Economic Slow Down Could Be Promising Locally

Mike's lead blog here. While the TV industry is in an economic slow down, there seems to be light at the end of the tunnel for those who take advantage of hyper-local ad spots. This article discusses companies like Comcast that has already been looking for boosting advertising solutions in the local markets since the middle of 2007 as you can see in an extra link included at the bottom of the main article if you wanted more information. In addition to the link at the bottom, emphasizing news stories, features, and other local events of interest is covered/produced by Comcast. Other ad producing agencies such as Citysearch, TurnHere, Spot Runner, help local businesses produce their content at very affordable prices with high quality as you can check out for yourself. I was impressed with these sites, particularly with Spot Runner and with what a business can get for their ad dollars.
(The first ad here was obtained from tvweek)

Local Cable TV Spots Work for Restaurants

October 22, 2008 10:45 AM

An article in today’s New York Times about how restaurants across the nation are hurting during the ongoing economic meltdown failed to address how their owners are tweaking their media plans to help manage the pain.

A solution that might help to stem the damage is hyper-local ad spots.

Elsewhere I read that broadcast national spot TV sales are expected to drop a whopping 17%.

But that doesn’t seem to be the case in Comcast-land, where I live. The MSO appears to be thriving with its Comcast Local Spot program, which runs scads of ads from local restaurants.

Judging from mere anecdotal evidence, local cable ads seem to really work. We went out to a Thai restaurant for dinner last night, and it was hurting, even though the food is excellent, the ambiance and service are great, in essence making it a great value experience.

By contrast, a nearby restaurant that floods local cable with ads had a jammed parking lot. The restaurant is expensive, the service is abysmal and the ambiance totally blows.

But the Thai restaurant doesn’t advertise on local cable while its next-door neighbor—the crummy, expensive restaurant—runs a heavy ad schedule on Comcast’s Local Spot program.

Have you witnessed that correlation in your neck of the woods? Check it out and share. I think I’m onto something here.

Here's the additional link to check out:

http://blog.kelseygroup.com/index.php/2007/06/12/comcast-goes-hyper-local/