By a considerable margin, the Omnicom Media Group - OMD and PHD - dominated all of the major media-related advertising awards competitions that took place throughout the world over the past year, according to a new report compiling the results. The report, the Gunn Report for Media, is a media-centric version of the Gunn Report, a publication that has compiled the leading advertising creative awards competitions around the world for several years. Omnicom Media Group's results were fueled by OMD, which also dominated the individual agency media-related awards wins by a margin of two-to-one over its next closest competitor, Publicis' Starcom unit. Among the big agency group's media networks, the Publicis Media Group, which also includes ZenithOptimedia Group, placed second behind Omnicom, followed by WPP's Group M (MindShare, Mediaedge:cia and Maxus), MediaCom (soon to be part of Group M), Initiative, Universal McCann, Japan's Dentsu Media and Aegis (Carat and Vizeum). Global Media Agency Ranked By Awards Competition Rank Media Agency Network Points 1 OMD 110 2 Starcom 53 3 ZenithOptimedia 50 4 MindShare 48 5 BBDO* 37 6 (T) TBWA** 29 6 (T) MediaCom 27 8 Mediaedge:cia 25 9 Leo Burnett*** 22 18 Wieden & Kennedy 12 22 The Media Kitchen 8 Source: Gunn Report for Media. Agencies ranked by their performance in the world's 31 top award contests, including MEDIA magazine's Creative Media Awards. *BBDO is affiliated with PHD in the U.S. **TBWA is affiliated with OMD in the U.S. ***Leo Burnett is affiliated with Starcom in the U.S.(T) = tie. The Gunn Report for Media, which was unveiled earlier this year during the Cannes Lions awards, was sponsored by Procter & Gamble, which has sought to take a leadership position in the area of media creativity. The report includes media awards from such well-known competitions as the Cannes Lions, the Clios and the Effies, as well as MEDIA magazine's Creative Media Awards. While Omnicom and OMD dominated the results, the findings are good news for all media agencies because it signals that media truly is becoming recognizes as enough of a creative process to justify an array of media awards competitions. In a forward to the report entitled "The Art of the Connection," P&G Manager of Global Media and Communication Bernhard Glock noted, "It has become extremely clear that the media channels we use to connect to our consumers are as vital as the creative content we deliver to them. As consumers gain more control over their media consumption, and as more content and messages vie for their attention, the path to our core consumers becomes increasingly complex. "We understand that the art of the connection, or contact, requires more insight and creativity than ever before. Simply, the innovation of the media plan must parallel the innovation of the creative messaging and content." To a certain extent, the compilation does not necessarily reflect the most outstanding media work of the best media shops. It only reflects those that have competed in awards competitions, many of which reside in disparate geographic regions. In fact, the U.K. market dominated the competition results, which reflect the fact that some regions are more awards competition prone than others. Nonetheless, Isabelle Musnik, editor of the report, noted that existence of the report is proof of the growing strategic value of media. "In a world where consumers increasingly exert more control over the messages they receive (through changing channels, fast-forwarding through commercials, or just tuning ads out), the act of reaching a consumer requires as much innovation and strategy as the creative messages carried by the advertising. We all know from our own experience how messages fail to reach us with increasing frequency," she wrote, adding, "Put another way, contact has become as critical to the success of a marketing campaign as content, and media is more and more the message. The right connection can make or break a campaign, and indeed, a brand." Global Media Agency Networks Ranked By Awards Competition Rank Media Agency Network Points 1 Omnicom Media Group* 123 2 Publicis Media Group** 105 3 Group M*** 73 4 MediaCom 29 5 Initiative 23 6 (T) Universal McCann 22 6 (T) Dentsu Media 22 8 Aegis**** 14 9 MPG 7 Source: Gunn Report for Media. Agencies ranked by their performance in the world's 31 top award contests, including MEDIA magazine's Creative Media Awards. *OMD, PHD. **Starcom MediaVest Group, ZenithOptimedia Group. ***MindShare, Mediaedge:cia, Maxus. ****Carat, Vizeum. (T) = tie.
