount of consideration how we plan media and content … and weirdly that is something that TV schedulers are only getting their heads around.

this thought was prompted by a piece by Mark Lawson writing in The Guardian about two recent revelations by Shane Allen, BBC controller of comedy commissioning, to the UK’s Broadcasting Press Guild. one, that Ben Elton’s heavily-panned series The Wright Stuff will not be recommissioned and, much more interestingly, that Peter Kay’s new series will premiere on the BBC’s iPlayer – a platform originally conceived as a catch-up service.

why the online platform play? in the article Lawson observes that “Kay admits he was nervous, fearful of heavy backlash had the BBC unveiled his new show with extended hype” … this is Peter Kay we’re taking about, the creator of the sublime Phoenix Nights, running scared. of social media.

the problem is that social media, especially Twitter, gives such immediate and public feedback that opinions can move and upscale with such speed that public-opinion has moved against a show before the first episode has even aired. but shows sometimes need breathing space to develop (I give you Blackadder as exhibit A) but now there’s just no time.

PHD talked about this in Fluid, one of the books what we wrote. a local example is what happened with the Shire (I knew you were wondering about the pic) … in the crucible of Twitter it was judged and hung out to dry before it had even begun.

now I’m not defending The Shire, but as Lawson observes:

“The question of how best to launch – or, as executives like to say, “get away” – a TV show has become a huge debate now that there are so many ways of watching. It’s the reason drama executives lurch nervously between stripping (running a series on consecutive nights, such as next week’s Run on Channel 4) and playing episodes once a week, such as ITV’s Broadchurch.” (source)

the point is that, all of a sudden, TV schedulers face the same problems, challenges and opportunities that media planners have enjoyed for decades: choosing platform, designing context, sowing seeds or landing large, on-demand or broadcast big, all together or spaced out, OTS calculations, reach builds … the art of programme scheduling is about to be transformed.

welcome to our world TV execs, you’re in for a treat.

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PHDcast TV Special: From Masterchef to the Voice, via Ten’s audience strategy, brand integration, and the future of screens


yey, another week another PHDcast from the good people of PHD Australia. this week we’re focusing on TV – the last few weeks having seen the finale of The Voice, and the return of Masterchef and The Block. we talk formats, performance and the current state and future of big reality format TV.

we also talk about Ten’s back to the future audience strategy and the challenges faced by the broadcaster. they want to be seen as the home of event TV … but to what extent can the recent cricket deal, existing content and formats deliver this for the network?

and if that wasn’t enough there’s a quick run around the future of TV … connected TVs, on demand and IPTV, second (and third) screening, addressable advertising and social TV.

enjoy.

PS. if you haven’t seen it totes check out our very own worldwide executive planning director Mark Holden on the future of TV. it rocks.

featured image: iMedia screen, featuring an SBS promotion

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branding, broadcasting, conferencing, debating, learning, opinionating, television

Dispatches from Mumbrella 360 Day One: Coles’ McDowell on Aussie Families and Nine’s Gyngell on Waterhouse

another year and another gathering at Mumbrellaland (I still think they should call it that) for the annual 360 conference. I’ll sum up later but for now just capturing the notes and the content from the sessions I jumped into during day one.

up first was Simon McDowell of Coles, them of the down down, Status Quo, Dawn Frenchness and now biggest-boyband-in-the-world-ness.

Simon-McDowell-mumbrella

Simon McDowell at Mumbrella 360, picture source: Mumbrella

McDowell discussed the approach to marketing at Coles, describing it as “a bit of a creative hot spot, a melting pot … we’ve got a thousand ideas a day and we’re going at this hard.” by this he means making life better for Aussie Families, a picked this up because he mentioned the phrase ‘Aussie Families’ about forty three times, that’s almost one a minute. this seems to mean (1) bringing prices down and (2) making ads for them, and not adland.

he repeated asked us not to “be fooled by the sizzle on the sausage … we’ve invested hundreds of millions of dollars in bringing prices down … It’s a fundamental part of what we’re about … But how do people know you’ve done it when sales [messages] are everywhere? … Is all just blah … Were really trying to be unique.”

Tom Donald asked about the negative response in the industry to some of the Coles ads. “Do I care what adland thinks? Not a bit. The Coles business is in a turnaround, we have more customers spending more money [with us] than ever before. Were trying to build the most famous and compelling brand in Australia.” (and, wait for it) “… we’re trying to create something that resonates with Aussie families”. cue One Direction …

on the more serious matter of supplier pressure, McDowell was firm but clearly less comfortable. asked if Coles was doing the right thing by farmers, he replied that “[all the] discounts are funded by Coles, the more milk we sell the better off farmers are. Prices are too high in Australia, we have to take care of Aussie families … at the end I’d the day we have to look after Aussie families where the cost of living is going up … we want to sell more. it’s a serious business looking after Aussie families and that’s what we’re about.”

just in case you’re not clear, its about Aussie families.

next up was Group M’s John Steedman in discussion with Nine’s CEO David Gyngell

John-Steedman-and-David-Gyngell

picture source: Mumbrella

its been a big year for the network, and the discussion covered a range of subjects …

on positioning Nine and investment in drama: “You have to stand for something. your audience has to know what you stand for … we’ll keep investing in Australian drama, [it] delivers against an audience that will watch linear TV for a long time to come”

that investment is based on an optimism about the future, saying that we are “heading into a purple patch for Australian drama – expect production to double.”

