"new" media???

The numbers are out for advertising revenue in New Zealand, and while advertising revenue has gone down wholesale, radio and online have shot up.

What does it mean? Here are my educated guesses:

• Advertisers are losing confidence in traditional, expensive media like TV and print. Radio has always been known as cost-effective, and maybe that message is getting through in a very ROI-conscious era.
• Radio and online are more personal in their approach, which may reflect multichannel strategies to target people by interest, demographic or psychographic and invite them into a relationship (that would be the smart thing to do, anyway!)
  
• The slow but steady rise of unaddressed mail also suggests more businesses are becoming aware of the possibilities of direct marketing.
  

And, of course, it could be the slowing economy.

But media and marketing are becoming increasingly difficult to silo these days. Right now I'm working on a feature for Marketing Magazine about "new technology" - an impossibly broad brief. In fact, I'm always writing about technology.

• When I write about TV, I end up writing about online.
• When I write about newspapers, I end up writing about online.
• When I write about outdoor, I mention TXT.
• When I write about PR, I write about blogging.

Truth is, these "new" media are about ten years old, as Steve Shearman pointed out to me yesterday. But what is new is the fact everyone's a) heard of them, and b) can see the possibilities.

Welcome to the future. Confused? You will be.