Media Tribes

Michael Hedges September 6, 2004

The excellent EBU conference Multimedia Meets Radio last March (“Tribes Build Digital Communities,” RWI, August 2004) expanded the cultural tribe idea. As all things technical become all things purposeful, these new capacities expand medias ability to give voice, and narrative. Something very powerful happens as the tribe, then, becomes the driving force in the media brand.

It’s an interesting discussion point for broadcasters, shuddering as they would at the thought of giving over the airwaves to the audience. Imagine that directors meeting: “You’re going to do what?”

Audience is such an outmoded concept I hesitate using the word.

Customer is probably worse.

User sounds dull.

Constituent is nice; too many syllables.

Stakeholder is good.

We’ve discussed brand to the point everybody declares it, brand but not necessarily the discussion, dead.

The ad world loved the brand concept until, pushed to its logical end, they realized that stakeholders insist on having a voice in “their” brand. And sometimes the marketing message gets in the way of that communication. The point of branding is creating that conversation between (or among) stakeholders and the producer. So, Saatchi & Saatchi’s CEO Kevin Roberts declares “brand” dead and creates a product called “Lovemarks.” 

It’s all so unnecessary. Imagery is no substitute for character; what Steven Covey calls, “the composite of our habits.” Some media brands have stronger, more identifiable, character than others and that character is measurable. Strong media brands and media tribes interact.

There’s the BBC.

There’s MTV.

Now, there’s iPod. See this Media Guardian article on UK download charts.

Zurich RadioDay and the GoldMedia study

Swiss Press Association President Hanspeter Lebrument

RadioDay in Zurich has become a very polished and well-attended event. But this year the double divide in Swiss radio was very obvious.

For some reason still unclear to me, audience survey results are now reported separately; SSR-SRG and commercial stations. This separateness benefits neither. Since listeners choose stations and programs they like and those choices are measured through the same system, the results should be comparative. Many of the presentations and workshops were given over to ad sales. More than one SSR-SRG broadcaster mentioned a noticable imbalance. RadioDay "took off" when SSR-SRG got involved fours years ago and it would be unfortunate indeed if they lost interest.

The divide between the German-speaking broadcasters and the rest - French and Italian speaking - seemed larger this year. Offering two Radio of the Year awards, one for a station in the German-speaking region and another for the rest of the country, only points to that difference. Maybe it's just me.

The GoldMedia study done for OFCOM (see Media Rules and Rulers...) nailed some of the problems facing the commercial radio sector not only in Switzerland but all of Europe. The most obvious is that local ad revenue will not sustain every local stations. The sales pool system used in Switzerland, and elsewhere, further complicates the situation. The GoldMedia study floated the "rising tide lifts all boats" theory. Two big regional stations in the German-speaking region and maybe one in the French-speaking region might very well add the geographic weight necessary to pull more ad speading toward the radio sector.

Then there's the DAB argument. Unrestricted commercial sector access to DAB multiplexes might have an affect on ad markets in 5 to 7 years equal to or maybe greater than the addition of two or three "super-regional" commercial FMs. The GoldMedia study also makes an important point that the quality of FM receivers has measurably deteriorated in the last few years. Maybe it's time to move on. (Did I say that?)

Coming Up

For the next RWI deadline I’m working on an article about the efforts made to set up and operate radio stations in conflict zones: hot conflict zones. Afghanistan, Iraq, Sudan, Chechnya.

Also for RWI, I’m writing about the current radio news from Bulgaria, Hungary, Slovenia, Slovakia and the Czech Republic.

On the horizon is an article about restructuring DG Culture and DG Info Society and implications for broadcasters. The audiovisual sector could move from DG Culture to DG Info Society, with implications for both PSBs and commercial broadcasters.

If you haven’t yet noticed, followthemedia.com is more or less up and running. For the next few weeks Phil Stone and I will be adding content about all European media, new each Monday morning. Once I can set aside HTML For Dummies news, insight and other features will be updated more frequently.

Keep in touch!