• by David Goetzl  @dgoetzl, January 3, 2012

There might have been some gloom for TV buyers and sellers to wake up to Monday. Two pieces of news offered suggestions that 2012 could bring slow growth and fewer dollars for them to exchange.

Don’t count on that becoming reality.

TV sales executives might have even shrugged with a what-me-worry attitude about a New York Times piece on challenged consumer spending and a report that auto sales might not have as much fuel as last year.

The Times reported consumers are pulling in the reins and analysts are concerned that led to holiday-time discounting that will cut into retailers’ profits.

Also, respected auto-market analyst Polk predicted the U.S. consumer business would grow at a “moderate” 7.3% this year and won’t reach pre-recession heights until 2015. (It did say Toyota and Honda should win back share after natural disasters in their Japanese base last year.)

But in the continuum of TV advertising, 2011 should be remembered as the year that quieted doubters about the medium’s long-term prospects (even as the naysayers will persist). DVR ad-skipping will keep growing, as will cord-cutting. Yet, as maddeningly cliché as it has sounded over the past decade, there is hardly evidence that other options can provide that wide, fast reach with sight, sound and motion that sets TV apart.

It’s not just the strong upfront market last year that should offer proof about TV’s should-be strength for the next decade.

Maybe more than anything, indications are that digital and social media are viewed as valuable drivers of TV advertising. So, keyboard and smartphone options can bring increased spending on TV, not cannibalize it.

Reports are that Super Bowl ads are sold out and marketers are willing to pay high prices because they believe their spots will bring subsequent social/digital media waves and a long-tail effect. But the big game frisson is a once-a-year opportunity.

What's notable is a semblance of that philosophy is solidifying. Compelling evidence came at a MediaPost event last spring as two media buyers – yes, people apportioning money, not seeking it – weighed in.

Chris Geraci, a managing director at OMD, mused at how much opinions about TV’s role in a marketing mix had been transformed in about a five-year period.

“I don think back then any of us really envisioned this reciprocal relationship that’s going on right now, where television is actually better because of the Internet," he said. "Not just online viewing -- that ability to get more information and get more involved in what you’re seeing."

Pair that with Initiative’s Kris Magel:

“You’ve got this giant megaphone that is television that drives all this awareness, all this curiosity,” he said. “And you’ve got digital that’s now really developed into something amazing, sitting there like a giant catcher’s mitt pulling people in."

Two months later, there was legendary creative guru John Hegarty, a co-founder of BBH, telling a British paper about a “Super Bowl to super-social” strategy at his London-based agency. (Yes, his reference was to American football, not the kind that breeds U.K. fanaticism.)

"Social networking is fundamentally important but what are people going to social network around?” he told The Guardian. “You write a brilliant ad in a big way … then people tweet each other 'Have you seen that? That's absolutely fantastic'. The old medium is still brilliant but you've got to use it in a much more imaginative and daring way."

Referring to TV as an old medium now seems very old.