The biggest growth category for media companies has been the unemployed category, according to a study from Ad Age. It says that you have to go back 15 years to find a lower total of media employees. Leading the charge to the unemployment lines have been newspapers. The current media employment total was pegged at 886.9K, after peaking at well over 1M around Y2K. Advertising/marketing was strong, however, at 769K, a total Ad Age says is a new record.
160K media jobs have been lost since that high water mark, accounting for about one out of every six jobs. Roughly half of the erosion is attributable to newspapers alone. In the past years, radio and television employment were down, while magazines had a tiny increase.
Retailers and services still need to sell their wares, though, despite the bottom line problems hitting the media. That has led to growth in marketing consultancies, firms that help guide clients through the rapidly changing media landscape. And the element that is changing that landscape the most, the internet, is the biggest growth category.
RBR/TVBR observation: They say you can’t save your way to prosperity. So the question becomes this: If a broadcaster’s sweetest dream is true — that the internet is highly overrated as an advertising medium, especially at the local level, and the extended honeymoon it has had with some former broadcast clients will soon lose its luster, leaving the clients look back to the airwaves again for a solution, will there be enough of an industry left to welcome them back?
