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More Attacks On TV Ad Budgets - But Turning the Titanic Ain’t Easy
Filed Under Advertising, Digital Signage
Ad Age has an interesting article this week on some work that MediaVest (a Publicis Co) has been trying to do in shifting some of their client ad dollars in to new mediums (Cinema advertising specifically)…without much success.
The article is focused on the Cinema advertising business, which I consider a bit of a cousin to the DOOH business, although National Cinemedia is referenced in the article. Cinema advertising is much older than DOOH, although it met a lot of resistance when it was first launched (folks throwing things at the screens and such). It’s much more accepted now. It does raise some interesting points about the state of the media business and how hard it is to change Brand perceptions on where to spend their dollars. It’s ALWAYS easier to do the same thing as last year than bring new media into the mix, even if it seems smarter…
The article speaks to Mediavest trying to make a committment to take $100 million from TV and throw it into Cinema advertising. End of the day, they could only get clients to shift up to $30 million. Part of this stems from Brand direction on where media gets bought and part of it stems from the internal machinations inside media buying shops themselves. While it was the MediaVest executives who hypothesized the potential for up to $100 million, not everyone inside these organizations like some of the new media options or are simply comfortable with how existing plans look and ultimately, the media is planned and bought at the lower levels.
Interestingly (for me anyway) David Krupp, who heads things up at Kinetic (a WPP company) feels new money for alternative media will come from TV and traditional OOH budgets, which you wouldn’t have heard a few years ago:
“If there’s any big shift to be had, it probably will be some sort of migration of TV dollars and some sort of migration of out-of-home dollars,” said Dave Krupp, a managing director at WPP Group’s Kinetic Worldwide.
My thoughts on allocation also included print budgets…if only because of the huge revenue declines the newspaper and magazine business have gone through over the last 2 years that have been feeding Internet growth. WPP, Group M and the team under that holding company have been pretty progressive in this space, comparatively speaking. Some other shops definitely disagree with the approach, however:
But cinema can be a tough place to run commercials. Audiences expect to see fresh content that is deserving of big-screen treatment, not by-the-numbers stuff they see on TV every day. One rival media buyer said the idea of moving $100 million from TV is “ridiculous.”
This growth has been well deserved and a long time coming for cinema ads….let’s hope the trend continues to its cousin, retail and place based DOOH.
Article from Ad Age:
Published: June 02, 2008 NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — In November, ad-buying giant MediaVest started talking to its clients about a potentially radical idea: Moving some ad dollars from prime-time broadcast TV into ads that run on movie screens. MediaVest executives in January even broached the notion that more than $100 million in clients’ dollars might go along for the ride.
In the end, the Publicis Groupe shop will have to be content with moving between $20 million and $30 million, ample proof that marketers still face an internal tug of war when considering alternatives to the ever-popular boob tube.
“TV is still an incredibly powerful medium; there’s no two ways about it,” said John Moore, senior VP-director of ideas and innovation at Interpublic Group of Cos.’ Mullen. “But it is not as powerful as it used to be.”
At the beginning of the writers strike, “scatter prices in the fourth quarter and first quarter were through the roof,” said Donna Speciale, president-investment and activation at the Publicis Groupe firm’s U.S. operations, referring to TV ad time that is purchased on an as-needed basis rather than reserved for upfront negotiations.
Money from broadcast
MediaVest expects clients to commit more dollars in 2009, after learning about the movies and looking at the results of tests by the firm. The dollars represent money that was once committed to broadcast prime time.
Among the MediaVest clients that have switched TV money to cinema are Kraft Foods, Activision and Capital One.
“We have definitely broadened our definition of video and are pushing out beyond the TV screen into other areas,” said Gary Gruneberg, Kraft’s director of media buying. Among the Kraft brands that are part of the cinema effort are Jell-O, Chips Ahoy and Oreo.
An Activision spokeswoman said the company has purchased cinema advertising “for some time” but has not finalized its mix for this year. Capital One executives were not available to comment.
Cinema advertising can be a way to reach consumers when TV viewing ebbs, particularly between Friday afternoon and Sunday evening. Executives expect dollars to be reallocated to the medium gradually, as more advertisers grow accustomed to the ins and outs of advertising on the big screen.
Building interest
Since MediaVest’s intentions became known, National CineMedia has received inquiries from other buyers trying to stake out inventory, said Cliff Marks, the company’s president-sales and chief marketing officer. “We’ll try to be fair, but we’re going to take the deal we need to make when we are negotiating with MediaVest,” he said. A Screenvision spokesperson said the firm has been approached by other media agencies “about discussing shifting dollars to cinema” but declined to name the agencies.
Cinema advertising has gained ground in recent years. In 2006, cinema advertising increased 15% to $455.6 million, according to the Cinema Advertising Council, up from $394.8 million in 2005.
“If there’s any big shift to be had, it probably will be some sort of migration of TV dollars and some sort of migration of out-of-home dollars,” said Dave Krupp, a managing director at WPP Group’s Kinetic Worldwide.
But cinema can be a tough place to run commercials. Audiences expect to see fresh content that is deserving of big-screen treatment, not by-the-numbers stuff they see on TV every day. One rival media buyer said the idea of moving $100 million from TV is “ridiculous.”
Mullen’s Mr. Moore said cinema advertising “is emphatically a complement and not a substitute” to broadcast.
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This is very interesting. I was doing a search on trends.google.com and posted some interesting information on it regarding the search volume for “digital signage” vs. “search engine marketing.” The results are quite interesting.
http://digitalsignage.com/feeds/blog/79-signage-vs-search-engines
Interesting post Rob-when I was introducing Starpoint’s network to the market and selling ad space, many of the advertisers/agencies were also experimenting with cinema advertising-needless to say I generated a bit of revenue from those budgets. There is more to your post, but I am going to stick with selling. In my opinion digital signage reps can make a good start by using cinema advertising to their advantage-learn everything! Many agencies and their clients are pushing for new mediums to be used-and these large agencies move slow-as they should-maybe not slow, but picky and through-they certainly have to show clients results. Like cable or even broadcast numbers play a huge role for the agencies; thats why I am confident Adcentricity and those like will be the ultimate players when it comes to digital signage networks…..