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…