OTTAWA – Jean-Pierre Blais, chair of the CRTC, challenged Canada’s independent producers to think unconventionally when it comes to promoting their creations, reaching audiences and attracting new advertising revenue.
In a keynote to the Canadian Media Production Association’s annual Prime Time event in Ottawa on Friday, Blais highlighted a quote from the late Thomas Bata, the former head of the Bata shoe empire, to indicate how Canadian content creators should be viewing the world in which their businesses operate. “Executives should be people with a sense of urgency, a demand for excellence and a healthy discontent with the way things are,” he said.
“Have you asked yourselves whether you have maximized the opportunities to connect with new audiences and attract new advertising revenue? How do you brand yourself in the international marketplace?” he asked. “Are you cashing in on the vast array of distribution networks to connect with new viewers in a world that knows no borders?”
In a nutshell, Canadian producers “need to step up their game and become more competitive, both here at home and abroad,” said Blais. “The production industry needs to move beyond individual projects. We need well-defined global champions producing content for the world stage. We should be creating international brands that can compete with the best in the globe.”
And it appears that the opportunity for homegrown, but globally competitive, production houses could be on the horizon, particularly given the amount of funding available to Canadian productions. Funding has never been higher with money coming from a variety of sources including simultaneous substitution, the Canada Media Fund, federal and provincial tax credits and benefits packages that totaled more than $722 million from January 2007 to December 2011. And in 2012, Blais noted that the big four English language television providers – Rogers Media, Bell Media, Corus Entertainment and Shaw Media – spent upwards of $900 million on Canadian programming. If the production spend trajectory continues, the industry could see $3 billion worth of production investments in the future, he added.
But are producers making best use of this money when it comes to producing and promoting their content and attracting audiences, wondered Blais.
“How do we leverage the investments Canadians have made, and are making, in the production industry to fuel innovation, create more jobs and produce world-class storytelling in a diversity of formats?” he asked. “How do we grow Canadian production companies into businesses that can successfully compete with the best the world has to offer?”
Connecting with audiences is critical in this regard, but it can be difficult when viewers are using multiple platforms to get the content they want, when they want. Blais pointed to recent comments Fred Forster, CEO of Omnicom Canada to illustrate the challenge in connecting to audiences (something Cartt.ca first reported on).
“Old metrics don’t apply in an ad-skipped, channel-shifted, time-shifted, place-shifted, device-shifted content world,” he said. “Today, a screen-based content producer has to find the innovative means to harness the tools of discovery, to become a platform curator, to be a maker of taste – in short, to connect the potential viewer to the content.”
In addition, a greater number of viewers are tuning into amateur content which is garnering considerable viewership on YouTube for example. And this only reinforces the fact that viewers can choose if and when they want to view a specific piece of content, which makes it that much more important for content creators to “use the promotional, analytical and technological tools” to help consumers “discover your content,” said Blais.
“Canada’s production community has unparalleled opportunities to be successful in this environment,” he said. “This could be a once-in-a-generation opportunity to grow your business in new directions. But you will need to compete, just like any other sector.”
