Industry players call on traditional media to work closer with advertisers to create more opportunities

IPOH - The traditional media should work hand in hand with advertisers to create and innovate more opportunities to enhance brand awareness as one of the marketing tools in the digital era.

The Malaysian Advertisers Association’s (MAA) senior adviser Mohammad Kadri Taib said it is still relevant for both parties to collaborate as traditional media are regulated and verified platforms.

"Our members are very concerned about where their contents are placed.

"With traditional media, they can see where it goes, whether it is proper, put on a good page and so on," he said as a panelist at the 2023 National Journalists’ Day (Hawana) Media Forum, titled 'Survival of Traditional Media In The Digital Era' here, today.

Mindshare and Msix chief executive officer (CEO) S. Sheila said traditional media in the country have either transformed to become digital or operating on a hybrid approach.

For the media or even technology companies and advertisers to survive in the digital era, she said they have to follow where the eyeballs head, which is social media.

"Social media movement is huge and we cannot underestimate it. But I do agree that we do have to bring certain orders to social media, especially in the area of hate speech where a proper guideline needs to be put in place," she said.

She noted that a decade ago, advertisement expenditure (adex) share on digital media was only 10 per cent, while today its share of adex has increased to 58 per cent.

On the other hand, the share of newspaper adex was 48 per cent back in 2013, but today it has gone down to only 7 per cent.

Echoing similar thoughts, Rev Media Group, Operation and Technology transformation officer at GMD Office of Media Prima Nicholas Sagau said that when undergoing digital transformation, traditional media must have the ability to move its team to work with those on the digital team.

On top of that, traditional media needs to be agile and have the discipline to undergo cultural changes.

"Content is king. Constant discussions on news angles need to happen while observing how the processes and deliverables can be improved and effective by the hour.

"We put all of our data and content together, and six years later, we can actually now look at what people are reading on Berita Harian (for example), whether the story is trending or not, and if not, how can we deliver the news piece to be delivered more effectively," he said.

On the other hand, another panelist - the Editor-in-Chief of The Jakarta Post - M Taufiqurrahman, said as traditional media do not stand a chance to be on the same playing field as digital media, small and traditional media companies in Indonesia have proposed to its government to "force” giant technology companies to negotiate with them.

"I believe in another one or two months our proposal can be passed, where these big tech platforms will be required to have a business deal with us.

"I think this might be the way to have a sustainable future the only way for us to have a level playing field is basically to have the regulators intervening, otherwise it is going to be a cutthroat competition," said Taufiqurrahman.

The proposal by Indonesian media players came following a law that was passed by the Australian government in December 2021, where digital platforms like Meta and Google are required to pay local media outlets and publishers to link their content on news feeds or in search results. - BERNAMA