Do You Grow with Market Shifts – or Slowly Lose Relevancy?  The Advertising Story

Do You Grow with Market Shifts – or Slowly Lose Relevancy? The Advertising Story

In 2020, internet ads will represent over 50% of all advertising money spent. Think about that factoid. An ad medium that wasn’t even important to the ad industry a decade ago now accounts for half of the industry. It took three years after the Dot Com bubble burst for internet advertising to hit bottom, but then it took off and hasn’t stopped growing.

An example of rapid, disruptive change. A market shift of tremendous proportions that has forever changed the media industry, and how we all consume both entertainment and news. Did you prepare for this shift? And is it helping you sell more stuff and make more money?

This was easy to predict. Seven years ago (12/10/12), I wrote “The Day TV Died.” The trend was unmistakable – eyeballs were going to the internet. And as eyeballs went digital, so did ads. These new, low cost ads were “democratizing” brand creation and allowing smaller companies to go direct to consumers with products and solutions like never before in history. It was ushering in a “golden age” for small businesses that took advantage.

However, small businesses – and large businesses – largely failed to adjust to these trends effectively. By 3/21/13 I pointed out in “Small Business Leaders Missing Digital/Mobile Revolution” that small businesses were continuing to rely on the least economical forms of media outreach – direct mail and print! They were biased toward what they knew how to do, and old metrics for media, instead of seizing the opportunity. Likewise, by 12/11/14 in “TV is Dying Yet Marketers Overspend on TV” I was able to demonstrate that the only thing keeping TV alive were ad price increases so big they made up for declining audiences. The leaders of big companies were biased toward the TV they knew, instead of the better performing and lower cost new internet media capabilities.

Three years ago (1/6/17), I pointed out in “Four Trends That Will Forever Change Media… and You” it was obvious that digital social media advertising was making a huge impact on everyone. Fast shifting eyeballs were being tracked by new technology, so ads were being purchased by robots to catch those eyeballs – and this meant fake news would be rampant as media sites sought eyeballs by any means. And Netflix was well on its way to becoming the Amazon of media with its own programs and competitive lead.

So the point? It was predictable all the way back in 2012 that digital media would soon dominate. This would change advertising, distribution and content. Now digital advertising is bigger than all other advertising COMBINED. Those who acted early would get a huge benefit (think Facebook/Instagram Path to Media Domination) while those who didn’t react would feel a huge hurt (newspapers, radio, broadcast TV, brick and mortar retail, large consumer goods companies that rely on high priced TV.) But did you take action? Did you take advantage of these trends to make your business bigger, stronger, more profitable, more relevant? Or are you still reacting to the market, struggling to understand changes and how they will impact your business?

The world continues to be a fast changing place. Mobile phones and social media will not go away – no matter what Congress, the UN or the EU regulators do. Global competition will grow, regardless what politicians say. Those who understand how these big trends create opportunities will find themselves more successful. Those who focus on the past, try to execute better with their old “core,” and rely on historical biases will find themselves slowly made irrelevant by those who use new technologies and solutions to offer customers greater need satisfaction. Which will you be? A laggard? Or a leader? Will you build on trends to grow – or slump off into obsolescence? The choice is yours.

The Remarkable, Predictable Decline of TV

The Remarkable, Predictable Decline of TV

Seven years ago (12 December, 2012) I said it was “The Day TV Died.” There were a LOT of skeptics. At the time, TV was by far still the dominant medium. But the trends were absolutely clear – ad revenues were quickly moving toward on-line opportunities. Print was already well into the grave, and radio was sputtering along with no growth at all. Eyeball momentum had shifted on-line, and thus ads moved on-line, and it was obvious that programming dollars would soon follow – meaning that TV programming was already in Stage 4 termination.

Trends and Tech drove Netflix growth

Meanwhile, Netflix and its brethren were poised to have a fabulous, furious growth. These same trends led me to a full-throated pitch to buy Netflix nine years ago (Nov. 2010.) After Netflix made the decision to raise prices for DVD distribution in order to push people toward streaming the stock crashed, but trends indicated that customer preferences would lead Netflix to be the content winner so despite widespread despair, I called for people to buy the stock in Oct. 2011. In Jan. 2012, I made Netflix one of my top 4 picks for the year. So by Jan. 2013, I was making it clear that TV was has-been, and Netflix was the company to own.

Now, Statista has produced the numbers showing that in 2019 internet media consumption exceeded TV consumption – for the first time ever. And this trend will not stop. It was wholly predictable years ago – and the trends all say this will only accelerate. Where once the competition for entertainment was Netflix, now there is Amazon Prime, Disney+, Comcast Peacock, AT&T HBO Max and Apple TV+. The traditional networks simply don’t have a chance.

