News & Events

Facing Today’s Challenges

Representatives of the Accredited Advertising Agencies Association (4A’s) and the International Advertising Agencies (IAA’s) addressed publishers, editors and advertising managers on the need to work together to encounter core issues impacting the industry.
Addressing the audience, Ranil de Silva, Chairman joint media committee said that many media houses were facing increased competition and decreasing profit sales due to the stiff competition within the industry. He added that unlike the international media industry, which was gearing up to meet new challenges, the local industry needed to face today’s challenges and move with the times.
According to de Silva, whilst the client and agency work together, most often the publishers do not agree to formats and creativity, thus causing the clients to cut advertising budgets with incompliant publishers.
Laila Gunesekera Martynstyn, President of the 4A’s said that it is time for all three entities to work together and maintain a mutual partnership which in turn will be an opportunity to secure long term clients, create collective volumes versus smaller volumes and as an avenue to client concentrations.
Meanwhile, it was suggested that a Media Council be established to overcome these problems which would include media owners, ad agencies and marketers. This Council, they added, would oversee unethical practices amongst these entities and promote fair trading which will be mutually beneficial to all parties.