MQT: ITV Ahead Of The Game In Multi-Channel Build Up- “Charles Is Playing A Blinder”
ITV appears to be on the right track to embrace the impending digital age, with a panel of industry experts, rather to the surprise of many in the audience, commending chief executive Charles Allen’s leadership skills in preparing the channel for the multi-channel era.
At the fifth MediaTel Media Question time, Bob Wootton, director of media and advertising at the ISBA asked the panel for their opinions on the recent activities of commercial broadcaster, ITV, asking them “What they thought ITV’s game was.”
Adam Singer, chief executive of the MCPS-PRS Alliance and ex-Flextech boss, commended ITV for giving itself “as much space as possible” in preparation for the “multi-channel revolution.” He argued that, with increasingly fragmented audiences, the broadcaster was playing “the game” very well, rolling out streams of extra channels.
According to Phil Georgiadis, chief executive officer of Walker Media, ITV needed to “fail in order to succeed” refering to the crash of ITV Digital. Coming from such a strong position as a commercial channel, the Walker Media boss claimed that the broadcaster’s fall from grace has forced it to think about its future.
He said: “The bottom line is that what ITV is now doing is working out that the future of advertising revenue will be made by engaging audiences across a number of channels. I think they’re still in an incredibly strong position to be a large part in advertisers schedules.”
ITV’s realisation that its main revenues will be made from its multi channel offerings can be seen in its recent launch of ITV4 (see ITV4 Lifts Lid On Launch Programmes) and also the planned start of a children’s channel, which will be available on all digital platforms from 11 February (see ITV Confirms February Launch For Kids Channel).
Richard Eyre, chairman of the IAB and former boss of ITV, continued: “I think Charles is playing a blinder. I think its extremely useful for the advertising industry to have a broadcaster like ITV who can still do the really big shows and compete with BBC1. I think at the moment it’s hard to criticise them.”
David Hanger, former publisher of the Economist emphasised the importance of having ITV as a strong broadcasting brand saying: “We need this strength and we need them to find some way through this, I think they’re playing a game they need to play.”
However, despite such strong praise for ITV and its recent strategy, Fru Hazlitt, chief executive of Virgin Radio voiced a strong opinion against the panel, exclaiming that it is “absolutely astounding how everyone in the media industry still bangs on about ITV in one way or another.”
She continued: “At the end of the day, we still need an ITV to compete with BBC. At the end of the day it is only one company, I think we need to get real about this and think more broadly about what is going to happen to media in this country, not just ITV in its own right.”
In response from the floor Bob Wootton said he now felt “chastened”.
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