Impact of Trends

These trends are having an enormous impact on how we behave, how advertisers behave, what technology we buy, what entertainment we watch, how we use other technology like social media, how we absorb news — and more. So the question is, did you see the trends 7,8,9 years ago? Have you adjusted your strategy? Are you sure where trends are headed, and are you prepared for the future? Will you be a winner as the world changes – in a pretty predictable way – or will you lose out and say “you know, way back when……”

Netflix – Demonstrating Why Good Strategy Matters

Netflix – Demonstrating Why Good Strategy Matters

On January 23 Netflix’ value rose to $100B. The stock is now trading north of $250/share. A year ago it was $139/share. An 80% increase in just 12 months. And long-term investors have done very well. Five years ago (January, 2013) the stock was trading at $24/share – so the valuation has increased 10-fold in 5 years! A decade ago it was trading for $3/share – so if you got in early (NFLX went public in June, 2002) you are up 83X your initial investment (meaning $1,000 would be worth $83,000.)netflix profits 2017 statista

Back in 2004 I wrote that Blockbuster was dead meat – because by going after streaming Netflix would make Blockbuster obsolete. Netflix was using external data to project its future, and thus its strategy was not to defend & extend its DVD rental business but to spend strongly to grow the replacement. In 2010 I wrote that Netflix had projected the complete demise of DVDs by 2013, and was thus investing all its resources into streaming in order to be the market leader. At the time NFLX was $15.68. Over the next year it took off, tripling in value to $42.16. By cannibalizing DVDs it’s strategy was to leave its competition in a dying marketplace.

But, investors weren’t as sure of the Netflix strategy as I was. They feared cannibalizing DVDs would cut out the “core” of Netflix and kill the company. By October, 2011 the stock had tumbled to $12 (a drop of over 70%.) But, with the stock at new lows after a year of declines I optimistically wrote “The Case for Buying Netflix. Really.” I told readers the stock analysts were wrong, and the Netflix strategy was spot-on.

Netflix went nowhere for the next year, trading between $9 and $12. But then in December, 2012 investors started seeing the results of Netflix strategy, with fast growing streaming subscriber rates. By January, 2014 the stock was trading north of $52, so those who bought when my article published made a 400% return in just over 2 years! By March, 2015 NFLX was up another 23%, to $62 when I told readers “Netflix Valuation Was Not a House of Cards.” The Netflix strategy to dominate streaming by offering its own content may have shocked a lot of people, due to the investment size, but it was the strategy that would allow Netflix to grow subscribers globally. That has driven the last jump, to $250 in just under 3 years – another 400%+ return!

Strategy matters- to company performance, and thus long-term investor returns. Netflix has been a volatile stock, and it has had plenty of naysayers. These were people looking only short-term, and fearful of strategic pivots that have proven highly valuable. If you want your company, and your investment portfolio, to succeed it is imperative you understand external trends and use them to develop the right strategy. And heed my forecasts.

Facebook’s Path To Communication Domination

Facebook’s Path To Communication Domination

Facebook shareholders should be cheering. And if you don’t own FB, you should be asking yourself why not. The company’s platform investments continue to draw users, and advertisers, in unprecedented numbers.

sms messaging is declining

With permission: Statista

People over 40 still might text. But for most younger people, messaging happens via FB Messenger or WhatsApp. Text messages have thus been declining in the USA. Internationally, where carriers still frequently charge for text messages, the use of both Facebook products dominates over texting. Both Facebook products now are leaders in internet usage.

And as their use grows, so do the ad dollars.

digital advertising now greater than tv

With permission: Statista

As this chart shows, in 2017 ad spending on digital outpaced money spent on TV ads. And TV spending, like print and radio, is flat to declining. While digital spending accelerates. And the big winner here is the platform getting the most eyeballs – which would be Facebook (and Google.)

Looking at the trends, Facebook investors should feel really good about future returns. And if you don’t own Facebook shares, why not?

Why Investors Should Support the Tesla, SolarCity Merger

Why Investors Should Support the Tesla, SolarCity Merger

In early August Tesla announced it would be buying SolarCity. The New York Times discussed how this combination would help CEO Elon Musk move toward his aspirations for greater clean energy use. But the Los Angeles Times took the companies to task for merging in the face of tremendous capital needs at both, while Tesla was far short of hitting its goals for auto and battery production.

Since then the press has been almost wholly negative on the merger. Marketwatch’s Barry Randall wrote that the deal makes no sense. He argues the companies are in two very different businesses that are not synergistic – and he analogizes this deal to GM buying Chevron. He also makes the case that SolarCity will likely go bankrupt, so there is no good reason for Tesla shareholders to “bail out” the company. And he argues that the capital requirements of the combined entities are unlikely to be fundable, even for its visionary CEO.

musk-tesla-solarcityFortune quotes legendary short seller Jim Chanos as saying the deal is “crazy.” He argues that SolarCity has an uneconomic business model based on his analysis of historical financial statements. And now Fortune is reporting that shareholder lawsuits to block the deal could delay, or kill, the merger.

