VSS, a media private equity company, predicts that by the end of 2008, TV ad revenue will beat newspaper revenue for the first time since record-keeping began in the 18th century.  They say that TV ad revenue, boosted by political races and the Olympics, will reach 51-billion dollars this year.

Newspaper revenue will sink like a rock to just under 47-billion dollars - that is nearly 5-billion dollars less than last year.  TV ad revenue will be up about 3-billion, according to VSS.

But this is no time for Broadcasters to be smug about their victory.  Yes, TV ad revenue sprinted past newspapers (which are having an historically horrible year), but that big whale known as the Internet is swimming fast and VSS says will gobble up TV's revenue lead by 2011.

VSS says by 2011, Internet revenue will spike at 60-billion dollars, while broadcast ad revenue will be just over 51-billion dollars.  Newspapers will continue to lag with about 44-billion in 2011 revenue, according to VSS.

But there is a silver-lining in the VSS prediction.  They arrive at the 60-billion dollar Internet figure by combining “Pure Play” dollars (revenue earned by Google, Yahoo etc.), and “Traditional” dollars (revenue earned by local TV websites, network sites etc.).  In fact, VSS estimates that “Traditional” Internet ad revenue will be up 28% this year to just over 14-billion dollars.  They say “Pure Play” Internet revenue will grow by a little over 20% to nearly 22-billion dollars.

AR&D 2.0 strategic gurus Terry Heaton and Steve Safran have been pushing a “Multi-Path” strategy for the past several years to help local television stations grab both “Pure Play” and “Traditional” revenue.  If your station is not heading down those twin paths you need call Terry or Steve today.

The big bright light coming at you is the Internet - don't let the “Pure Plays” run you over!

Jim

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 5th, 2008 at 7:08 pm and is filed under Willi. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.