Monopolies, duopolies and oligopolies: new perspectives with Admeira?

ADVERTISING MARKET The Swiss advertising market is not exactly characterized by a great deal of competition. Although market players like to shoot at all birds of prey, everyone always looks after their own nest first. Admeira's entry into the market does little to change this.

In many media genres, there are only a few major players with a strong position.FROM ROLAND EHRLER, DIRECTOR SWAOver the past few years, strong supplier positions have emerged or been deliberately built up in almost all media categories. Advertisers have already had to get used to this. They only have the freedom to decide for themselves in which media categories they want to invest more or less advertising money. Within these categories, there are often only one or two providers to choose from. Here is a brief overview of Swiss advertising marketing in 2016.

Print market: Oligopoly in the national market

Much has changed in the newspaper and magazine sector in recent years due to the decline in advertising revenue. This has led to mergers, cooperations, takeovers and the closure of titles. As a result, a few large media companies such as Tamedia, Ringier, NZZ, AZ Medien and Somedia now dominate the national print market. Some of these have been able to establish regional monopolies with print titles, TV, radio and online offerings, while there is still a wide range of local newspapers and trade and specialty press with many providers. Publicitas is also still active here as an intermediary and marketer, but has lost much of its former market position. In recent years, many print titles have failed to adjust their official rates to the services they offer.

Television: clear duopoly

In TV, there are more and more channels with small market shares. This means that there is a very wide range of offerings for advertising customers. On the marketer side, however, the launch of Admeira has further accentuated the duopoly situation of the two big players. Goldbach Media and Admeira, which together also form AGFS, the Swiss Television Advertising Consortium, now share the TV business. This is because Ringier no longer acts as a TV marketer itself, and the local TV stations sold by regional media companies such as AZ Medien cannot change this duopoly situation. The reach of the local TV stations is simply too insignificant for national advertising. Following the dispute over the founding of Admeira, it is now time to further develop the TV market in the interests of marketers and advertising customers: interactive TV, target group-specific TV, more precise measurement data on usage and a common currency for moving images on all screens.

Out-of-home advertising: duopoly to monopoly

There are effectively two major providers in the poster market. APG|SGA has further expanded its already strong market position with the recent acquisition of Alpenplakat AG. APG|SGA already has a monopoly in certain areas, such as SBB spaces. Although Clear Channel is catching up in some cities (Lucerne, Zurich) when it comes to new tenders for poster sites, it is the clear No. 2 in the market. Other providers are only active regionally or in niches. Neo Advertising, for example, which markets space at Geneva Airport or in numerous shopping centers, is one of the disadvantages of the market power of the two major providers: advertisers have been waiting for new research data for some time and have few alternatives to their analog and digital offerings.

Cinema: clear monopoly

After Publicitas exited the cinema business, Werbeweischer was able to secure the cinema contracts of the former Cinecom. This has given Werbeweischer a clear monopoly since the beginning of the year. The company only entered the Swiss cinema market from Germany a few years ago. With the exception of a few open-air cinemas, cinema advertising can now only be booked with this marketer, and this marketing situation does not only have disadvantages for the small Swiss cinema market. It now offers the opportunity to market and further develop all cinemas from a single source with simple and transparent offers!

Radio market: duopoly or oligopoly?

Although advertising can be booked directly with almost all private radio stations, two companies in particular play a role in national marketing: Swiss Radioworld, a subsidiary of the Goldbach Group, and Cover Media. Spot-Promotion should also be mentioned here as the third marketer. Admeira has also been selling the SRG broadcasters' national sponsorship offers for many years and it remains unclear how much Admeira will be involved in the radio market in future. Ringier's three NRJ stations in Basel, Berne and Zurich are not (yet) included in the Admeira portfolio. Unfortunately, due to the lack of advertising opportunities on SRG stations, the Swiss radio market has not been able to develop sufficiently to date.

Digital market: competition among Swiss providers

The bad news first: nobody can get past the global players Google and Facebook. Google clearly dominates the search engine market with its Adwords and display offerings, and its offering for advertising with moving images on YouTube is almost unrivaled. Facebook's position in social media is just as strong. This is a pleasant situation for the two American companies, which can go about their business virtually unaffected by regulation and Swiss politics, leaving local competitors and advertising customers behind. Swiss publishers have to make do with their advertising inventory in display, moving images, native advertising and classifieds. However, there is fierce competition among providers. Major marketers and intermediaries are: Goldbach Audience, Serranetga, Adwebster, Stailamedia, Publicitas, Tamedia, NZZ and numerous other media companies and online specialists.Admeira has also explicitly announced that it wants to play a role here and take on Google and Facebook. The advertising inventory of Ringier, Swisscom and SRG is considerable in size. However, SRG websites are still subject to an online advertising ban, and the disadvantages of the numerous global and domestic players are a lack of market standards, intransparency of prices and services and few joint market initiatives. For example, there is still a lack of online reach research, which other media genres have long been familiar with, or precise figures on advertising revenues. The latter because many online market participants have shown little willingness to deliver for years and this lack of transparency suits them just fine?Admeira is required to fulfill its promisesWhat will change in the advertising market with the arrival of Admeira? Not much at first. In the first year, the three companies and their employees must first grow together culturally, move to their new locations and bring their portfolios under one roof. At least the first cross-media offerings can be expected. However, numerous Admeira sellers for print, TV, radio and online are currently contacting advertising clients. There will still be a lot to coordinate here - especially in key accounting, where major clients want information and offers from a single source, which means that the management and employees of the new provider will have a lot of work to do and even more expectations from the market! Only the next one or two years will show whether Admeira will open up new perspectives in the advertising market, as it promises with its slogan!SWA fights for competitive conditions in the advertising marketThe SWA has been campaigning for competitive conditions in the advertising market since 1950. With the work of its office and its numerous representatives in organizations of the Swiss advertising market, it fights on the front line for the concerns of its members. This includes numerous initiatives and demands vis-à-vis market participants. Current examples include the SWA's demands for target group-specific advertising on all TV channels and new, performance-based pricing for all out-of-home offerings. www.swa-asa.ch