TV 3 wants net advertising figures
Jürg Wildberger considers Mediafocus's gross figures to be too imprecise
The gross figures from Mediafocus are too inaccurate for Jürg WildbergerBy Markus KnöpfliLast November, Jürg Wildberger, TV-3 Managing Director, approached the larger private TVs, SF DRS and TV advertising marketers with a request: Since the gross advertising figures collected monthly by Mediafocus (MF) are inaccurate, the broadcasters should jointly set up a net service.
In concrete terms, each station is to report its net advertising income to a specific trust company on a monthly basis. This company calculates the total net advertising volume of Swiss TVs and passes this - and only this - back to the individual stations.
According to information officer Andrea Hemmi, "all major providers have reacted positively". In addition to TV 3, these are Publisuisse, Belcom, Cinecom and IP Multimedia. According to research, Radiotele and the private TV association Telesuisse (18 members) will not react. The latter was not asked.
And the TeleNewsCombi (TNC) - which, it should be noted, also includes the Belcom stations Tele 24 and Tele Züri - waved it off. "MF is enough for us," explains TNC managing director Christian Stärkle. In addition, it would first have to be defined how the net figures would be collected. It is unclear, for example, how sponsorship or countertrade will be included.
The devil in the details:
The definition of the net figures
According to Hemmi, this task has meanwhile been completed by TV-3's own lawyer. The definition catalog will be presented around the end of May. However, it remains to be seen whether it will be possible to agree on a uniform definition.
And why did the initiative for the net survey come from TV 3 of all places? The following reason is circulating in the industry: TV 3's board of directors also saw that TV 3 did worse than the average station based on the MF figures. Now Wildberger, who has come under pressure, hopes to be able to show in the future with "more representative" net figures that TV 3 is not doing so badly compared to other stations.
"Wrong," says Hemmi, "this has nothing to do with the situation between us and our shareholders." Net figures are, after all, "more representative. The fact that the major suppliers have also agreed to participate shows the general need for net figures.
In concrete terms, each station is to report its net advertising income to a specific trust company on a monthly basis. This company calculates the total net advertising volume of Swiss TVs and passes this - and only this - back to the individual stations.
According to information officer Andrea Hemmi, "all major providers have reacted positively". In addition to TV 3, these are Publisuisse, Belcom, Cinecom and IP Multimedia. According to research, Radiotele and the private TV association Telesuisse (18 members) will not react. The latter was not asked.
And the TeleNewsCombi (TNC) - which, it should be noted, also includes the Belcom stations Tele 24 and Tele Züri - waved it off. "MF is enough for us," explains TNC managing director Christian Stärkle. In addition, it would first have to be defined how the net figures would be collected. It is unclear, for example, how sponsorship or countertrade will be included.
The devil in the details:
The definition of the net figures
According to Hemmi, this task has meanwhile been completed by TV-3's own lawyer. The definition catalog will be presented around the end of May. However, it remains to be seen whether it will be possible to agree on a uniform definition.
And why did the initiative for the net survey come from TV 3 of all places? The following reason is circulating in the industry: TV 3's board of directors also saw that TV 3 did worse than the average station based on the MF figures. Now Wildberger, who has come under pressure, hopes to be able to show in the future with "more representative" net figures that TV 3 is not doing so badly compared to other stations.
"Wrong," says Hemmi, "this has nothing to do with the situation between us and our shareholders." Net figures are, after all, "more representative. The fact that the major suppliers have also agreed to participate shows the general need for net figures.
