In the past three years, more than $100 million of radio advertising revenue has disappeared from Greater Media markets.
That’s according to President & CEO Peter Smyth, who wrote in his monthly newsletter, “These dollars, which were once used to fund ad messages to broad audiences, are being redeployed to the Internet in more personal, one-to-one marketing efforts. Advertisers are rethinking their approach to media marketing and are questioning their media mix.”
Smyth noted that interactive advertising is growing in excess of 25 percent per year, while radio revenues have been flat to negative for three years. “In the near future, the interactive world will be a larger, yet more diverse advertising medium than radio. What are we as an organization going to do to respond to this trend …? It is time for us to more clearly define our business.”
Smyth said Greater Media’s goal is to “become an audio entertainment company for our listeners that provides marketing solutions (not just ads) delivered locally for our clients.” The creation of an interactive unit, he said, is part of that.
Read his column here.