Local TV making comeback, not so much with newspapers

Posted by Cory Bergman on December 20, 2010

Everyone is writing about the demise of newspapers these days, but not many journalists are writing about the resurgence of local TV from the recession.

Fueling by cyclical political spending, local TV revenues jumped 32% in the third quarter — up 27% for the first three quarters of the year. And the biggest local TV spender of all, the automobile industry, is spending again — up 74% over a year ago.

Meanwhile, newspaper ad revenue fell 8.7% in the first three quarters of the year — not as much as previous years, but there’s no sign of a resurgence. “I think 2010 showed the continued decline of an industry,” said Ken Doctor, industry analyst and author of Newsonomics. “Unless it makes significant changes, we’re in a death spiral.”

With newspapers bleeding jobs, local TV stations in many markets now have more journalists on staff, combined, than the major daily newspaper. And as the world of network and syndicated programming becomes more clouded, local TV stations will ramp up production of new local programming — across multiple platforms — to fill the gaps. Meanwhile, the lines are blurring between TV video and web video, bringing the industry into a new world of web-enabled social TV.

In other words, the future of local news may spring from television.

I spoke with a new college graduate over the weekend and recommended he focus on broadcast, not newspapers, to land a journalism job. While the job market certainly is still tough, there will be emerging opportunities at the best stations for web-savvy, social-native multimedia journalists looking to reinvent local news, where the revenue is still flowing. Look no further than TBD.com, one of the most aggressive news startups in 2010 — launched at a local television company.

The biggest hurdle, as always, will be cultural. Will TV invest in new innovative products that don’t always align with current priorities? For that, we’ll just have to see what happens next.

Update: Some good points in comments below…

Filed Under local TV

Eric Olander

Cory, wishful thinking. Wishful thinking.
http://twitter.com/joemurph Joe Murphy

Hi Cory — you didn’t link to your source on this line — do you have any info to back this up? “With newspapers bleeding jobs, local TV stations in many markets now have more journalists on staff, combined, than the local daily newspapers.”
Anonymous

Doing a little napkin math of my own. Seattle has 4 TV newsrooms: 120+100+90+50 = 360 newsroom employees, which by my estimates is larger than the Seattle Times + Seattle PI editorial staffs. Most markets have just one major metro newspaper, and the newsroom staff sizes in Seattle aren’t that out of line with similar-sized markets.

Now, if you count all the small newspapers around the Seattle DMA, the number of newspaper journalists would still outnumber TV.

-Cory
Michael Bille

Cory:

Key point of your story:” “Fueled by political spending.” Until stations develop new business models, they will be slaves to the boom and bust of political, Olympics and the hot category of the day. In just two years, companies like Groupon have swept in and taken millions of local ad dollars right off their plate. Looked at a local newscast lately, the mother lode of local revenue? Hasn’t changed conceptually in 30 years. While TBD.com was launched by the owner of a local TV station, it has very little to do with local TV. However, these are the kind of diversified media moves station owners will have to make to survive in a web universe of infinite “channels.”
Anonymous

We’ll see. All it takes is a couple stations to take some risks and show some real, tangible success before others jump in.

And I think things will be a little different as TV begins to fuse more seamlessly with other platforms. For example, on-screen TV apps. Social media has been a good indicator — reporters who would never publish a web-version of their TV scripts are now tweeting like crazy. So as web merges into TV, stations may be more inclined to be more innovative, because it’s on a platform they (and their advertisers) are familiar with.

Just a theory.

-Cory
steve

i was going to simply stfu regarding the auto industry’s ad spend “up 74% over year ago”, but you make a good point about boom and bust.

much of that 74% is a backdoor government bailout of local tv via taxpayer dollars by gm and chrysler.
Jim

If it’s true that “… the future of local news may spring from television.”, we’re screwed if television continues to produce the pablum they do now. Local TV has an opportunity to become the credible stalwart/institution the local newspapers were, but they’ll have to bulldoze their current products and start anew with news of substance.
http://www.findingthegear.com David Gehring

I am totally bullish on Local TV also! First, the web is going to be more and more about video content. TV stations know how to produce high quality video content rapidly. Second, Groupon has provided us with a local revenue model anyone with a local sales organization can replicate. TV stations have local sales folks. Third, as local TV stations begin to realize they need to aggregate content as well as produce their own, they are well positioned to be the hubs of all things news and information related and then to manage the conversation digitally about news and information. They have all the building blocks for a really great future. You’re right though…the only hurdle is cultural. Which can be a doozy!
Eric Olander

Cory: I did not intend to sound flippant in my initial comment however I am just very suspicious that the management teams at most local TV stations have a sophisticated enough understand of how to entirely reinvent their business models to accommodate the new realities. The quality of journalism at most local stations is no where on the level of newspapers or even bloggers given that the overwhelming majority of TV reporters are under such tight deadlines each day that it is really less about “journalism” per say and more about getting a story, any story, in under deadline. Furthermore, the lack of enthusiasm that the local stations have had when it comes to employing web and social media is another major impediment. They just do not have the culture of innovation at most local stations, particularly in major markets, that would allow me (and others below) to feel they can credibly remake their programming and business models.
Dave

I still don’t get why local just means news. You mean to tell me that a well-produced local talk, lifestyle, or entertainment show can’t be just as or even more successful than local news.

The fact that we just limit ourselves to news shows our short-sightedness. In my market, we produced a 60 minute local documentary that unfortunately ran up against American Idol’s semi-finals. Yes, it lost in the ratings but it still did better than some network shows in the same time slot.

There’s a hunger for local, not just local news. Our differentiator from every other channel on cable boxes is our community, not our news brand.
invitedmedia

dave, have any of your local competitors announced they’ll be the first in the market to have a 3:00am newscast?
Kevin Selle

Another major correction coming for local TV. One large market station I know said 2 years ago that 45% of revenue was from auto sector. The recovery seen this year is likely only a bounce back from the low of last year, the trend is still down.

That trend for local TV from auto should accelerate. Was told a few years ago (fading memory but numbers are close) that 80% of new car buyers do so at a dealer within 5-8 miles from their house. As the ability to draw a circle around their dealerships and advertise locally evolves, why would they want to paid to reach the entire market?
The Unknown Known

Now I have to step in and remind you that you are simply being geeky and trying to make something of TV that it isn’t going to be. It will either be television of it will be downloaded video.

To be fair to everybody, please refrain from ‘sexing it up’.
The Unknown Known

Now I have to step in and remind you that you are simply being geeky and trying to make something of TV that it isn’t going to be. It will either be television of it will be downloaded video.

To be fair to everybody, please refrain from ‘sexing it up’.
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