Alison Simpson, CEO of the CMA, and Cathy Collier, CEO of OMD, delve into everything from the dynamic changes in consumer behaviour to the explosive surge of connected TV and the challenges local and mass media will face now and in the years ahead.

00:00:02:10 - 00:00:23:09

Announcer

Welcome to CMA Connect Canada's marketing podcast, where industry experts discuss how marketers must manage the tectonic shifts that will change how brands and businesses are built for tomorrow, while also delivering on today's business needs. With your host, CMS CEO Allison Simpson.

00:00:23:09 - 00:00:49:13

Alison Simpson

The marketing profession has experienced an absolute tsunami of change, and media will be a prime example of that, especially when it comes to mass media with connected TV reaching scale with Canada leading the world in livestream, signal availability and attention metrics becoming more important, a massive evolution is absolutely underway. Today, I'm very pleased to be joined by Cathy Collier, the CEO of OMD and a leader in Canada's media and agency community.

00:00:50:04 - 00:02:29:00

Alison Simpson

Cathy's expertise and deep knowledge on media in Canada make her a terrific guide through the media tsunami. She'll share her insights on how mass media is changing, and it absolutely promises to be a thought provoking discussion. Thanks so much for joining us on CMA Connect today. Cathy, We're going to kick things off by having you answer what trends you're seeing that are most important for marketers for 2024.

00:02:29:00 - 00:03:10:02

Cathy Collier

So connected TV has to reach scale as well and in a lot of markets, but also in Canada, 74% of Canadian households have a smart TV. So connected TV is starting to close the gap in screen time spent between mobile and really the hardware that is now in living rooms. So thanks to many factors like Samsung plus really an avalanche of services, including our latest acronym, FAST, which stands for free ad supported streaming TV.

00:03:10:07 - 00:03:52:02

Cathy Collier

And a good example of that is Corus's Pluto. But both hardware and the services are really changing that ten foot living room experiences and the economies of mass media forever. And then moving on to what would be the third trend that we're paying attention to, that everyone is paying attention to? Is A.I. within the loop of creativity. So really, the first impact I think everyone is seeing is inclusive of ideation, of audience testing, dynamic, creative, as well as content and writing within SEO.

00:03:52:22 - 00:04:23:18

Cathy Collier

But as we all know, A.I. is really, really tricky on ethics. The biases that are built in intellectual property and privacy. You only have to look at the writers strike to know how much impact it is having. And I heard a great analogy about A.I., and that is, you know, they build F1 cars to go really, really fast, but they also design them with state of the art brakes.

00:04:24:04 - 00:04:28:16

Cathy Collier

So to avoid crashing and I don't think that we have the brakes yet.

00:04:29:05 - 00:04:31:01

Alison Simpson

That is such a fitting analogy. I love it.

00:04:31:09 - 00:05:16:05

Cathy Collier

So and fourth of four things that we're paying attention to and really have been building data around is attention planning and optimization around it. It really sheds light on how important scripted programing news and audio formats are. So OMD has been investing in attention for a number of years. Attention is a key indicator for effectiveness. Studies by amplified intelligence uses advanced eye tracking, and they've shown a strong correlation between the amount of attention paid to ad formats and their impact on both short term sales and long term salience.

00:05:16:05 - 00:05:51:24

Cathy Collier

So all of these trends, all four trends are showing how quickly things are changing pretty significantly. And it does highlight the opportunities. But it brings to mind really the conversation that continues to be underlying, which is all about impact measurement and the business value of a brand, the importance of unified measurement and how we're working with marketers to define frameworks that help them demonstrate the value marketing brings to the business.

00:05:52:05 - 00:06:05:19

Cathy Collier

Even in the face of all this change and fragmentation. And it's hard, right? The math is hard, the politics are harder and but they're doable and we're doing it now.

00:06:06:02 - 00:06:27:15

Alison Simpson

That's such a great overview and thanks for sharing those four crucial trends. For every marketer that's listening today. And also to acknowledge you're obviously right, it is so incredibly hard. And I'm getting to my second question. When you take what's happening in the marketplace and overlay consumer behaviors, it just adds to the complexity. It still is doable, but it certainly won't be easy.

00:06:28:05 - 00:06:37:09

Alison Simpson

So on that note, how is changing consumer behavior affecting the media landscape, and what are the specific implications, ones that you see for the traditional mass media formats?

00:06:38:05 - 00:07:05:21

Cathy Collier

Good question, though. I think at a very high level, just looking at it, we know that consumers have been equally enabled through technology, but also through an abundance of content and they're spending a little bit of time at a whole bunch of places. Another word for fragmentation, of content, of platform of time, and they now have infinite choice and it's resulted in a couple other sub trends.

