*Last week was BIA/Kelsey’s Digital Strategies for Broadcasting conference in Jersey City, NJ.   The main focus, as the title suggests, was the changing landscape of the television and radio industries, as new technologies impact the businesses.  Some observations:

*Broadcasters realize that their industries are largely tied to the advertising market, but the more forward-thinking companies are spending great effort to find ways to gain advantage getting out ahead of additional revenue streams that are possible via internet and multiplatform opportunities.   There seems to be recognition that while the bulk of the revenues will be dictated by current advertising trends both locally and nationally, interactive revenues are a part of operation where an individual company can have great impact on its own fate. 

*A common theme in the sessions at the conference was “an internal tolerance for errors in exploring this space”.  This seems to be a recognition of the rapidly evolving arena of internet/multiplatform and differences in the broadcasters’ strategies.  There are many success stories, but the successes seem to vary market-by-market and company-by-company re) which interactive strategies are working best.  To be certain, this experimentation is necessary to ultimately achieve success and grow the relatively small 5-7% this currently contributes to most broadcasters’ income statements. 

*Many broadcasters have been restrained from putting forth necessary expenditures to an extensive strategy due to financial covenant/limitations.  Financially-strapped broadcasters have needed to adhere to investors/lenders ratios (or even financial survival in several cases), so the potential of possible short-term losses from rolling out interactive plans caused these plans to be delayed.  Hopefully, as the broadcasting industry (and companies’ financial ratios) improve, more budgets increase allocations to these important strategies.

*Overall, a well-done conference by my BIA/Kelsey colleagues that provided great depth to the future direction/technologies of the broadcasting industries.

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