This morning’s MediaTel INSIGHT Digital Radio and Beyond Seminar, held in association with MediaGuardian, saw radio chiefs Ralph Bernard and Simon Cole, of GCap Media and UBC Media, urge a focus on the industry’s digital future rather than being distracted by the current “fight” over analogue audiences.
“The problem is that analogue fighting could distract from digital, which is the real future” explained Bernard, when asked about the future direction of the industry, adding that “the opportunities for advertising are greater going forward, through increased digital listening.”
Cole echoed the GCap chief executive’s sentiments, stating that UBC Media has “always positioned itself as a digital company,” before deploring the lack of foresight by some investors in radio who fail to see the attractiveness of digital broadcasting. “We were able to start as a digital broadcaster from a blank sheet of paper,” Cole continued. “In many respects that’s a very luxurious position to be in.”
Spelling out the benefits of digital radio, Cole explained that additional revenues were within the reach of broadcasters who embraced the medium’s data-based applications. The radio boss then gave a brief demonstration of UBC’s work in progress music download service, explaining: “GPRS and telecoms spectrum is costly. We own radio data spectrum and it costs £120,000 per year full stop. There isn’t telecoms bandwidth which comes close.”
“The future is not solely music downloads,” he continued, “and it won’t replace advertising. But it does show what is possible and what could be done today.”
However, the radio bosses claims of increased revenues through alternative streams were lambasted by media commentator Ray Snoddy, also speaking on the event’s panel.
“I don’t see them as a substitute for advertising,” he explained, “and I think a lot of these alternative sources of revenue can be double edged. For instance, once people download music tracks they’re going to start listening to them, and what happens to your audience in the meantime? It goes down of course.”
Bernard agreed in part with Snoddy’s viewpoint, stating that additional services such as music downloads would only ever be used as “add ons” to traditional listening, and claiming: “I don’t think it will detract from listening because people still listen to the radio in the same way they did 20 years ago, despite all the distractions such as iPods, they adopt these new services as well as listening, not instead of.”
A Digital Radio Executive Report is available to buy at: http://www.mediatelinsight.co.uk/reports priced £225. The report features the latest forecasts and current marketplace dynamics for the digital radio market, including the uptake and listening patterns emerging for this medium, and looks forward to where new technological advances will take radio in the future.
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