Has TV Had Its Day?

UK TV ad spend is expected to fall by 30% between 2007 and 2010 in real terms, and is closer to 19% when the changes are measured with inflation included according to a report by Enders Analysis.

By the end of this year, TV ad spend is expected to have fallen to £3.3bn, from £3.5bn last year. By 2009, TV ad spend is predicted to have fallen to £2.9bn and by 2010, to £2.8bn.Online growth and the appeal of online media, as well as the analogue to digital broadcast shift, are all structural changes cited for the decrease in TV national advertising revenue by Enders.Further structural change could follow as the funding gap between the BBC and the commercial broadcasters grows, fuelled by poor economic conditions and a gradual shift to more personalised media consumption in the digital age.

Reports rightly point to Internet advertising spend overtaking the £3.5 billion spent on ‘traditional TV’ for the first time next year; however in a sense, it is actually TV which is taking over the internet.

New formats and viewing occasions are being created where previously these options simply didn’t exist. Through the development of ITV’s online video service, 4OD and BBC’s iPlayer consumers are now devouring online video with a phenomenal appetite. Project Kangaroo is a much anticipated joint venture between ITV, Channel 4 and BBC Worldwide which will see the creation of a single site where consumers can search and enjoy content from all three broadcasters. The launch was scheduled for September 2008 but due to scrutiny from the OFT this has been delayed till later 2008, possibly early 2009. This will undoubtedly put the traditional players in a position of strength as they can combine content in one place for users to select what they watch, where they watch it and how they access it.

The scale of growth, and the ubiquity of audience, means that there are real, substantial and tangible commercial opportunities in this area, harnessing the known entertainment capacity of TV to the bespoke, dynamic, interactive functionality of the web.

2008 could well be seen as a watershed year for television as a whole, a year when the nation’s favourite form of entertainment gave definitive proof of its health in a new media landscape and demonstrated its ability to evolve and offer outstanding value for money.