00:07:06:02 - 00:07:42:03

Cathy Collier

One that we've seen is a craving for nostalgia, and you can see it manifesting itself in the resurgence of programs like The Office. And if you look around, you can see nine of these type kind of topography being used in different campaigns. So they're also longing for that cultural connection. But at this point, taking all of those trends, we know that both consumers and media are trying to find the next set of viable models.

00:07:42:15 - 00:08:17:16

Cathy Collier

We can see that there's fractures right across the business models, and it's not really a debate whether the big prod casters and editorial publications will be still around or will change. They will have to be changing and they are changing. And this decade long trend of consumers migrating to new forms of content has led to new business models and economic realities that right so owners and content marketers have to get ahead of.

00:08:18:00 - 00:09:00:21

Cathy Collier

We can see that broadcast delivery units are not able to fund and share revenue and fuel an entire mass ecosystem the way they could in the past. And it's not coming back and looking specifically at local media and news. We can see that there's growing awareness among marketers and agencies on the impact to local media, and it's crucial to connect this awareness with the challenges facing local news outlets in the current climate and what's often overlooked is that this industry issue isn't solely a matter of economic concern.

00:09:01:08 - 00:09:41:07

Cathy Collier

It is a pressing social concern. Access to trusted Canadian news outlets for reliable information has become vital, particularly in an era where misinformation is on the rise. So finally, what our role is and all of this change as marketers and agents is I think that there's an opportunity for local media and brands to come together as businesses, not clients, not sales people, marketers and business owners, and innovate for the sake of shared growth in a very tough market.

00:09:42:14 - 00:09:58:01

Cathy Collier

By more ads doesn't help anyone in the long term. The role of the agency, we believe, is to very clearly orchestrate the conversation on both sides and keep it focused on what big picture matters.

00:09:58:20 - 00:10:24:24

Alison Simpson

Thanks, Cathy. And when you bring it back to Canadian consumer as and that, obviously we all want to be abreast of what's happening on the global stage. We also equally, if not more, want to be well on what's happening in our country and our neighborhoods. So can you share any data are learning you have on Canadian consumers desire around local media and what they're really looking for local media to deliver on?

00:10:24:24 - 00:10:32:13

Alison Simpson

Because that also opens the doors for opportunities for our Canadian media, media companies, marketers and agencies as well.

00:10:33:04 - 00:10:49:23

Cathy Collier

So I think consumers aren't aware of the changes going on, right. So and they need to be aware we need to make a bigger deal of the absence of local information and facts being made to them.

00:10:50:07 - 00:11:04:23

Alison Simpson

So when you what do you see as marketers and media agencies role in the transformation and in helping legacy media companies find a path for it? We know it's not going to be easy, but it's mission critical. So how can we work together to create the path for it?

00:11:05:23 - 00:11:32:08

Cathy Collier

So I think that there is a lot of examples of how the media companies are already evolving. And I'll just I'll mention a couple. I think we need to create more opportunities. So a couple of the great examples of how the media companies are evolving is chorus, right? Chorus launching Stack TV, a Canadian subscription video streaming package through Amazon's Prime channels.

00:11:32:18 - 00:12:01:02

Cathy Collier

That was a great example of them. Rogers Launching their Frequency podcast is another example. Rogers becoming the rep for Disney Plus in Canada. Again, more evolution. And then I think we can look in terms of publishing to how the Globe and Mail has really transformed. And I think it's over 60% of their revenue now comes from paying subscribers.

00:12:01:02 - 00:12:33:07

Cathy Collier

They have had so much success using the paywall automation technology called Sofi that runs on AI and was recently acquired and had that much value. We look to the US and New York Times. They've been buying things like Myrdal and the serial podcaster. So I think there's a lot of experimentation that marketers can take heart of heart from and really dig in to those conversations with the with the media owners.

00:12:33:15 - 00:12:57:21

Alison Simpson

And the examples of Canadian companies partnering with global companies and really coming together to deliver a better product and experience for consumers, as well as benefiting both of their businesses, is absolutely the path for that we'd all love to see. Yes. Now, can you envision a future without mass broadcasts? And if so, get out your crystal ball and when would you predict it to end?

00:12:57:21 - 00:13:00:06

Alison Simpson

And what measures can be taken to preserve it?

00:13:00:09 - 00:13:32:14

Cathy Collier

So I think the question is more will we notice when broadcast evolves to broadband and the current broadcasters: Bell... Rogers... There are also Internet providers combined with the strength of connected TV and with all the channels available through the apps, we may not notice. So what will happen? We think that, as we've said, connectivity, TV and advanced TV is maturing.