But short-sellers are clearly not long-term investors. And there is a lot more ability for this deal to succeed and produce tremendous investor returns than anyone could ever glean from studying historical financial statements of both companies.

GM buying Chevron is entirely the wrong analogy to compare with Tesla buying SolarCity. Instead, compare this deal to what happened in the creation of television after General Sarnoff, who ran RCA, bought what he renamed NBC.

The world already had radio (just as we already have combustion powered cars.) The conundrum was that nobody needed a TV, especially when there were no TV programs. But nobody would create TV programs if there were no consumers with TVs. General Sarnoff realized that both had to happen simultaneously – the creation of both demand, and supply. It would only be by the creation, and promotion, of both that television could be a success. And it was General Sarnoff who used this experience to launch the first color televisions at the same time as NBC launched the first color programming – which fairly quickly pushed the industry into color.

Skeptics think Mr. Musk and his companies are in over their heads, because there are manufacturing issues for the batteries and the cars, and the solar panel business has yet to be profitable. Yet, the older among us can recall all the troubles with launching TV.

Early sets were not only expensive, they were often problematic, with frequent component failures causing owners to take the TV to a repairman. Often reception was poor, as people relied on poor antennas and weak network signals. It was common to turn on a set and have “snow” as we called it – images that were far from clear. And there was often that still image on the screen with the words “Technical Difficulties,” meaning that viewers just waited to see when programming would return. And programming was far from 24×7 – and quality could be sketchy. But all these problems have been overcome by innovation across the industry.

Yes, the evolution of electric cars will involve a lot of ongoing innovation. So judging its likely success on the basis of recent history would be foolhardy. Today Tesla sells 100% of its cars, with no discounts. The market has said it really, really wants its vehicles. And everybody who is offered electric panels with (a) the opportunity to sell excess power back to the grid and (b) financing, takes the offer. People enjoy the low cost, sustainable electricity, and want it to grow. But lacking a good storage device, or the inability to sell excess power, their personal economics are more difficult.

Electricity production, electricity storage (batteries) and electricity consumption are tightly linked technologies. Nobody will build charging stations if there are no electric cars. Nobody will build electric cars if there are not good batteries. Nobody will make better batteries if there are no electric cars. Nobody will install solar panels if they can’t use all the electricity, or store what they don’t immediately need (or sell it.)

This is not a world of an established marketplace, where GM and Chevron can stand alone. To grow the business requires a vision, business strategy and technical capability to put it all together. To make this work someone has to make progress in all the core technologies simultaneously – which will continue to improve the storage capability, quality and safety of the electric consuming automobiles, and the electric generating solar panels, as well as the storage capabilities associated with those panels and the creation of a new grid for distribution.

This is why Mr. Musk says that combining Tesla and SolarCity is obvious. Yes, he will have to raise huge sums of money. So did such early pioneers as Vanderbilt (railways,) Rockefeller (oil,) Ford (autos,) and Watson (computers.) More recently, Steve Jobs of Apple became heroic for figuring out how to simultaneously create an iPhone, get a network to support the phone (his much maligned exclusive deal with AT&T,) getting developers to write enough apps for the phone to make it valuable, and creating the retail store to distribute those apps (iTunes.) Without all those pieces, the ubiquitous iPhone would have been as successful as the Microsoft Zune.

It is fair for investors to worry if Tesla can raise enough money to pull this off. But, we don’t know how creative Mr. Musk may become in organizing the resources and identifying investors. So far, Tesla has beaten all the skeptics who predicted failure based on price of the cars (Tesla has sold 100% of its production,) lack of range (now up to nearly 300 miles,) lack of charging network (Tesla built one itself) and charging time (now only 20 minutes.) It would be shortsighted to think that the creativity which has made Tesla a success so far will suddenly disappear. And thus remarkably thoughtless to base an analysis on the industry as it exists today, rather than how it might well look in 3, 5 and 10 years.

The combination of Tesla and SolarCity allows Tesla to have all the components to pursue greater future success. Investors with sufficient risk appetite are justified in supporting this merger because they will be positioned to receive the future rewards of this pioneering change in the auto and electric utility industries.

‘Mythbusters’: Six Steps To Greater Diversity And Superior Results

‘Mythbusters’: Six Steps To Greater Diversity And Superior Results

Most of the time “diversity” is a code word for adding women or minorities to an organization.  But that is only one way to think about diversity, and it really isn’t the most important.  To excel you need diversity in thinking.  And far too often, we try to do just the opposite.

Mythbusters” was a television series that ran 14 seasons across 12 years.  The thesis was to test all kinds of things people felt were facts, from historical claims to urban legends, with sound engineering approaches to see if the beliefs were factually accurate – or if they were myths.  The show’s ability to bust, or prove, these myths made it a great success.

