Will TV, digital continue to grow at the expense of other media? Join the debate.

Mandy Le
Manager of global forecasting for APAC & Latam, Magnaglobal

TV and digital will sustainably lead media industry growth in most markets. For mass marketers, television remains uniquely capable of driving awareness. Further, fragmentation creates smaller units of inventory, which in turn enables smaller marketers to use TV. Under such circumstances, TV’s growth should persist for some time, growing 10.2 per cent each year through 2016 across Asia. Digital is expected to grow quickly, at 13.9 per cent per year for the next five years, but its growth is due to different reasons. Mass marketers are relying on digital as their secondary medium - often at the expense of print or radio which are only expected to see growth of 4.4 per cent and 9.4 per cent respectively across the region despite Asia having the strongest print and radio markets globally. But the story of digital is primarily one of expansion, as many new e-commerce based and small enterprises build their businesses using digital media. Traditional media owners - especially those with print and radio assets - may yet be able to leverage the popularity of digital media by incorporating digital facets into traditional media and creating campaigns spanning media. Those owners who also happen to be dominant digital owners are even better placed, such as newspaper owners in Australia. 

Toby Hack
MD, PHD Australia

Traditionally, money follows audiences, which denies the fact that different media offer different benefits. Investment patterns are influenced by a range of factors and are rarely decided by something as simple as an equation factoring audience scale and price. That said devices and consumers are moving towards screens and advertisers have followed. FMCG has supported TV as it has looked to bolster its own customer base, and mobile is the next big opportunity here. Digital still offers new tricks alongside the trump card of accountability. At PHD we don’t think in cost per thousands but in terms of effective cost per thousands. We focus on the audience you actually want that’s inside the bigger audience that you buy. Media buying should never just be about price. Investment will always vary as media develops different techniques and offerings. In this world there is no such thing as an irreversible trend.

Matthew Semple
Regional development director, ZenithOptimedia

Going forward, digital will show unabated irreversible growth across all markets in Asia-Pacific. TV will also continue to rise across this region. However, the rate of growth will be slower coming off a far larger base. Our experience from other regions shows that as markets mature TV’s share of total ad expenditure is likely to stagnate or show slight declines as seen in Western Europe in 2009. This trend can already be seen in Japan and Australia, but TV revenues there are still increasing year-on-year, and are forecast to continue to do so for the next three years. New free-to-air digital channels with more targeted programming options in Australia are performing well, providing further positive signs there. In other major markets, such as China and India, the outlook for TV is healthy with double-digit percentage increases forecast for the same period. Ultimately content remains the key success driver regardless of platforms. The wider availability and consumption of TV content and online video across multiple platforms is further boosting digital ad revenues and this is an area where Asia-Pacific leads in adoption rates compared to Europeans and North Americans. The demise of TV is not imminent.