Broadcasters have nothing to fear from the NBN but it will unleash a new focus on ideas and creativity for commercial messages, according to NBN’s chief marketing officer, Kieren Cooney.
The ability of IP-based media to allow greater targeting and “addressability” of ad messages to individuals meant technology and channel planning would become less of a competitive advantage for agencies and brands, Cooney told an International Advertising Association (IAA) Thought Leadership forum last week.
But the high-speed IP network will mean more attention will need to be applied to developing smarter ideas and crafting messages more cleverly to stand out in an environment where most marketers will know the interests and whereabouts of individuals.
Cooney, who joined a panel with Mi9 chief executive Mark Britt, Microsoft’s marketing head Joanna Stevens Kramer and Mediabrands chairman Henry Tajer, was also unconvinced that the NBN would kill traditional TV broadcasters.
“I don’t think the internet will kill the broadcast star, much the same as TV didn’t kill the radio star,” he told IAA attendees during a panel debate on the impact the NBN would have on TV. “We do have this fatalistic tendency for change, as in something new is going to wipe everything off the map. It generally doesn’t.”
But Cooney said what the NBN would do is swing the current obsession in the media and marketing sectors from media channel planning back to messages and ideas.
“I think it does come down to the idea. Down to the insight and the execution of it,” he said. “It’s less about the media, more about the message.”
Mediabrands chairman Henry Tajer said technology-led initiatives like multivariate testing will become more central to communications campaigns in an NBN environment.
“Multivariate testing lets you measure the channels and whether the placement is right but you also measure whether the message is right,” he said. “A number of advertisers are really good at it and are getting superior levels of return on their marketing spend versus some of the more traditionally minded in the marketplace.
"As the broader industry gets more comfortable with the concept and gets skilled up with people and technology to execute I think the market will head in that direction. The good news for media companies is it will refocus the discussions away from price to value.”
This article first appeared in the 27 July 2012 print edition of AdNews.
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