Workplace DiversityThe show was led by 2 engineers who worked together on the tests and props.  Interestingly, these two fellows really didn’t like each other.  Despite knowing each other for 20 years, and working side-by-side for 12, they never once ate a meal together alone, or joined in a social outing.  And very often they disagreed on many aspects of the show.  They often stepped on each others toes, and they butted heads on multiple issues.  Here’s their own words:

“We get on each other’s nerves and everything all the time, but whenever that happens, we say so and we deal with it and move on,” he explained. “There are times that we really dislike dealing with each other, but we make it work.”

The pair honestly believed it is their differences which made the show great.  They challenged each other continuously to determine how to ask the right questions, and perform the right tests, and interpret the results.  It was because they were so different that they were so successful.  Individually each was good.  But together they were great.  It was because they were of different minds that they pushed each other to the highest standards, never had an integrity problem, and achieved remarkable success.

Yet, think about how often we select people for exactly the opposite reason. Think about “knock-out” comments and questions you’ve heard that were used to keep from increasing the diversity:

  • I wouldn’t want to eat lunch with that person, so why would I want to work with them?
  • We find that people with engineering (or chemical, or fine arts, etc.) backgrounds do well here.  Others don’t.
  • We like to hire people from state (or Ivy League, etc) colleges because they fit in best
  • We always hire for industry knowledge.  We don’t want to be a training ground for the basics in how our industry works
  • Results are not as important as how they were obtained – we have to be sure this person fits our culture
  • Directors on our Board need to be able to get along or the Board cannot be effective
  • If you weren’t trained in our industry, how could you be helpful?
  • We often find that the best/top graduates are unable to fit into our culture
  • We don’t need lots of ideas, or challenges. We need people that can execute our direction
  • He gets things done, but he’s too rough around the edges to hire (or promote.)  If he leaves he’ll be someone else’s problem.

In 2011 I wrote in Forbes “Why Steve Jobs Couldn’t Find a Job Today.” The column pointed out that hiring practices are designed for the lowest common denominator, not the best person to do a job.  Personalities like Steve Jobs would be washed out of almost any hiring evaluation because he was too opinionated, and there would be concerns he would cause too much tension between workers, and be too challenging for his superiors.

Simply put, we are biased to hire people that think like us.  It makes us comfortable. Yet, it is a myth that homogeneous groups, or cultures, are the best performing.  It is the melding of diverse ways of thinking, and doing, that leads to the best solutions.  It is the disagreement, the arguing, the contention, the challenging and the uncomfortableness that leads to better performance.  It leads to working better, and smarter, to see if your assumptions, ideas and actions can perform better than your challengers.  And it leads to breakthroughs as challenges force us to think differently when solving problems, and thus developing new combinations and approaches that yield superior returns.

What should we do to hire better, and develop better talent that produces superior results?

  1. Put results and accomplishments ahead of culture or fit.  Those who succeed usually keep succeeding, and we need to build on those skills for everyone to learn how to perform better
  2. Don’t let ego into decisions or discussions.  Too many bad decisions are made because someone finds their assumptions or beliefs challenged, and thus they let “hurt feelings” keep them from listening and considering alternatives.
  3. Set goals, not process.  Tell someone what they need to accomplish, and not how they should do it. If how someone accomplishes their goals offends you, think about your own assumptions rather than attacking the other person.  There can be no creativity if the process is controlled.
  4. Set big goals, and avoid the desire to set a lot of small goals.  When you break down the big goal into sub-goals you effectively kill alternative approaches – approaches that might not apply to these sub-goals.  In other words, make sure the big objective is front and center, then “don’t sweat the small stuff.”
  5. Reward people for thinking differently – and be very careful to not punish them.  It is easy to scoff at an idea that sounds foreign, and in doing so kill new ideas.  Often it’s not what they don’t know that is material, but rather what you don’t know that is most important.
  6. Be blind to gender, skin color, historical ancestry, religion and all other elements of background.  Don’t favor any background, nor disfavor another.  This doesn’t mean white men are the only ones who need to be aware.  It is extremely easy for what we may call any minority to favor that minority.  Assumptions linked to physical attributes and history run deep, and are hard to remove from our bias.  But it is not these historical physical and educational elements that matter, it is how people think that matters – and the results they achieve.

 

 

Can Netflix Double Pivot to Be a Media Game Changer?

Can Netflix Double Pivot to Be a Media Game Changer?

Netflix has been a remarkable company.  Because it has accomplished something almost no company has ever done.  It changed its business model, leading to new growth and higher profits.

Almost nobody pulls that off, because they remain stuck defending and extending their old model until they become irrelevant, or fail.  Think about Blackberry, that gave us the smartphone business then lost it to Apple and its creation of the app market.  Consider Circuit City, that lost enough customers to Amazon it could no longer survive.  Sun Microsystems disappeared after PC servers caught up to Unix servers in capability. Remember the Bell companies and their land-line and long distance services, made obsolete by mobile phones and cable operators?  These were some really big companies that saw their market shifts, but failed to “pivot” their strategy to remain competitive.

