Not that very long ago, when I started selling advertising in newspapers (about 15 years ago), in any given town, there would maybe have been 2 or 3 main advertising opportunities for businesses to use to promote themselves. Generally a paid for weekly, a free paper delivered through the door and a radio station.
If that said area had 75,000 population, it would stand to reason that most of them will have seen – AND PAID ATTENTION TO at least one of those mediums.
So based on that figure, you could argue that each of those mediums attracted a 25,000 strong audience.
Now with capitalism and a free market, there are monthly free magazines, monthly “Parish” newsletters, competitive radio stations and newspapers etc along with buses, cinemas, online advertising from all manner of sites – local, regional and national, Directories both printed and online etc.
With each business having a different idea of who their market is, they may decide to go with a different medium than their neighbour and as such – the split of an audience comes about – much as it has with all the myriad of TV channels we now have on offer to us.
Whilst some may argue that choice is a good thing and as we all like different things, surely it`s better that we all have the choices that suit us and our lifestyles etc….
I can`t help but feel that with everybody crying out for, or leaning towards marginal products to satisfy our cravings, the audience figures for all of these mediums is greatly reducing.
Long gone are the days of 23 million viewers of Coronation street etc.
Local newspaper reader figures are reducing compared to those of 10-15 years ago.
Newer businesses may be enjoying a “healthy” audience, but it`s all relative – as they weren`t about 10 years ago.
Also, with all the different options out there in the market, a reader has so many ways in which they can find out what`s going on in their neighbourhood – possibly upto 10+ ways of catching up and researching what the latest news / events are to hit their town….BUT, with an arguably busier lifestyle than 10 years ago, do they have more time to catch up on 10+ forms of media to find out what used to be found in 2 or 3?
I would argue that no they don`t and as such, a lot of people tend not to look at ANY of the 10+ forms of media and the resultant cumulative audience figures are more than likely down overall on those of 10 years ago.
In a nutshell, we`ve split the market, given them too much choice and are wondering why revenue streams are reducing both through purchase cost and advertising revenue.
If you are a business and you had £6,000 per year to spend on advertising 10 years ago to get in front of 75,000 people, it would appear that the same £6,000 would now have to be spent with about 6 or 7 publications to get to a similar total audience – but whilst it`s more likely that there`ll be a larger crossover of audience included in those figures – the cost of advertising has cone up and to keep the same profile as before, the likely required spend would be in the region of £40,000+.
So, a newer business will be dealing with the current situation and therefore making the best of the current climate, the more long established companies who have seen “the good times” will be struggling to come to terms with the difference in foot fall, profits, phone activity, staffing levels, stock levels, credit ratings and feel good factor.
I suggest that with the Federation of Small Businesses, Linked In, Facebook, Twitter, Chamber of Trade etc, should promote the use of one or 2 forms of media – Radio and Local Newspapers being the obvious 2 that immediately spring to mind.
It could be argued that if ALL the news, ALL the entertainments details, ALL the cars for sale, ALL the property for sale, ALL the public notices, ALL the Jobs, ALL the In Memoriam and ALL the fell good stories were printed / broadcast using these 2 forms of media, then the audience figures would RISE again, the public interaction with businesses will rise, the cash spent locally will rise, the desire for products will rise and more importantly for businesses – their advertising spend will FALL, the need for more staff will increase, profits would rise and the feeling of being a part of the local community will rise also – but it will take a change of ideas amongst ALL the advertising buying businesses out there to make this happen.
In the meantime – enjoy listening to / reading the news on the latest scandal in the 1 armed lawnmower racing championship or the latest developments in the new painting techniques on the 1/20th scale Dolls house.
Agree with everything you say in principal; the only thing I am not so sure about is the dramatic change in the media sources. As far as I can remember, buses, cinema, radio, magazines, parish rags, directories and TV have all been around during both good and bad times and have survived together, so why a sudden problem now?
Also, there are still some local media setups bucking the current trends, but why?
in my opinion, the buses, Cinema etc were “also rans” with the main mediums being the local newspapers and local radio stations.
Since more options have come about, the strength of the local papers has been diluted which in turn has made the other options – buses, cinemas, parish mags etc look more favourable cost wise and therefore increase their market share.
I don`t seem to recall AS MANY other options as there are out there now though.
I also think that the amount of advertising that there is out there – what with all the TV channels and the commercial radio stations etc are helping “dumb down” the population and the advert on Sky+ and BT Vision where you can pause the TV program, and then fast forward the advertisements etc – helps to get “ignore the advertising” in our heads.
I think the problem, if you want to call it that – some people don`t see it as a problem at all, is that the situation is too big now and too far reaching that it`s going to take a lot of little changes rather than one big change to answer to it all.
The advent of “sponsorship” to the level it is now, corporate deals, online advertising, directories (you just have to type in anything on google and see how many directory listings come up rather than useful websites of companies who you are actually looking for.
Social networking is also responsible for the change in peoples’ perceptions to events and news etc.
Sometimes this is a great thing for example, the speed at which a petition can get to parliament with 100,000 signatures on it can be done in a day now as opposed to topics never being raised. (although I await the figure of 100,000 changing to 500,000!).
If there are an local media companies bucking the trend – I would be interested to know if they have “branched out” into local magazines, online advertising, special stand alone publications etc or just stuck with and continued the quality of their local press.
also, are these companies Publicly owned, or still private companies…ie, do they have to make a large profit for the shareholders over making a smaller profit for themselves.
Your ACTUAL blog must be the smallest ever type font I’ve ever seen on the web. The part copied into Facebook is readable, the font on the blog almost not. I needed to zoom it to 125% to read it comfortably. Given the subject matter and the difficulty in reaching a fragmented audience I thought I’d say. It’s a problem with the body text only. The links on the right hand side are all in normal sixed font.
Hi Keith – I`ve sorted out the font size now – so it shouls read a little easier on the eye! Thanks for your comments.
So, in essence what we are saying is that the advertising sector is so saturated that it cannot sustain its current path, if at all?
I think I have to agree!
Thanks for raising a good point of interaction.I personally believe we are directly or indirectly depend upon media and advertising. By Advertising we get to know various things around the world.
People are aware with surroundings the way media and advertisement brings renaissance.