Media Honchos Consider Online Strategies
"building online strategies remains very much a work in progress for many major media executives"
"Our challenge is to come up with hassle-free and reasonable-cost technologies for the consumer"
"I think the opportunities will explode over the next four to five years."
"I think it's going well, particularly as we see the movement to video on broadband, which suits all these media companies really well"
"I think there are more questions than answers at this point"
witness the dichotomy of points-of-view coming out of the annual allen & co media-tech schmooze fest in sun valley...
so, one at a time:
- all business strategies are a work in progress, that's the difference between a strategy and the tactical implementation of operational elements against that strategy - so why is online for media viewed any differently?
- consumers actually have hassle-free and reasonably costing technology today - that's the myopia, those stating that it's a challenge don't seem to understand their own customers
- next 4 to 5 years - the opportunities are exploding now, if you wait 5 years you'll never catch-up, and you actually may just fade away
- yup, video via broadband works fine - so does audio, but for both - media companies need to consider what consumers want not just what suits the companies themselves
- there are tons of answers, you just have to be asking the right questions folks, try starting w/ (guess what) your customers - what are they already doing and how can you morph to accommodate their desires?
i'm constantly amazed when i see how many media industry entities are threatened by emerging media consumption and technology trends, that think the genie can be put back in the bottle, instead of seeing these capabilities and practices as opportunities to stay current and relevant to their customers...
the key of course is to provide a product or service where the desire and practice of sharing or bootlegging is irrelevant - one that is easier, cheaper and of higher quality than whatever the customer can get via bootlegged media and is positively effected by sharing practices...
if you're in media, suggest that you track what's going on in the "free" & "viral" media as a percentage of "paid" media movement, start by listening to this fantastic podcast of an interview dave slusher did of cory doctorow, via the it conversations channel - voices in your head - whew - got all the links in doug ;)
finally, i can't imagine any business model surviving when a major requirement of the success of that model is the need to constantly prosecute the customers - instead try conversing w/ those same customers (not just via press releases or snailmail either) - create corporate blogs, allow your employees to blog (use the "be smart" approach), podcast, videoblog, augment your customer service areas w/ wiki's, subscribe and read your customer's blogs/posts, track their conversations and join in on these conversations via comments and trackbacks (not just defensively either)...
oh, and don't just ask only your pr and communication folks to do these things - every cxo, gm, vp, director, etc... should have these practices baked into their performance plan and compensation model (scary huh) - try that strategy, talking and listening to your customers might actual teach you how to survive and prosper no matter what emerging media comes into play :)
update: a nice comment from doug kaye, which is highly appreciated ;)
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