Netflix built a tremendous business delivering physical videos on tape and CD to homes, wiping out the brick-and-mortar stores like Blockbuster and Hollywood Video.  By 2008 Netflix reached $1B revenues, reducing Blockbuster by a like amount.  By 2010 Blockbuster was bankrupt.  Netflix’ share price soared from $50/share to almost $300/share during 2011.  By the end of 2012 CD shipments were dropping precipitously as streaming viewership was exploding.  People thought Netflix was missing the wave, and the stock plummeted 75%. Most folks thought Netflix couldn’t pivot fast enough, or profitably, either.

But in 2013 Netflix proved the analysts wrong, and the company built a very successful – in fact market leading – streaming business.  The shares soared, recovering all that lost value.  By 2015 the company had more than doubled its previous high valuation.

But Netflix may be breaking entirely new ground in 2016.  It is becoming a market leader in original programming.  Something we long attributed to broadcasters and/or cable distributors like HBO and Showtime.

Today’s broadcast companies, like NBC, CBS and ABC, are offering less and less original programming.  Overall there are 3 hours/night of prime time television which broadcasters used to “own” as original programming hours.  Over the course of a year, allowing for holidays and one open night per week, that meant about 900 hours of programming for each network (including reruns as original programming.)  But that was long ago.

Netflix Original ProgrammingThese days most of those hours are filled with sports – think evening games of football, basketball, baseball including playoffs and “March Madness” events.  Sports are far cheaper to program, and can fill a lot of hours.  Next think reality programming.  Showing people race across countries, or compete to survive a political battlefield on an island, or even dancing or dieting, uses no expensive actors or directors or sets.  It is far, far less expensive than writing, casting, shooting and programming a drama (like Blacklist) or comedy (like Big Bang Theory.)  Plan on showing every show twice in reruns, plus intermixing with the sports and reality shows, and most networks get away with around 200-250 hours of original programming per year.

Against that backdrop, Netflix has announced it will program 600 hours of original programming this year.  That will approximately double any single large broadcast network.  In a very real way, if you don’t want to watch sports or reality TV any more you probably will be watching some kind of “on demand” program.  Either streamed from a cable service, or from a provider such as Netflix, Hulu or Amazon.

When it comes to original programming, the old broadcast networks are losing their relevancy to streaming technology, personal video devices and the customer’s ability to find what they want, when they want it – and increasingly at a quality they prefer – from streaming as opposed to broadcast media.

To complete this latest “pivot,” from a video streaming company to a true media company with its own content, Morgan Stanley has published that Netflix is now considered by customers as the #1 quality programming across streaming services.  29% of viewers said Netflix was #1, followed by long-time winner HBO now #2 with 21% of customers saying their programming is best.  Amazon, Showtime and Hulu were seen as the best quality by 4%-5% of viewers.

So a decade ago Netflix was a CD distribution company.  The largest customer of the U.S. Postal Service. Signing up folks to watch physical videos in their homes.  Now they are the largest data streaming company on the planet, and one of the largest original programming producers and programmers in the USA – and possibly the world.  And in this same decade we’ve watched the network broadcast companies become outlets for sports and reality TV, while cutting far back on their original shows.  Sounds a lot like a market shift, and possibly Netflix could be the game changer, as it performs the first strategy double pivot in business history.

 

Netflix Valuation is Not a “House of Cards”

Netflix Valuation is Not a “House of Cards”

The Netflix hit series “House of Cards” was released last night.  Most media reviewers and analysts are expecting huge numbers of fans will watch the show, given its tremendous popularity the last 2 years.  Simultaneously, there are already skeptics who think that releasing all episodes at once “is so last year” when it was a newsworthy event, and no longer will interest viewers, or generate subscribers, as it once did.  Coupled with possible subscriber churn, some think that “House of Cardsmay have played out its hand.

So, the success of this series may have a measurable impact on the valuation of Netflix.  If the “House of Cards” download numbers, which are up to Netflix to report, aren’t what analysts forecast many may scream for the stock to tumble; especially since it is on the verge of reaching new all-time highs.  The Netflix price to earnings (P/E) multiple is a lofty 107, and with a valuation of almost $29B it sells for just under 4x sales.

Netflix House of CardsBut investors should ignore any, and in fact all, hype about “House of Cards” and whatever analysts say about Netflix.  So far, they’ve been wildly wrong when making forecasts about the company.  Especially when projecting its demise.

Since Netflix started trading in 2002, it has risen from (all numbers adjusted) $8.5 to $485.  That is a whopping 57x increase.  That is approximately a 40% compounded rate of return, year after year, for 13 years!

