• by Wayne Friedman , March 3, 2020

The effects of the coronavirus may result in a shift -- possibly a decline in media and marketing consumption -- as more consumers work and/or stay at home, says Brian Wieser, global president, business intelligence, GroupM, in a recent report.

“Traditional television could fare relatively better because of the likely improvements in audience levels, while outdoor advertising may be worse off with lower levels of foot traffic in many places.”

He adds: “At the same time we emphasize that spending on paid media will not necessarily correlate with spending by marketers on services, such as those provided by agencies.”

This summer, the Summer Olympics in Tokyo -- a major two-week televised event -- could be affected. Along with China, South Korea (as well as Iran and Italy), Japan has also been hit with significant effects due to coronavirus.

“While the games are still moving forward at the present time, because so many marketers build substantial campaigns centered around the Olympics, it will be particularly critical for those marketers to establish potential back-up plans in the event the Olympics do not occur."

He adds: “Given the absence of near-term sales to be realized, advertiser willingness to spend may fall despite higher audience levels for some media.”

The effects of consumers working from home would also extend to shopping and consumer activities:

“Media consumption at home will likely rise as will e-commerce sales, although because so much of the world relies so heavily on China to manufacture finished goods or components of goods, supply chains will likely be compromised.”

He also cautions -- as many analysts have already said -- that consumer spending on travel is anticipated to decline dramatically -- as well as activity public entertainment activity in movie theaters, concerts and other events.

He adds that slowing virus infection in China may be a path that other nations will follow: “Now that the spread is slowing in China and gradual signs of a resumption of normalcy are resuming, we do have a sense of how this could play out elsewhere.”

For example, at Chinese internet technology giant Baidu, he notes the company has said “in the past 2 weeks... business activities have started to pick up as people returned to work.”