on the evolution of media, and the sale of the magazine business to Bauer, Gyngell was clear, saying that newspapers and magazines “won’t be as profitable as they were. quality magazines won’t go anywhere. the magazine business will be smaller and more nimble. newspapers will go online – less profitable but just as relevant. the fin review may lose $10m a year but you couldn’t buy it for $100m because its relevant.”

as far as digitisation of Nine goes, when asked when will Nine become a digital first company, he answered when you can make more on digital than we can at the moment. “we’re still nimble enough to be able to move when we want to. we’re not a digital company, we’re a marketing and content creation and distribution company.”

on advice for Seven and Ten: “Tim knows what he’s doing, and has Stokes around him. Seven won’t break because Tim won’t let it. Hamish is an accomplished marketer. if he gets a good programme he’ll know what to do with it. they need to get lucky … keep your head down and pray for some luck.”

its fair to say that Steady gave him a pretty easy ride as interviews go … it was left to a delegate to bring up Tom Waterhouse and the recent over-stepping the mark on programme integration and live odds. to which he commented that Nine, and broadcasters per se, have “a moral compass to provide to the country, but we’re not in the businesses of telling people what they can and can’t do. Tom Waterhouse was a lightning rod. we have a government that reacts quickly to any negative press. his competitors had a go – when the mafia start saying how bad the triads are you know what’s going on. we pushed it too far – we know that. did we overstep the mark? perhaps at the start when Tom was with the commentators. we’ve pulled back from that now and its the right balance.”

after that went to a cracking session with Rob Pyne of X or Y Decisions, about why businesses, and marketing teams in particular, make bad decisions. great insights and advice based on understanding and mitigating biases we inherently have when we’re making decision.

then Coady and I presented to a judging panel for Network Agency of the Year (which we won – yey!) … after which I jumped into Tom Donald‘s brilliantly fun session on fads – of which I hope there will be a future download / follow-up. and that (PHD’s session on gamification and evening drinks aside) was day one. here’s a pic of the guys collecting that Network of the Year award. whoo hoo.

Mumbrella-Awards-2013-APAC-Media-Network-PHD

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advertising, broadcasting, data planning, debating, predicting, television

Media lessons from Sydney Writers Festival: or what Wikileaks and Sneakerpedia have in common

SWF 2011
we've been warned: Paul Gilding, Naomi Oreskes, Curt Stager discuss acting on Climate change as Sam Mostyn facilitates

so Friday evening was spent at the brilliant Sydney Writers Festival at Sydney's Town Hall.  the two sessions, 'who's afraid of Wikileaks?' and the climate-change-themed 'you've been warned' had illuminating things to say on a diversity of subjects but I was particularly struck by what they had to say, explicitly or otherwise, on the subject on media.

a key element in the first session was a specific question posed to the panel on whether Wikileaks is a media organisation or a political organisation.  the panel were agreed in the main that Wikileaks is a media organisation…  that they exist to aggregate, organise and make available information for distribution.

the panel were of the opinion that Wikileaks is non-political in the sense that what happens as a result of the information they release is up not to Wikileaks but rather to those who consume its content.  Wikileaks were, the panel argued, political only in the sense that Assange is a fervent believer in transparency of information, and its ability to hold corrupt organisations and governments to account.

it occured to me that the idea of 'becomng a media organistion' wasn't limited to Wikileaks…  the model – of aggregating useful information and then distributing it – is essentially an owned and then earned media combo.  and any organisation could adopt it…

The greatest sneaker archiving project is about to begin; Footlocker's SneakerPedia

there are parallels to what Footlocker are doing with the rather glorious Sneakerpedia; aggregate information – with utility – into an owned media space.  then use that to stimulate earned media (3,300 Twitter followers and counting) … bought media could come later – amplifying Sneakerpedia's greatest hits or rarest items in print ads, or short form sneaker documentary content on TV, but it doesn't necessarily have to.  Sneakerpedia, like Wikipedia, is an owned and earned media combo – and that's all it has to be: the mechanics of media now not only permit that but in many ways favour it…

because bought media is developing a serious credibilty issue.  the rise of owned media and emergence of tangible earned media has put bought media – as exemplified by the ad – into the spotlight, and the glare seems to be hurting it…

in the second session of the writers festival, a wonderful panel consisting of Paul Gilding, Naomi Oreskes, Curt Stager, Sam Mostyn discussed the hard choices we have to make now to preserve our planet.  Oreskes described how the climate change movement had been undermined (like the anti-smoking lobby before it) by an argument of credible doubt.  the proponents had used bought media to amplify their message to a broad audience.

Oreskes was asked why the pro-climate camp hadn't adopted the same tactics?  her response was stark: "advertising exists to sell people things they don't need, scientists reject that [advertising] can be used to sell climate solutions" … the message is clear, bought media lacks the credibility of owned and earned.

this should come as no surprise to anyone familiar with our industry – the reality is that we have shouted our messages to people for over half a century.  we have created as a result several generations of ambivalence towards our branded messaging, the result of which is now not only passive resilience from audiences, but outright rejection of not only the message but the media delivery channels themselves…

this point is important.  Channel 4 Chief Executive David Abraham noted in his RTS speech this week that according to Channel 4 research, "about two-thirds of all 'TV audiovisual content' viewing time – across TV, PC and mobile – will be 'tracked intelligently' in some way by 2020"… our working assumption should be that such tracking will only be able to be utilised if people permit us to use it.  if they are similarly minded to Oreskes, that may set up a tricky negotiation between our industry and our audiences.

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