Outdoor media’s chief spokesperson says it should be a billion-dollar industry in three years, but government regulation and a failure to sell its strengths is holding it back.
The industry smashed all growth records last year and cracked $600m, but Outdoor Media Association chairwoman Charmaine Moldrich said in a live interview with Mumbrella that she is ‘disappointed’ with its 10 per cent growth rate.
“We are very ambitious, we hope to be a billion dollar industry within the next three years, and that is what our challenge is, to convince the people who are buying from us how good the channel is,” she says.
“But if you want me to talk about it, in truth I think we should have grown more. I am actually disappointed with our growth.”
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Moldrich blamed the industry itself for being unable to effectively sell its strengths, and be ‘nimble’ enough to respond to and take advantage of changes in the market. As a result, she says it lags behind both the US and Britain.
“I think it is about education and working habits; it is about looking at the way people buy in order to sell better,” she says.
“I think we need to move a bit faster and be a bit more nimble, and we need to actually sell how well our channel works in this new media paradigm.”
However, Moldrich seems to believe many of the growth opportunities lie in digital, which increased its share of revenue from 11.3 per cent to 18.8 per cent last year, singling out government restrictions on digital billboards.
“I think government regulation is still an issue here in Australia and I think that while governments are still timid about digital networks we will be slightly behind the eight ball,” she says.
Moldrich says outdoor is one of the few media markets helped rather than hindered by digital technology, as it allows it to be more creative.
“I have to say out of all the industries to be in, outdoor would be the best in terms of traditional media because that growth makes sense where technology has really affected other traditional media models, it’s enhanced us,” she says.
Moldrich’s view on digital as the driver of future growth is shared by all three big outdoor media companies – Adshel, APN Outdoor and oOh! Media – which have all emphasised their digital assets and begun digitising portions of their print billboards and panels.
She also says outdoor has benefited from the fragmentation of other media, and is better poised to pick up ad dollars because of improved audience measurements like the OMA’s ‘move’ tool.
“I think the growth is yes move absolutely helped that growth, the growth in the industry has been propelled by it, but it’s also the fact that it’s the last truly remaining broadcast channel,” she says.
“So while other traditional media channels have fragmented, we’ve been able to pick up some of that fragmentation.”
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