Waiting for the inevitable shift
The folks at Pew have released a study of the internet’s impact on last year’s political campaigns, and the numbers raise a troubling question for 2008.
Twice as many Americans used the internet as their primary source of news about the 2006 campaign compared with the most recent mid-term election in 2002.
Some 15% of all American adults say the internet was the place where they got most of their campaign news during the election, up from 7% in the mid-term election of 2002.
So if it doubled last year, will it double again in 2008? I think that’s probably conservative, and what it means is that political ad money will shift as well. The question is what happens to the formula for revenue growth for local television stations, if a big chunk of political money goes to the web? If you’re a station owner or manager, what are you planning to get your share of that money?
The study also found that younger people view the web as a more important source of political news than newspapers.
While television and newspapers still dominate political communication for the majority of Americans, there is now a group of citizens who use the internet more than newspapers. They are relatively young — under 36 years old — and they have broadband connections at home. Some 35% of those in that cohort say the internet was their main source of political news during the 2006 campaign, compared with 18% who cite newspapers. For older broadband users, the internet still seems to be a supplemental source of political information and activity.
As I’ve often reported, we’ve fallen into a pattern over the last decade of broadcast revenue being off during odd years and up during years with elections and the Olympics. Given these numbers from Pew, it may well be that we can’t count on political campaigns to pull us through difficult times much longer.
January 19th, 2007 at 7:14 am
it was only back in november’s election when the cw was that 2008 was secure when it came to political ad sales for tv.
it is research like this, as well as obama’s and edwards’ use of youtube and brightcove, that makes me think that 2007 ain’t even secure.
most of these candidates will fall off the map by 2008, but what they are doing is “making” the inevitable shift a reality.
January 21st, 2007 at 10:09 pm
Terry, I’m sure it has not escaped your attention, but given this recent post of yours, it’s worth an additional comment. Don’t you find it interesting, if not fascinating, that both “rock star” Obama and front-runner, Ms. Clinton both chose to announce their “official” candidacy for president on their websites? I remember a time when a candidate would time their announcement so they would be the lead in the evening newscast. But now it is more important to put their newsworthy announcement on the web regardless of the impact it might have on their position in the nightly newscast.
To reinforce the point you make in your blog, I don’t think those that control the advertising purse strings of those campaigns are unaware of the strategy either