SAN FRANCISCO \u2013 As national television networks are coming together to standardize audience targeting, local broadcasters know they need to make the buying and selling of their inventory easier to execute. For Hearst Television and several others, one vehicle is the TIP Initiative hosted by the trade group TVB.<\/p>\n
\u201cLocal TV still has the majority of its revenue based upon the traditional buy\/sell process with our local clients,\u201d says Al Lustgarten, VP, Technology and Information Services at Hearst Television. \u201cWhat we\u2019ve seen in the market is that there is a very slow evolution of the traditional broadcast sales process.\u201d<\/p>\n
Advances like Internet-protocol-based ATSC 3.0 hold the promise of revolutionizing the way local broadcasters can deliver editorial and advertising content. But it\u2019s a voluntary standard requiring investments by broadcasters for something that won\u2019t reach consumers until late 2020 at the earliest.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe don\u2019t see any significant immediate change, but as new technologies emerge like ATSC we hope to have new targeted and addressable capabilities within our advertising that we could market to our customers,\u201d Lustgarten says in this interview with Beet.TV at the WideOrbit Connect<\/a> conference. \u201cBut we are very focused now on trying to maintain our current business but then try to bring more efficiency to the buy sell process.\u201d<\/p>\n A main selling factor for local broadcast is local news, which remains highly relevant despite competition from online outlets. Hearst\u2019s footprint<\/a> comprises just under 20% of the country or about one in five households.<\/p>\n \u201cThe local television market has a unique presence now in the media that the public consumes,\u201d says Lustgarten. \u201cThe unique presence is the fact that we can provide live news to an audience in the geographic areas that we support. There is no other medium that can provide that now.\u201d<\/p>\n