Achieving Reach in a Fragmented Media World - Webcast

Comcast Spotlight Take Five

We hope you had a chance to attend our Take Five for Your Future webcast, Achieving Reach in a Fragmented Media World, which took place on May 18. If you didn’t, you can watch the complete webcast here.

A panel of media experts including Jonathan Lichter; Chief Strategy Officer for Kelly, Scott & Madison; Ken Nippes, Vice President and Media Director for Cramer-Krasselt; Charlie Holmes, VP of Satellite Sales for NCC Media; and Peter Heisinger, Regional Vice President for Comcast Spotlight, participated in a lively discussion on how fragmentation is changing the media landscape.

Our panel felt that increased fragmentation of audiences across multiple media platforms can pose a challenge for advertisers in their efforts to achieve effective reach goals, and is requiring more resources from agency media departments as they attempt to evaluate the growing range of media options. Ken Nippes and Jonathan Lichter agreed that the increased focus on media alternatives have increased the importance and stature of media departments within agencies.

Diminished reach is the largest single issue that comes up with clients,” said Lichter. “And the resources required to evaluate everything that comes through is in fact the key agency operational issue.” Nippes added, “We have the benefit of being the first to know about a lot of new things, so we’re a logical filter for what the rest of the agency needs to know about.”

That’s where I+, or “Interconnect Plus,” comes in, according to NCC’s Charlie Holmes. He introduced the new platform for spot advertising in local markets, and explained how it will simplify the process of reaching, and reporting on, fragmented television audiences by allowing advertisers to reach cable, telco and satellite subscribers with a single media buy. Holmes said affiliation partnerships between cable MSOs and, AT&T U-verse and DirectTV would be in place by the end of the year, building on an agreement with Verizon FiOS that rolled out last year. Peter Heisinger provided specific examples of how I+ can help advertisers increase reach in specific markets thanks to I+. Comcast Spotlight is launching I+ partnerships in 33 of its markets, including Houston, Chicago, Atlanta, San Francisco, Miami and Detroit, among others.

We polled the audience during the webcast and the attendees agreed with Lichter and Nippes that fragmentation was affecting their ability to do their job. When asked what consequence of audience fragmentation had impacted them the most, 55% said they have difficulty combining campaign metrics from multiple sources, 24% felt that that time required to deal with more media sales organizations is their obstacle, while 21% said that fragmentation was making it difficult to achieve reach goals. The panel concluded that the I+ affiliate partnership offered by NCC and Comcast Spotlight would help alleviate all three concerns.

To download the slides from this or other educational videos and webcasts, please visit: http://www.comcastspotlight.com/takefive