JacoBlog - Jacobs Media's Blog

The News From Brokaw

At age 67, Tom Brokaw - typical of Baby Boomers - is still in touch with the times.  Maybe leaving the daily grind to someone else at NBC has even given him a fresh perspective.  So leave it to Tom to deliver the news to the folks at the Washington Post, during a recent tour of their plant, that he doubts they'll even have a printing press there in 10 years.

And really, why should consumers care?  Ask Gen-Y how they get their news and information, last night's scores, or the latest music.  Many laugh at the quaint suggestion that they might want someone on a bicycle to deliver a daily printout that's hours old.  Or that they'd wait through 5 minutes of commercials and 5 bad songs.

Brokaw didn't say there wouldn't still be a need for news journalists, but that there may not be much of a need for newspaper.  Oh, but the "paperboy" is as American as apple pie!  He's downright Rockwellian!  Of course, so were milkmen and ice truck drivers, even though we now drink refrigerated milk without their help.

Once upon a time, the printing press put the Town Crier out of business, but it also created new jobs requiring new talents.  So will digital media delivery.

No, NOT A Blender...

Jacobs Media's Dave Beasing gets his game on in today's post:

Quick quiz:  What brand name gift item has been in the top 3 on Amazon.com's wedding gift registry for the past several weeks?

Give up?  It's the Nintendo Wii videogame system.  Apparently videogames have evolved from a reason couples split up to become something that brings them together.

It's further confirmation of a key finding in the Arbitron/Jacobs Bedroom Project - that videogames are largely a social activity these days.  Many of the young people we visited at home were eager to show us how much fun they have playing videogames with their friends - either in person or in online competition - and they told us they often "talk smack" with their rivals.  One high school senior even said that he and his friends often refer to each other by their on-screen player names.  (I thought to myself, "At least teenagers get to pick their own nicknames now.  That's social progress.")

The Bedroom Project also verified what our friend Steve Schnur at EA Games has been telling us for years, that games are often a "gateway" to discovering other entertainment.  It's Steve's job to decide what sounds - and music - get put on popular games like Madden Football and NBA Live, causing many gamers to then search for more songs by those artists.  If not through James Bond videogames, how else would one of our Bedroomers - a senior at UCLA - have become a Henry Mancini fan?

Just as a whole generation has grown up loving the NFL because of Madden (the videogame, not the play-by-play analyst), Rock music is experiencing a revival that can be directly credited to Guitar Hero.  The third edition was just released with fanfare, and it's still not too late to celebrate.  Clients should check out our handy idea starters on JacobsMedia.com.

Technology changes, but common sense marketing doesn't.  Videogames like Guitar Hero bring people together, and - whenever that happens - there's a golden opportunity.

Boom Boom

In a new eMarketer article, this question is posed:  "Could Boomers Save The Music Industry?"  That's because more than seven in ten Baby Boomers bought music last year.  When you consider that population tops out in the 76,000,000 range, that's a lot of CDs and downloads.  In fact, more than two-thirds of Boomers buy only CDs.

Yet, the record industry has traditionally focused on youth, and "hits" stations.  In a new study, conducted for the National Association of Recording Merchandisers (NARM) and the AARP by The NPD Group, the potential and real power of Boomers is reinforced by hard sales data.  Considering that those born between 1941 to 1964 now account for one-third of music sales, and could generate $1 billion in revenue, it says something about the disconnected "strategies" of record labels.

Consider this quote from The NPD Group's Russ Crupnick: "While the recording industry struggles with piracy and sharing among younger consumers, there's at least one group with the income and inclination to pay for music."

And Boomer tastes are established and rock solid.  If you grew up with The Eagles and Van Halen, you're paying top dollar for new and old albums by these bands, as well as shelling out top dollars to see them perform live.

For years, the labels have virtually ignored Classic Rock stations, yet these are the listeners consistently buying CDs, box sets, and by the way, paying $100+ for concert seats.  And much of this is happening organically - with minimal effort at the label level.  That's because the conventional "wisdom" in the record community is that it's all about currents and spins.  If they made more than just a token effort to better service these stations, advertise on them and share their artists with their millions of listeners, how much more revenue could they generate?

As every media and entertainment sector struggles to comprehend the "new rules," the record community would do well to finally figure out who's got the money and the loyalty to keep buying CDs - bad songs and all.  As the eMarketer article suggests, Boomers just might save their butts.

Loners?

One of the more interesting findings from the Arbitron/Jacobs "Bedroom Study" was the realization that video gamers aren't just kids sitting in their basements by themselves.  Like TV viewing, gaming is becoming a social activity.  A recent Advertising Age article points out that marketers are beginning to figure this out.

Whether it's Wii parties or "Guitar Hero" fests, gamers enjoy hanging out and competing with each other.  And as we've pointed out in past advisories and blogs, radio should be at the center of this activity.  The "Guitar Hero" application is especially important because it totally supports the music foundation of radio, while giving even the musically-challenged the opportunity to feel like Eddie Van Halen or Joe Perry.

As video gaming spreads to older demos, stations can tap into activities that the audience is already participating in, while cashing in on the phenomenon.

You can see both "Bedroom Project" presentations at the NAB/R&R Conventions in Charlotte this September.  Conceived by Arbitron and conducted by Jacobs Media, "The Bedroom Project" is an ethnography study about media, technology, and survey research.  The presentations are Wednesday afternoon at 3:45 at the NAB; Thursday afternoon at Jacobs Summit 12.

AARP This

OK, I'll admit it.  I'm clearly of AARP age, but have thus far refused to join this group.  Call it a vanity thing, but the discounts aren't worth the trouble for me, and this is clearly an organization I do not wish to be a part of.  (Of course, an estimated 37 million members disagree with me.)

Not surprisingly, music and concert promotion are now becoming AARP activities, based on their notion that 45+ Americans are being under-served by radio.  AARP's Senior Producer of Digital Media (yes - they have one of these!), Steve Mencher, notes that "we're constantly barraged by talk of the prime demographic of 18-to-34-year-olds, and it's like nobody else matters."  Besides promoting Tony Bennett, AARP also has put its resources behind Rod Stewart and Earth, Wind & Fire tours.  They are also producing radio features now, geared to the notion that their membership is being ignored by commercial broadcasters.

Ironic, isn't it?  As we know only too well, radio is hardly about 18-34s.  But given what the industry did to the Oldies format, radio has all but walked away from fiftysomethings.  I'm not a big believer that the return of WCBS-FM is a harbinger of things to come, or even a revival of the Oldies format.  And it's concerning that the same fate awaits Classic Rock in a few years.

There was nothing wrong with Oldies.  There is nothing wrong with Classic Rock.  Instead of investing more money on music testing to "young up" these formats, perhaps there needs to be more effort in learning how to market different demographics to the advertising industry.

Otherwise, AARP, Starbucks, and all the other entities that embrace aging Boomers will reap the benefits - just as MTV, Teen People, and Cosmo Girl! have gleaned those teen dollars.  It's a sales problem, not a programming problem.