The barrier between news content and advertising in broadcast television may be crumbling.
According to a study recently published in the journal Electronic News, authored by two University professors and a former journalism doctoral student, there is increasing pressure from advertisers to integrate ads in newscasts, and small markets are most likely to promote advertisers during news stories.
The study was conducted over four months in 2004 and included 17 U.S. stations broadcasting early-evening news in a variety of markets. The types of “stealth advertising” studied included product placements, stories about a single business, segment sponsorship, and using a specific business as the sole example of a news story’s theme.
Study author Jim Upshaw, who worked with former University student Gennadiy Chernov on the study, said the study is just the beginning of research and leaves many questions unanswered. He said with an even larger sample and over a longer period of time, “then you would get a firm grip on what’s happening in the industry.”
Despite the preliminary nature of the findings, both Upshaw and co-author David Koranda said questions they had about the nature of the situation prompted them to begin researching whether television news content is being increasingly influenced by advertisers who want more for their advertising dollars.
Viewers may not be aware of the commercial aspects of news content.
“A lot of the stuff is not directly detectable on the first pass,” Upshaw said. Viewers may not realize a news story contained visual images of a single store or brand, or be aware of the logo on a reporter’s jacket.
In its report “The State of the News Media 2007,” the Project for Excellence in Journalism stated that while television news remained most Americans’ choice for local news, Nielson Ratings for local newscasts were down in all measurements. This plunge may be adding to pressure from advertisers for promotion within news content.
The report also states the public is increasingly concerned with advertiser influence on news content. In its survey, the group found nearly half of respondents said it would make a “big difference” to them if they knew advertisers were influencing content. Three-fourths said they would be less likely to watch if there was product placement in the newscast, although only 21 percent could recall having seen a sponsored segment.
As part of the advertising study, Koranda spoke with news directors and sales managers from several stations, who told him they were all getting more pressure from advertisers to be incorporated in news stories. But Koranda questions whether this influence is having an adverse effect on both industries.
“Eventually you realize more people are turning away from the news,” he said. “So it hurts both advertising and the news.”
Upshaw said while television newscasts often have some of the most loyal viewers, a lot of people are branching out to the Internet for their news, and that means advertisers are not reaching their targets.
“They are starting to think that money is lost,” Upshaw said.
In an age of digital video recording and TiVo, people are also skipping commercials all together.
“One of the least recorded things on a DVR is the news,” Koranda said. “By the time you’ve got it, it’s old.”
Nielson announced last year it will begin rating commercial viewing and incorporate the use of DVRs in that research. Nielson reports 17 percent of U.S. households have a DVR and 42 percent of prime time viewing is done through playback, rather than live viewing.
Indicating his Blackberry, Koranda said he has little need to catch up with the evening news. He is able to surf the Internet from anywhere. The influence of the Internet, the professors speculate, could be leading the way for the disintegration of the wall between advertising and news.
The researchers suggest the limited number of local advertisers and staff at a station may play a roll in why smaller markets seemed to be more susceptible to advertiser influence. Upshaw, who spent 22 years as a television journalist, said smaller markets tend to have younger, less seasoned reporters whose ethics may still be forming.
The causes of this increase in “commercial intrusion” into newscasts has yet to be explored.
“If you read the study, we didn’t say whether it’s good or bad,” Koranda said. “People need to draw their own conclusions.”
However, both professors agreed that people need to be aware of the influences to make a decision.
Upshaw said a common conception of television news is that it is inherently sensational because it needs to create an emotional response in viewers.
“They can do anything with that space because they already are,” he said. “Lots of different folks may say, ‘where’s the harm?’”
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