Strata

August 2010

• August 17

  TAB in Review - Hot and Helpful!

  It’s always a pleasure to visit Austin for the Texas Association of Broadcasters (TAB) annual convention.  August in Austin is always the same – hot!  (I don’t know how those Longhorn football players handle it, but that’s a topic for another day.)   I have attended the TAB show for a number of years now and I’m always impressed that no matter the format - TV, radio, digital concerns – the TAB handles it all, offering what’s billed as the largest state convention in the country.  >Read More

July 2010

• July 27

  Under the Lights at Bloomberg TV

  By now whether it was through our website, the Washington Post, YouTube or even live, many of you have watched my interview that was on Bloomberg TV.  It was an interesting experience to be a guest on the In Business program.  I’ll get more into that in a second.  The main reason we were on the program was to talk to about our latest survey (www.gotostrata.com/news).  Since we started doing these surveys at the end of 2008, we have noticed some interesting trends.  Digital advertising has taken a big leap forward, TV remains tops, and agencies have gone from shedding employees to returning to a hiring process.  We use this valuable information in many different ways.  One, it helps us get a gauge of what our clients are going through – their struggles and successes.  Two… >Read More

June 2010

• June 30

  Social Media is Changing Advertising

  Many media buyers that we hear from say that their clients are more and more interested in putting dollars into social media advertising.  According to a recent Nielsen report, the world now spends over 110 billion minutes on social networks and blog sites.  It also pointed out that consumers spent more than five and a half hours on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter in December 2009.  That is an increase of 82% from the same time a year earlier.  >Read More

• June 4

  Great Job STRATA Runners/Walkers

  STRATA proudly sponsored a team of runners/walkers for the recent J.P. Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge.  The JPMCC is a huge run in Chicago that saw nearly 20,000 people run and walk 3.5 miles near the shores of Lake Michigan not far from our offices at STRATA.  The theme this year was “Working Together for a Greener Tomorrow”. >Read More

May 2010

• May 20

  Social Media: Is it Measurable?

  I attended The Cable Show recently in Los Angeles.  Among the many great points discussed at the conference were Social Media and its impact on advertising.  We use various forms of social media here at STRATA in our marketing efforts, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn just to name a few.  We aren’t alone either, hundreds of thousands of businesses use social media to connect to their clients, customers and prospects.  >Read More

March 2010

• March 26

  Olympics or No Olympics… a Ratings Tale

  The much-anticipated Nielsen February ratings started rolling out this week.  For the majority of Nielsen clients that’s one of the four report cards most stations look forward to getting.  I say most stations because this release presents a quadrennial set of challenges for TV stations and their buyers.  The Vancouver Olympics may be just a memory now, but they’ve left quite a legacy in the short-term for broadcasters. The February 2010 survey period was influenced by impressive Olympic numbers for most NBC affiliates, which in turn made this rating period anything but normal.   For familiar primetime “hits”, well, some of them took a big hit running against the Olympics! So what’s a station to do? >Read More

• March 12

  Political Advertising Affects Everyone

  If you have one shot at keeping your job what do you do?  For many politicians, they launch a television campaign.  Television commercials are still the avenue of choice for politicians and this is a huge election year for senate, house and gubernatorial races.  You couple that with the recent Supreme Court decision to open campaign finance limits, and the floodgates are wide open for political advertising and lobbying groups like healthcare, energy providers and many more. >Read More

February 2010

• February 24

  35,000 feet up – and worlds away from good customer service

  Good customer service is essential.   When it isn’t a priority, you notice and it can negatively influence the way you feel about a company.  I was a victim of bad customer service recently.  Imagine this – you are 35,000 feet in the sky, belted to your seat and the service you received makes you want to grab a parachute and jump.  Ok, it wasn’t quite that bad, but it did leave a negative impression on me.  I was on an airline (that shall remain nameless) flying back from New York.  I travel quite a bit, so I redeemed some frequent flyer miles for a first class seat.  What I received there was less than first class and even less than my luggage in the hull… >Read More

January 2010

• January 26

  Predictions… Results… Changing Landscape

  Electronic channels have definitely changed the advertising industry and are shaping the future of this space.  According to a recent article by Jennifer Seidel of the 4A’s, “Advertising has undergone dramatic changes…Digital technologies have transformed the way we do business.”  Here at STRATA we see that change every day.  We had over 2.6 million electronic orders and invoices flowing through our systems in 2009.  We expect that number to climb higher this year. >Read More

• January 5

  2009 Ended with a Rush to Advertise

  Quality is quality. And when it comes to advertising everyone showed up in the 4th quarter buying quality media. Most media sellers reported surprisingly strong fourth quarter business. Surprising - because there were virtually no pre-sales.
  Advertisers waited until the last minute, risking a sell out. And most of them were able to get their ads placed, this year. >Read More