These are interesting times, and the challenges faced by Australian marketing and media are frequently diabolical. There is always opportunity in a crisis, but rarely a single solution that is easy to see. Many are worried, searching for answers, and seeking guidance from our best thinkers. At Mumbrella, we want to interview industry leaders to understand their insights and learn how they handle the challenges and structure for the future. We hope this can help inspire our industry to trade through the storms and deliver the best work on the global stage.
In this week’s Media Mayhem, we speak to Brian Gallagher, the chairman of regional advertising collective, Boomtown.
How is the operating environment impacting your team, your clients, and or your partners?
Uncertainty is a disease that spreads like wildfire in corporate life. Uncertainty about the emerging environment for advertising breeds caution in marketing and advertising spend. Growth becomes difficult to find, and teams are working harder to stand still.
I’m finding this environment is one that encourages innovation and I’m pleased to see our regional media partners gravitating towards fresh thinking, new processes and ideas to stimulate the market. We see AI playing a role in the development of creative that opens whole new client cohorts, for example. Another is in the development of dynamic targeting tools that position local broadcast and digital media products to compete with pure play digital platforms. In the short term, these things may not achieve the desired immediate gains but in time innovation and effort will pay dividends.
What changes are you seeing in consumer behaviours and preferences? How are you meeting them?
Our lens is on regional consumers with a big emphasis on the heavy migration of populations from capital cities to regional cities and towns. Achieving lifestyle benefits without compromising career goals is the key theme, driven by Millennials. Having a higher disposable income is fueling investment in property which in turn is creating opportunity in regional economies. Decentralisation is a great example of changing consumer behaviour and it’s having a generational impact on our communities which is really exciting to see.
When you lift your eyes from the screen to the media and marketing horizon, how are you planning?
I believe there is enormous social value in local media continuing to produce uniquely local content for communities across Australia. Advertising is the means of funding these critically important services and in turn these services fuel a virtuous circle of economic return for their communities, as they connect local advertisers and businesses. We’re looking at how we go further in reaching local businesses, making access to local media services easier, so these businesses can tap into accountable, effective local media campaigns to drive their business forward.
What proposals for legislative change would you prioritise?
I see billions of dollars from small advertisers invested in offshore advertising platforms promising the world and delivering ever increasing costs for decreasing returns. The commercial landscape in that space is murky and opaque, with very little commercial or social value left behind for our communities. The current regulatory push to protect consumer data and privacy is an essential step, which I support. Does that go far enough? There is a larger question around unpacking the ecosystems that take such a large share of the turnover of small enterprise and understand just how ethically and fairly they operate.
What opportunities do you see, and how are you positioning your organisation?
Audience migration is constantly reframing the opportunity for Boomtown and advertisers big and small. We will continue to advocate within the sales teams of the media organisations we represent, within the media buying system, and educating and encouraging planners and buyers as we have since Boomtown’s inception.
Beyond these actions, we will double down on our contact with the end user – our clients. Contact with the CMOs and marketing teams of the larger advertising cohort is a given. Increasingly, we want to communicate with local regional advertisers to discuss the benefits that their local media outlets bring, especially compared to alternative global platforms. Ultimately, we seek a migration of ad revenues from existing offshore platform activity into acquisition, brand and awareness campaigns from local vendors that can reinvigorate campaign returns and lead to greater client success. Driving client success is our primary goal.