But it has not been a smooth ride. After starting (all numbers rounded for easier reading) at $8.50 in May, 2002 the stock dropped to $3.25 in October – a loss of over 60% in just 5 months.  But then it rallied, growing to $38.75, a whopping 12x jump, in just 14 months (1/04!) Only to fall back to $9.80, a 75% loss, by October, 2004 – a mere 9 months later.  From there Netflix grew in value by about 5.5x – to $55/share – over the next 5 years (1/10.)  When it proceeded to explode in value again, jumping to $295, an almost 6-fold increase, within 18 months (7/11).  Only to get creamed, losing almost 80% of its value, back down to $63.85, in the next 4 months (11/11.)  The next year it regained some loss, improving in value by 50% to $91.35 (12/12,) only to again explode upward to $445 by February, 2014 a nearly 5-fold increase, in 14 months.  Two months later, a drop of 25% to $322 (4/14).  But then in 4 months back up to $440 (8/14), and back down 4 months later to $341 (12/14) only to approach new highs reaching $480 last week – just 2 months later.

That is the definition of volatility.

Netflix is a disruptive innovator.  And, simply put, stock analysts don’t know how to value disruptive innovators. Because their focus is all on historical numbers, and then projecting those historicals forward.  As a result, analysts are heavily biased toward expecting incumbents to do well, and simultaneously being highly skeptical of any disruptive company.  Disruptors challenge the old order, and invalidate the giant excel models which analysts create.  Thus analysts are very prone to saying that incumbents will remain in charge, and that incumbents will overwhelm any smaller company trying to change the industry model.  It is their bias, and they use all kinds of historical numbers to explain why the bigger, older company will project forward well, while the smaller, newer company will stumble and be overwhelmed by the entrenched competitor.

And that leads to volatility.  As each quarter and year comes along, analysts make radically different assumptions about the business model they don’t understand, which is the disruptor.  Constantly changing their assumptions about the newer kid on the block, they make mistake after mistake with their projections and generally caution people not to buy the disruptor’s stock.  And, should the disruptor at any time not meet the expectations that these analysts invented, then they scream for shareholders to dump their holdings.

Netflix first competed in distribution of VHS tapes and DVDs.  Netflix sent them to people’s homes, with no time limit on how long folks could keep them.  This model was radically different from market leader Blockbuster Video, so analysts said Blockbuster would crush Netflix, which would never grow.  Wrong.  Not only did Blockbuster grow, but it eventually drove Blockbuster into bankruptcy because it was attuned to trends for convenience and shopping from home.

As it entered streaming video, analysts did not understand the model and predicted Netflix would cannibalize its historical, core DVD business thus undermining its own economics.  And, further, much larger Amazon would kill Netflix in streaming.  Analysts screamed to dump the stock, and folks did.  Wrong.  Netflix discovered it was a good outlet for syndication, created a huge library of not only movies but television programs, and grew much faster and more profitably than Amazon in streaming.

Then Netflix turned to original programming.  Again, analysts said this would be a huge investment that would kill the company’s financials. And besides that people already had original programming from historical market leaders HBO and Showtime.  Wrong.  By using analysis of what people liked from its archive, Netflix leadership hedged its bets and its original shows, especially “House of Cards” have been big hits that brought in more subscribers.  HBO and Showtime, which have depended on cable companies to distribute their programming, are now increasingly becoming additional programming on the Netflix distribution channel.

Investors should own Netflix because the company’s leadership, including CEO Reed Hastings, are great at disruptive innovation.  They identify unmet customer needs and then fulfill those needs.  Netflix time and again has demonstrated it can figure out a better way to give certain user segments what they want, and then expand their offering to eat away at the traditional market.  Once it was retail movie distribution, increasingly it is becoming cable distribution via companies like ComCast, AT&T and Time Warner.

And investors must be long-term.  Netflix is an example of why trading is a bad idea – unless you do it for a living.  Most of us who have full time day jobs cannot try timing the ups and downs of stock movements.  For us, it is better to buy and hold.  When you’re ready to buy, buy. Don’t wait, because in the short term there is no way to predict if a stock will go up or down.  You have to buy because you are ready to invest, and you expect that over the next 3, 5, 7 years this company will continue to drive growth in revenues and profits, thus expanding its valuation.

Netflix, like Apple, is a company that has mastered the skills of disruptive innovation.  While the competition is trying to figure out how to sustain its historical position by doing the same thing better, faster and cheaper Netflix is figuring out “the next big thing” and then delivering it.  As the market shifts, Netflix is there delivering on trends with new products – and new business models – which push revenues and profits higher.

That’s why it would have been smart to buy Netflix any time the last 13 years and simply held it.  And odds are it will continue to drive higher valuations for investors for many years to come.  Not only are HBO, Showtime and Comcast in its sites, but the broadcast networks (ABC, CBS, NBC) are not far behind.  It’s a very big media market, which is shifting dramatically, and Netflix is clearly the leader.  Not unlike Apple has been in personal technology.

