Hoffman Reports. You Decide.

Few ad guys kick facts as consistently and blatantly as Bob Hoffman.
Right now the San Francisco ad man is kicking the hell out of the trade press for reporting an agenda (to keep interactive sexy), rather than the plainly obvious facts before them.
Let’s listen:

Some facts:

• In the recent election, candidates spent over 2 billion dollars on tv and radio ads.
• They spent less than 18 million on online ads
• Proportion of spending on traditional media: .992
• Proportion of spending on digital media: .008

So what was the story in MediaWeek? You guessed it. It was about how lousy the election was for tv spending and how fabulous it was for online spending.

I will add that a brand needn’t spend as much online to get the desired results. Not by a long stretch. Yet, even with that, the data is clear, Obama and McCain put a TON of money into traditional broadcast media.
As for why the press shapes stories the way they do, misses some stories altogether and predictably draws oddball conclusions, who can say? Okay, I can say. They’re not close enough to the story.