While a significant number of newspapers have formed partnerships with local TV news counterparts in the past decade, these relationships are more often than not underutilized; editors from both sides struggle to balance competitive instincts with business realities. Researchers at Ball State University have taken what they say is the first comprehensive look at the impact of these partnerships. According to the newly released findings, these media organizations, for the most part, continue to operate independently as they struggle to find common ground. Ball State found that within its survey of 372 newspaper editors, roughly 30 percent were involved in news-gathering relationships with television stations. And while some reported a healthy working relationship, the majority of survey respondents do not regularly leverage cross-promotional opportunities. "Cross-promotion has not happened at a high rate," said Larry Dailey, a journalism professor from Ball State's Center for Media Design. The problem, said Dailey, is that these arrangements have been forged between natural competitors. "Newspapers have a fear--If TV wants to scoop us they can," he said. "They might beat us with our own stories." Also, both newspapers and local TV news organizations invest heavily in branding themselves, and don't want to risk diluting any equity they have achieved. Dailey says that much of the convergence in the media resulted from fears in the 1990s that companies like Microsoft would begin encroaching on the world of local news (with products like the former local search portal www.sidewalk.com). "Media folks thought that this would be the wave of the future," said Dailey. But as the Internet threat to local domains appears to have subsided, so has the reason for many of these partnerships. "The urgency seems to have gone away," Dailey said. Yet given the ongoing shifts in media consumption, the two media may need each other more than ever. "For both local TV news and newspapers, the long-term prospects are not good," Dailey said. That is particularly the case with newspapers, which inherently cannot compete with TV news on certain fronts. "Newspapers need to figure out what their role is going forward--to break news or to explain news," he said. "Against TV, they are never going to win." Dailey suggests that such partnerships may work best on a project-by-project basis, where news organizations collaborate on a specific news topic in a comprehensive fashion while continuing to compete over reporting the news of the day. Different media may be more successful by developing specialties rather than trying to be all things to all users. Ball State's study will continue, with parts two and three due in 2005. Bailey said that it is difficult to draw any sweeping conclusions on the University's findings. "Each situation and each partnership will be different," he said. "Each market will have to define this." Among the study's other highlights: - Newspapers are willing to share story budgets and lineups with their television partners, but attempt to retain stories considered "exclusives." - About 44 percent of the editors said they are selective in what they share; 16 percent said they never share; and 12.3 percent hold back stories on which they have a competitive advantage over their partner. - Newspapers rarely encourage readers to view enterprise stories that are run by their partners. About 8 percent of newspaper editors said they urge readers to view those stories at least once a week, while 65.7 percent never do. - About 70 percent of newspapers do not spend any time during news meetings discussing how to promote their partner's content. - About 51 percent never share the cost of special projects or investigations with their partners.
Aside from adding another pre-eulogy to the impending death of the 30-second commercial, a study by the Reed Elsevier research firm In-Stat/MDR says that the growing attraction of video games as ad vehicles is likely to grow more than most expect. The report, "Television Advertising 2004-2009: The Slow Death of the 30-Second Commercial," looks at how TV advertising is changing in the face of increased competition from the Internet, video games, and prepackaged content, as well as new technologies such as personal video recorders. The report includes forecasts of new advertising methods such as video game advertising and product placement, as well as TV, cable, Internet, and radio advertising. Among the report's findings is that the total U.S. electronic advertising market will see an average growth rate of 2.8 percent from 2005 through 2009 in the face of the reduced potency of broadcast advertising. The growth will largely be driven by Internet advertising, and to a lesser extent, cable TV and video game advertising. The diminishing effectiveness of broadcast advertising can be attributed to two major irreversible trends, said Mike Wolf, principal analyst of In-Stat/MDR. The first is the continued fading away of the broadcast TV audience to other media, like cable television, DVDs, the Internet, and electronic gaming. The second is an increasingly empowered consumer through new technologies like the personal video recorder (PVR) that allows users to skip ads. In addition, the consumer will continue to be empowered through new distribution channels for content, such as DVD by mail and downloadable premium content through services such as CinemaNow and MovieLink. "PVRs have turned the broadcast TV ad business on its head," Wolf said. "Our research shows that over two-thirds of those with a PVR skip ads, with 75 percent of those individuals skipping over 50 percent of ads shown. Some of the ways broadcast TV execs and advertisers are combating the rise of ad-skipping technologies is through the increased use of product placement. The recent $7.7 million giveaway of Pontiac cars on Oprah to create a marketing 'event' is an example of what is being done today outside of the 30-second commercial." The report was based on interviews with people in the TV industry and with users of technology. Wolf said he believes that the coming troubles have been masked somewhat by the amount of political ad spending this past year. But the day of reckoning is fast approaching, as major Fortune 500 companies are beginning to say that they will not continue to pay as much for a shrinking audience. "Video gaming is now a $300 million a year business, but by 2009, it'll be more like $3 billion," he said. "It's an undervalued market right now. Granted, it will still be smaller than total TV is going to be, but as more people change their media habits, video gaming will make a difference. And ad insertion will be a major support in furthering online games, as many people will not want to pay the fees in order to play." As for putting video gaming in further perspective, market researcher Veronis Suhler Stevenson noted that last year, Americans on average spent nearly 1,800 hours watching TV and 71 hours playing video games. By 2008, that's not expected to change much, as their forecast expects slightly more than 1,900 hours devoted to total TV watching and 98 hours for video games.