00:13:33:03 - 00:14:24:01

Cathy Collier

There's a technology footprint, a user base, a set of modern marketing tools that can and will keep the ten foot living room experience viable. Within this, we have a type of TV kind of reemerging as this free thing off the cable box, and the consequences are always really quite far reaching. We've talked about fast, that free ad supported streaming TV and this delivery distribution type is basically an unencumbered cable box that anyone can package up a few hundred hours of free TV around a thing theme and distribute it on one of the distributors like Pluto or Amazon or Samsung TV.

00:14:24:21 - 00:14:57:03

Cathy Collier

It is super interesting and we'll have the opportunity, although it's longer form content nearly entirely video based, but it can behave much like pre social internet. So many of the producers and media companies will enter The space will be what you call smaller businesses that will be in the same pool as the well-established media brands. So you've got hundreds of free ad supported channels on fast.

00:14:57:18 - 00:15:16:08

Cathy Collier

They're now distributed and all of these people, all these people forms, those will need to really consolidate everything together. So what's even more interesting, have major cultural events moving off of TV are certainly being challenged by other media.

00:15:17:06 - 00:15:45:12

Alison Simpson

There's so many examples of where a legacy business across many different industries gets upset by a startup who doesn't have the history, doesn't have the infrastructure, and can approach the industry from an entirely new way. So it's a great call out for our established media companies to have the need for them to continue to innovate and things like a start up while they're continuing to maintain and build a business they have today.

00:15:46:01 - 00:15:48:03

Alison Simpson

Not an easy balance, but certainly an important one.

00:15:48:14 - 00:15:49:08

Cathy Collier

Now for sure.

00:15:49:23 - 00:16:06:08

Alison Simpson

So great. Thanks so much for your insights today. I am not going to let you off the hook quite yet, though. I'd love you to leave our listeners with what advice you would give for first legacy media companies, then media agencies and then marketers. All right.

00:16:06:19 - 00:16:43:03

Cathy Collier

So in terms of legacy media companies, I think continue what you're doing, continue to think about and develop distribution across multiple platforms to echo where consumers are to look internationally for opportunities like Pluto and three are a start to engage with, with our help in conversations with marketers of products that we can develop together. In terms of media agencies, we need to continue.

00:16:43:04 - 00:17:15:11

Cathy Collier

We have done a really good job of getting the pipes in order of sourcing the data, using the data, and we need to really focus on our comms planning and specific weekly creativity focus because there is something called the born rest off a fact. And what that is, is that when you see a sea of sameness, if there is something a bit different, your eye will immediately go to that.

00:17:15:20 - 00:18:03:06

Cathy Collier

And so we need to be factoring in creative but also media creativity to to partner and make it even stronger too, for media agencies using all of the data we have within attention to refocus on places that consumers are paying attention like scripted video, scripted audio, and so make a concerted effort to be going where consumers are and then finally make sure that we continue or start using learning agendas and measurement frameworks so that we can be proving the impact marketing is having to sales.

00:18:03:23 - 00:18:37:24

Cathy Collier

And then finally, for marketers, we need to continue using and developing MMS, right? They are a great modeling tool to be able to tie your marketing efforts to the sales. And again, they're not easy, they're not fast, they're not free, and they do need to be done with an expert partner. B And for again, for marketers to be open for the creativity and innovation, embrace creators.

00:18:38:02 - 00:19:02:06

Cathy Collier

As a media channel, we've experimented with influencers but really consider creators as a potential media channel. And then finally, always focus on what is culturally important to attract people who have unlimited choice. We need to be creating tribes and focusing on what resonate to these people.

00:19:02:18 - 00:19:32:01

Alison Simpson

I think that's great advice and it all resonates to that. Really jumped out for me was the way to break out of that sea of sameness. You shared it as a great advice for media agencies, but it's very applicable to media legacy media companies and marketers as well. And then when I think about MMM, and I've been in the profession long enough to remember the days where it was seen to be nirvana, where you could actually prove directly link the marketing dollars through to the business results it was driving.

00:19:32:06 - 00:19:53:06

Alison Simpson

So I know it's not easy. I know it takes investment, but it is such a crucial way for us to demonstrate the business value that the marketing profession brings to all of the businesses. And Brand three represents and ultimately to our country's GDP. So absolutely outstanding advice on all fronts. And with that, I want to thank you so much for joining us today.

00:19:53:06 - 00:20:06:07

Alison Simpson

I know you're very busy, but you're also someone who has been such a passionate advocate for the media industry in the marketing profession. And I really appreciate you taking time today to share your insights with our listeners.

00:20:06:19 - 00:20:14:23

Cathy Collier

Thank you for the invitation. I've enjoyed our conversation.

00:20:14:23 - 00:20:29:06

Announcer

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