The future of marine media
The marine industry over here has been trying to figure out the best way going forward to advertise and promote its products.
Companies have been watching to see how the traditional choice of print advertising is reacting to and competing with the internet, mobile technology and the like. And there were two interesting discussions that took place at the recent Miami Boat Show on the future for marine media which shed some light on where it’s heading.
The first was the Boating Writers International panel discussion on the “Future of Marine Journalism”. While advertising revenue is way off for print publications the panellists thought print would still be part of the mix but albeit in a different format and different delivery options.
The marine media is concentrating on how to use social media and take advantage of the mobile platforms. The take away conclusions from the discussion were “what works for print simply does not work on the web” and “an urgent unmet need is how to package longer works into two-to three-minute videos to tell the compressed story or drive readers to a longer format.”
The second presentation organised by the Marine Marketers of America was “The Secrets behind What YouTube Can Do for You”.
The biggest surprise for most people were the US viewer demographics. Viewership is almost evenly split by gender – 53%, 47% female, with a median age of 33 and evenly distributed throughout the United States. Median income is $74,000; 71% are employed and 47% are married.
Since NMMA research statistics show three out of four boat owners have a household income below $100,000, it won’t be a surprise to see boatbuilders, dealers and brokers making a much bigger investment in their video capabilities, especially for YouTube.
