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Consider this: India is set to overtake the US in 2014 with respect to the number of internet users it houses, and be second only to China with 300 million internet users. Driven primarily by mobile, internet usage in India has grown by 40 per cent in 2013.
It is no surprise that 28 per cent of mobile video users in India state that their traditional TV viewing has decreased - a figure higher than in most key markets. Nearly 40 per cent of our 'media interactions' take place on smartphones, as smartphone users spend close to 160 minutes (source: Nielsen Mobile Informate Insights) on their mobile phones, which is higher than the time they spend on TV. What's more, one in three YouTube users watches YouTube and TV together. Sequential screening - where we move from one device to another to complete a single goal - has officially arrived and so has simultaneous screening, where we use multiple devices at the same time.
Simply put, the so-called new media (social, digital and mobile) is expected to be the platform that will drive the next level of advertising growth. For marketers, things just got better. All three platforms are interconnected and have huge scope for innovative cross-media campaigns.
For media planners and buyers, however, things just got complicated.
The typical media manager was in a comfort zone. He could summon the skills he had honed over the years - that of buying the best TV spots based on television ratings, negotiating rates with TV channels and print publications, throwing in the occasional hoarding or bus panel ad in the media plan and pulling strings with a radio station 'roadblock', smiling all the way to the Emvies with that one. Digital was the new kid on the block - a presence, but not one that was given much attention. It seems like the time to take notice has come.
Consumers are way ahead on the digital curve while media managers scramble to catch up. Their job profile has gone for a toss, because the TV viewers they thought were 'distracted' by their mobile devices, have, in truth, never been more engaged by them.
Against this backdrop, we track how the job of a media manager has changed over the last five years and the skills he has to learn to stay on top.
1 It is about communication planning, not media planning
"Five years ago the expectations from media agencies were simpler," says Sameer Satpathy, executive vice-president and business head, Marico India. The primary implementation need was to optimise TV reach within a given spend, understand the need for a second and third medium, and deploy the same. On the strategy side, the need was usually about building brand salience, using existing media vehicles. "The biggest difference was that all of this was done under a fixed set of communication assets, especially a television commercial and a print creative," Satpathy adds.
Today, the demand is to understand a brand's objective and decode it in terms of a vast media universe. The starting point is no longer a defined TVC. Communication is now a two-way street and at times, it originates from the consumer, eliciting a response from the brand. So clearly, the media planner needs to be relevant not just to the brand manager but to the distribution and logistics department, the sales department, research and development etc.
Also, the consumer journey to purchase is very different now than it was till even a few years ago. The AIDA (awareness, interest, desire, action) route doesn't hold true. At any given point, the four stages crisscross one another. Clearly, media planning is no longer about TV, print and radio. The spotlight has shifted to communication planning.
The adage that the medium is the message has never been more evident. Today, media is just not a carrier of brand messages. It creates content which acts as a distribution and sales agent for brands, influencing consumers far more than a piece of advertising could.
The paid, owned and earned media framework is making every planner think of new ways to enhance every paid media activity. The truth is, media planners are struggling with the concept of branded content. "The ability to say stories creatively is something media planners are only now learning," says Kartik Sharma, MD, Maxus South Asia. Take energy drink brand Red Bull for instance, which now sees itself as a content producer. "This proves that you don't always need paid communication. Branded content can also be an enabler."
Today's media manager needs to think more creatively. In fact, media managers now also look after a brand's online reputation management too. And have to deal with practically every department at the client's end. This brings us to the next point.
2 It is no longer about a script, it is about a dialogue
The media manager's job now is not only about creating media plans but also managing the business aspect. They now need to deal with many new people like the CEOs of companies, procurement heads, head of legal, online publishers like Yahoo!, mobile ad exchanges, digital marketing agencies and so on.
The fallout? The media manager-advertiser-media owner triangle is fast becoming a hexagon at the very least, with multiple parties getting involved. "I handle Google as a client, and occasionally our team may need to speak to online publishers or mobile ad networks," says Eeshita Ghosh, client partner on Google at Maxus.
Gone are the days when the media manager sat down with a client and a media owner and discussed rating points and rates. He is no longer meeting just the advertiser and the channels/publications but also specialist units that have emerged as a result of the digital wave. "The media manager is our first line of contact; these are, after all, the guys who are hands-on with the media budget. They are also our last line of execution," says Preetesh Chouhan, vice-president (Asia Pacific), Vdopia, a mobile video ad firm.
Media agencies also create games and apps for brands for a more interactive connect with the consumer. "What has changed is that the advertiser now demands more from digital than TV or print. His expectations are high as digital is more effective" says PM Balakrishna, COO, Percept Media.
Big brands all have agencies on record, he says, so a typical digital ad network guy needs to interact with the media manager if he is to attract advertisers.
There are times when a client approaches a digital ad network directly as well. "But when we interact with the brand managers, it is more about educating them about the medium. The media guys come equipped with knowledge about digital, and in their case, the conversation is more about execution," Chouhan says.
