LAS VEGAS – Local television is being transforming with digital technologies that are transforming their power as an advertising medium. It’s important that these technologies not be seen as a threat to salespeople who have worked in broadcasting for longer periods.
“There’s been hesitancy on the part of a lot of salespeople to embrace digital,” Michael Spiesman, vice president of sales and marketing at Allen Media Broadcasting, said in this interview with Beet.TV contributor Tameka Kee at the NAB Show.
“You don’t really need to understand how the signal gets from a TV station into someone’s household, but yet when digital came up, everybody had to know everything about the technology behind it,” he said. “Demystifying digital and convincing salespeople that they don’t have to approach their advertisers with those details, but rather what benefit utilizing our digital portfolio would bring to them.”
Changing Audience Measurement
Spiesman said the media marketplace would benefit from reliable audience measurement, with only Nielsen and Comscore being accredited by the Media Rating Council (MRC), the watchdog group.
“Everyone would agree that there is better needed, but not necessarily more,” Spiesman said. “Reliable measurement is critical. We would be open to finding a better system, but thus far, we don’t know that one has been presented.”
