TAARUK RAINA
Student id. -42764890
‘Discuss the phenomenon of digital media
convergence in relation to one of the following: Advertising & New Media
or Music Video Online’.
Advertising and New Media
Advertising and New Media
With
the emergence of new media, advertising has multiple platforms, and has become
multidimensional, and as the technology changes, newer methods of advertising are created. Media convergence has brought about significant technological
and cultural changes over the last fifteen years. Jenkins defines media
convergence as coming together of technologies for media consumption,
production and distribution (2006). According to Dwyer the process of
accommodating new media in existing media and communication industries and
cultures. It could also be described as the ability to obtain multiple services
on a single platform or device or any given service on multiple platforms and
devices.
New
media is slowly overthrowing old media. For example, how often would a person
use the yellow pages to find a phone number of a restaurant? The answer is
almost no one. In today’s day and age, any knowledge-based requirement would be
satisfied by an “app”. Apple used “there’s an app for that” as a tagline for their
newly released Iphone.
With
the emergence of new media like Internet based devices, smartphones, tablet
computers, the approach to advertising took a drastic change. Traditional
advertising is not used as widely as advertising via new media. The convergence
of digital media creates new platforms for advertising.
Businesses
can advertise online, on mobile phone applications, through text messages and
even music videos. Advertising on YouTube is extremely popular amongst large
corporations, where they book a 15 second space before the video plays on
YouTube to showcase their commercial.
Large corporations have also created smartphone “apps” so that customers can access or shop for products
conveniently and directly from their phone. For example, banks like
Commonwealth Bank have launched an app where a customer can access his bank
account, make transactions and transfers. There is a smart-phone application
for almost every function today, whether it is checking the weather or the
stock exchange. Since the culture of “apps” come into existence, companies have
started advertising in the applications where they display linked or related
applications to the ones that are being used by a specific user.
Hence,
a consumer can now view YouTube videos on a smartphone, which can also perform
functions such as banking, shopping, and various others. A UK study, conducted
by Informa Telecoms and
Media and reported in the trade journal Marketing Week, predicts that the
global Mobile advertising market will be worth US$11.3 billion by 2011, a
significant increase on the earlier forecast of around US$871 million for the
year 2006 (Lester, 2006). Meanwhile, within individual markets, research by
Frost and Sullivan estimated expenditure on mobile advertising in Australia for
2006 to ‘reach above’ AUD$500 million, or around US$445 (Howarth, 2006a). This
is up from AUD$130 million (US$115) in 2004 and AUD$250–300 million
(US$222–266) in 2005, despite the perception of growth having slowed slightly by
the beginning of 2006 ‘due to the exclusion of certain content types from some
capped and pre-paid plans’ (2006a). In the USA, meanwhile, 2007 figures put the
amount spent on mobile advertising for the preceding year at around US$421
million, with predictions that this will rise to around US$4.8 billion by 2011
(Wilken,R, Sinclair,J, 2009).
The web has become one of the main platforms for advertising, being easy to access, widespread and cost effective. The superiors in online advertising are Google. According to Harold Davis “advertising on the
web is a 7 billion dollar business with an annual growth rate of 40%, give or
take a few percent but the lion’s share belongs to Google”(Google Advertising
Tools, 2009). Google has grown rapidly to become a recognized brand, and a
highly sophisticated search engine remains a key factor for advertisers and
users alike (Spurgeon, 2008). The method
of advertising used by Google is auctioning. Advertisers bid for their selected
positions and spaces on Google websites and partners and sales network
affiliates in a web-based auction market place (Spurgeon, 2008). The auction mechanism defines the market
values of keywords. Google started this method of auctioning keywords in the
year 2000 and by 2001, 77 percent of Google’s income was generated out of
advertising services. By 2004, the same figure had risen to 98 percent
(Spurgeon, 2008). Google created
“AdSense” which had a feature called ‘pay per click’ which meant that
advertisers only paid for self selecting click throughs, also referred to as
qualified leads, because they are considered more likely to result in a sale or
transaction than a more general or broader population. This new way method of
paying for advertising was well received as advertisers get a more specific
indicator of returns (Spurgeon, 2008). Google continues to be the most widely
known website and a brand in the world.
Businesses
or companies also advertise on social networking sites, the biggest example
being Facebook. Facebook currently has nine hundred active users, this makes it
an extremely widespread website for companies to advertise their products.
Advertising is more effective on Facebook, as the businesses can get
information of people’s interests. Hence, advertising on Facebook is more
accurate, efficient and effective. This video shows the activity on Facebook
each minute: -
Advertising
and new media are interrelated as if one changes; the other is forced to
change. The moment that a new platform is created, a new way of advertising is
created as well. The technological changes that have occurred for example, the
World Wide Web, mobile applications, have made way for newer methods and have
created a wider reach for advertising. Advertising can now be done on multiple
platforms or devices. Hence, the emergence of new media has changed the basis
of advertising a product.
References
1. Dwyer,T,
2010, Media Convergence, McGraw Hill, Berkshire. pp1-23
2.
Spurgeon, Christina, 2008, ‘From the ‘Long Tail’ to ‘Madison and Vine’, Advertising and New Media, Routledge, New
York.
3.Lester,
Robert, 2006, ‘Advertising on Mobiles “Worth £6bn in 5 years”, Marketing Week, Vol.29, No. 37, pp. 17
4.Sinclair,
John & Wilken, Rowan, ‘Waiting For The Kiss Of Life’, Convergence, Vol.15, No.4, pp. 427-445.
5. Todi,
Mrinal
‘Advertising on Social Networking Websites’, Wharton Research Scholars Journal, accessed on 30th
September 2012, < http://repository.upenn.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1054&context=wharton_research_scholars>
6. Jenkins.H
(2006) Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide, NY University
Press.
7.Davis, Harold, 2009, Google Advertising Tools: Second Edition, O'Reily Media, California, pp. 1-5.
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