Why Everyone Knows TV is Dying, Yet Marketing Leaders Over-spend on TV

Why Everyone Knows TV is Dying, Yet Marketing Leaders Over-spend on TV

The trend toward the death of broadcast TV as we’ve known it keeps moving forward.  This trend may not happen as fast as the death of desktop computers, but it is a lot faster than glacier melting.

This television season (through October) Magna Global has reported that even the oldest viewers (the TV Generation 55-64) watched 3% less TV.  Those 35-54 watched 5% less.  Gen Xers (25-34) watched 8% less, and Millenials (18-24) watched a whopping 14% less TV.  Live sports viewing is not even able to maintain its TV audience, with NFL viewership across all networks down 10-19%.

Everyone knows what is happening.  People are turning to downloaded entertainment, mostly on their mobile devices.  With a trend this obvious, you’d think everyone in the media/TV and consumer goods industries would be rethinking strategy and retooling for a new future.

But, you would be wrong.  Because despite the obviousness of the trend, emotional ties to hoping the old business sticks around are stronger than logic when it comes to forecasting.

screen shot 2013-01-31 at 10.42.21 am

CBS predicted at the beginning of 2014 TV ad revenue would grow 4%.  Oops.  Now CBS’s lead forecaster is admitting he was way off, and adjusted revenues were down 1% for the year.  But, despite the trend in viewer behavior and ad expenditures in 2014, he now predicts a growth of 2% for 2015.

That, my young friends, is how “hockey stick” forecasts are created.  A lot of old assumptions, combined with a willingness to hope trends will be delayed, and you can ignore real data while promising people that the future will indeed look like the past – even when it defies common sense.

To compensate for fewer ads the networks have raised prices on all ads.  But how long can that continue?  This requires a really committed buyer (read more about CMO weaknesses below) who simply refuses to acknowledge the market has shifted and the dollars need to shift with it.  That cannot last forever.

Meanwhile, us old folks can remember the days when Nielsen ratings determined what was programmed on TV, as well as what advertisers paid.  Nielsen had a lock on measuring TV audience viewing, and wielded tremendous power in the media and CPG world.

But now AC Nielsen is struggling to remain relevant.  With TV viewership down, time shifting of shows common and streaming growing like the proverbial weed Nielsen has no idea what entertainment the public watches.  They don’t know what, nor when, nor where.  Unwilling to move quickly to develop tools for catching all the second screen viewing, Nielsen has no plan for telling advertisers what the market really looks like – and the company looks to become a victim of changing markets.

Which then takes us to looking at those folks who actually buy ads that drive media companies.  The Chief Marketing Officers (CMOs) of CPG companies.  Surely these titans of industry are on top of these trends, and rapidly shifting their spending to catch the viewers with the most ads placed for the lowest cost.

You would wish.

Unfortunately, because these senior executives are in the oldest age groups, they are a victim of their own behavior.  They still watch TV, so assume others must as well.  If there is cyber-data saying they are wrong, well they simply discount that data.  The Nielsen’s aren’t accurate, but these execs still watch the ratings “because it’s the best info we have” – a blatant untruth by the way.  But Nielsen does conveniently reinforce their built in assumptions, and their hope that they won’t have to change their media spend plans any time soon.

Further, very few of these CMOs actually use social media.  The vast majority watch their children, grandchildren and young employees use mobile devices constantly – and they bemoan all the activity on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter – or for the most part even Linked-in.  But they don’t actually USE these products.  They don’t post information.  They don’t set up and follow channels.  They don’t connect with people, share information, exchange photos or tell stories on social media. Truthfully, they ignore these trends in their own lives.  Which leaves them woefully inept at figuring out how to change their company marketing so it can be more relevant.

The trend is obvious.  The answer, equally so.  Any modern marketer should be an avid user of social media.  Most network heads and media leaders are farther removed from social media than the Pope! They don’t constantly download entertainment, and exchanging with others on all the platforms.  They can’t manage the use of these channels when they don’t have a clue how they work, or how other people use them, or understand why they are actually really valuable tools.

Are you using these modern tools? Are you actually living, breathing, participating in the trends?  Or are you, like these outdated execs, biding your time wasting money on old programs while you look forward to retirement?  And likely killing your company.

When trends emerge it is imperative we become part of that trend.  You can’t simply observe it, because your biases will lead you to hope the trend reverts as you continue doing more of the same.  A leader has to adopt the trend as a leader, be a practicing participant, and learn how that trend will make a substantial difference in the business.  And then apply some vision to remain relevant and successful.

Coca-Cola, How a Giant Company Starts Losing Relevance

Coca-Cola, How a Giant Company Starts Losing Relevance

I’m a “Boomer,” and my generation could have been called the Coke generation.  Our parents started every day with a cup of coffee, and they drank either coffee or water during the day.  Most meals were accompanied by either water, or iced tea.