So we now have the media manager having to play a central role in the soap opera of media fragmentation as he juggles relationships with multiple parties, all the while ensuring he doesn't lose his eye on the ball - the consumer.
3 Social is not peripheral but core to strategy
A media planner who used to view TV, print, radio separately as independent content delivery platforms has had to understand media all over again.
Take television. Earlier, a media manager had a single measurement currency called rating point and if at all there were modifications, these were insignificant. The digitisation process has been a big trigger for change. Certain terms that have become part of a new age media manager's vocabulary are impressions (by far the most popular way of buying and measuring digital inventory), CPC (cost per click), CPL (cost per lead), CTR (click through rate), biddable inventory, bounce rate etc. "The language in agency hallways has changed. Now it is about CPT (cost per thousand) as opposed to CPR (cost per rating)," says a media buyer.
Even when one speaks of traditional media today, channel distribution is a popular term that is used with the digitisation wave. This has affected the measurement numbers as well. Today we have DTH, HD and CAS (conditional access system or digital cable) that are changing the content delivery mechanism.
In the case of branded content, the measurement is done for the engagement quotient, by mapping the influencers, sharing ability of the content, enquiries in the store as a result of it etc. Broadly put, the return on digital is measurable with the number of clicks, downloads and leads.
A lot of media agencies today have specialised digital arms. And why not - new devices and platforms have emerged, as digital has its own dashboard, measurement metrics and rates. Today, the mobile, TV, print and the web are measured separately. It is a comprehensive network dashboard that a media manager is dealing with, and not just one media plan or two.
A school of thought believes what the industry lacks acutely is a common measurement metric for digital. But the irony isn't lost on anyone: with the sheer variety of formats that digital advertising can experiment with, a common measurement metric - like TVRs for TV - seems to be an impossible dream.
4 Generational fluency is a must-have
A popular video on YouTube today offers the same number of views as a niche TV channel, or perhaps more. A media manager today should understand this. Media agencies are hiring more youngsters as they are flexible and comfortable with the march of the digital juggernaut.
Apart from the age factor, the skills of a media manager have changed significantly. Clients now expect them to have understanding of the factors that impact their business. This means the ability to connect the dots across a wide spectrum.
Also, big data on social media is crucial. The skill to sift through vast amounts of data to make sense is probably one of the biggest shifts for all media agency personnel.
We also witness the emergence of a 'digital planner' in addition to the traditional one. Unfortunately, "they are two different people who don't understand each other's worlds," says Sudha Natrajan, founder and director, The Media Consultants. "The consumer is far ahead because she consumes all media together, begins interacting with the brand through one medium and seamlessly flows into another," she says. There are some who believe that the best of digital planners may not be the best strategic planners. "This actually is the case with most traditional media managers too. They are all mainly TAM and IRS operators, but don't understand brands themselves," Natrajan adds.
Think about it: Media has always been an industry for the young. "Understanding digital media and creating winning brands is a business need, so 'older and experienced' managers will also need to learn and adapt to digital as it is no longer an option," says Satpathy of Marico India.
5 In digital, everyone is a content publisher
With so much talk of digital, let's not forget that the nature of traditional media is changing too. For instance, Tata Sky is available on mobile too. So if you are making a DTH plan, you will have to look at mobile too. The youth and professionals are increasingly reading newspapers on mobiles/tablets through apps. Videos on news sites have become popular. With this kind of a convergence, solo media plans will seldom work.
Everything has a technology angle to it: the pace of change is so rapid that media managers have to keep one eye on what's happening in the world of 'tech'.
"The revenue system is going to change in the years to come," says RS Suriyanarayanan, associate vice-president, Initiative. Broadcasters will get to know how many connections there are, and who is the end-mile user. They will then charge for the content, and their dependency on advertising will reduce. This is going to put pressure on the media manager.
Going by this theory, it will soon become a channel-driven market with content publishers calling the shots. The choices will be multiple for media managers, and they will be forced to choose the best one at the right time.
Even when it comes to print, digital may not be an immediate threat. The media manager still sees his half page ad as more alluring than a banner on an app. It may take another decade for newspapers to see digital media as a real threat. But this threat will also be an opportunity, as the platform will change for content-generation and delivery. This means that the revenue stream will also become a multiple one. The newspaper deal used to earlier have discussions on only the sizes of the ad and their placement in the paper. Today we talk of a package: placing the ad online as well as on the newspaper's online delivery mechanism, like going for indiatimes.com along with The Times of India, or the online versions of Daily Thanthi and Malayala Manorama along with the print versions.
"The job supplements with top dailies have shrunk in size and are playing second fiddle to the job portals of these newspapers," says a media manager. That is the way the market is moving, and hence, advertising is moving there too. Media managers will have to adapt to it, and this will severely test their change capabilities.
For categories that want instant leads and conversions like finance, banking, credit cards etc, digital is already very important.
Digital media offers interactivity and engagement. Conventional media continues to offer reach and loyalty. A successful media manager will perhaps be the one who can draw from the best of both.