But our generation loved Coca-Cola.  Most of our parents limited our consumption, much to our frustration.  Some parents practically refused to let the stuff in the house.  In progressive homes as children we were usually only allowed one, or at most two, bottles per day.  We chafed at the controls, and when we left home we started drinking the sweet cola as often as we could.

It didn’t take long before we supplanted our parent’s morning coffee with a bottle of Coke (or Diet Coke in more modern times.)  We seemingly could not get enough of the product, as bottle size soared from 8 ounces to 12 to 16 and then quarts and eventually 2 liters!  Portion control was out the window as we created demand that seemed limitless.

Meanwhile, Americans exported our #1 drink around the world.  From 1970 onward Coke was THE iconic American brand.  We saw ads of people drinking Coke in every imaginable country.  International growth seemed boundless as people from China to India started consuming the irresistible brown beverage.

santa-claus-coca-cola

My how things change.  Last week Coke announced third quarter earnings, and they were down 14%.  The CEO admitted he was struggling to find growth for the company as soda sales were flat.  U.S. sales of carbonated beverages have been declining for a decade, and Coke has not developed a successful new product line – or market – to replace those declines.

Coke is a victim of changing customer preferences.  Once a company that helped define those preferences, and built the #1 brand globally, Coke’s leadership shifted from understanding customers and trends in order to build on those trends towards defending & extending sales of its historical product.  Instead of innovating, leadership relied on promotion and tactics which had helped the brand grow 30 years ago.  They kept to their old success formula as trends shifted the market into new directions.

Coke began losing its relevancy.  Trends moved in a new direction.  Healthfulness led customers to decide they wanted a less calorie rich, nutritionally starved drink.  And concerns grew over “artificial” products, such as sweeteners, leading customers away from even low calorie “diet” colas.

Meanwhile, younger generations started turning to their own new brands.  And not just drinks.  Instead of holding a Coke, increasingly they hold an iPhone.  Where once it was hip to hang out at the Coke machine, or the fountain stand, now people would rather hang out at a Starbucks or Peet’s Coffee.  Where once Coke was identified and matched the aspirations of the fast growing Boomer class, now it is replaced with a Prada handbag or other accessory from an LVMH branded luxury product.

Where once holding a Coke was a sign of being part of all that was good, now the product is largely passe.  Trends have moved, and Coke didn’t.  Coke leadership relied too much on its past, and failed to recognize that market shifts could affect even the #1 global brand.  Coke leaders thought they would be forever relevant, just do more of what worked before.  But they were wrong.

Unfortunately, CEO Muhtar Kent announced a series of changes that will most likely further hurt the Coca-Cola company rather than help it.

First, and foremost, like almost all CEOs facing an earnings problem the company will cut $3B in costs.  The most short-term of short-term actions, which will do nothing to help the company find its way back toward being a prominent brand-leading icon. Cost cuts only further create a “hunker-down” mindset which causes managers to reduce risk, rather than look for breakthrough products and markets which could help the company regain lost ground.  Cost cutting will only further cause remaining management to focus on defending the past business rather than finding a new future.

Second, Coca-Cola will sell off its bottlers.  Interestingly, in the 1980s CEO Roberto Goizueta famously bought up the distributorships, and made a fortune for the company doing so.  By the year 2000 he was honored, along with Jack Welch of GE, as being one of the top 2 CEOs of the century for his ability to create shareholder value.  But now the current CEO is selling the bottling operations – in order to raise cash.  Once again, when leadership can’t run a business that makes money they often sell off assets to generate cash and make the company smaller – none of which benefits shareholders.

Third, fire the Chief Marketing Officer.  Of course, somebody has to be blamed!  The guy who has done the most to bring Coca-Cola’s brand out of traditional advertising and promote it in an integrated manner across all media, including managing successful programs for the Olympics and World Cup, has to be held accountable.  What’s missing in this action is that the big problem is leadership’s fixation with defending its Coke brand, rather than finding new growth businesses as the market moves away from carbonated soft drinks.  And that is a problem that requires the CEO and his entire management team to step up their strategy efforts, not just fire the leader who has been updating the branding mechanisms.

Coca-Cola needs a significant strategy shift.  Leadership focused too long on its aging brands, without putting enough energy into identifying trends and figuring out how to remain relevant.  Now, people care a lot less about Coke than they did.  They care more about other brands, like Apple.  Globally.  Unless there is a major shift in Coke’s strategy the company will continue to weaken along with its primary brand.  That market shift has already happened, and it won’t stop.

For Coke to regain growth it needs a far different future which aligns with trends that now matter more to consumers. The company must bring forward products which excite people ,and with which they identify. And Coke’s leaders must move much harder into understanding shifts in media consumption so they can make their new brands as visible to newer generations as TV made Coke visible to Boomers.

Coke is far from a failed company, but after a decade of sales declines in its “core” business it is time leadership realizes takes this earnings announcement as a key indicator of the need to change.  And not just simple things like costs.  It must fundamentally change its strategy and markets or in another decade things will look far worse than today.