Exciting news for South Africa is that local agency RMS Media is part of the new Local Planet global network

By Michael Bratt

This article appeared at The Media Online: http://themediaonline.co.za/2016/04/rms-media-joins-global-network-of-independent-media-agencies/

Michael Bratt spoke to CEO, Rob Smuts, to find out more.

Joining a global agency network is not a new thing for RMS Media as the company was previously part of Columbus Media International, a collective of global, independent […]

Local Planet claims to be the world’s only privately owned international media agency network

by David Furlonger, 03 May 2016, 05:47

Published in Business Day

INDEPENDENT media agencies are at a disadvantage in an era of market globalisation and must work together to win business, Rob Smuts, CEO of Johannesburg-based RMS Media, said.

RMS, which specialises in media buying […]

Rob Smuts was named Media Legend at the Most Awards 2015

See video interview with Rob Smuts Media Legend below

Winner of the Media Agency Legend Award at the 2015 MOST Awards was Rob Smut of RMS Media.

The MOST Legend and Rising Star Awards are presented to individuals in recognition of their commitment and integrity. Nominations for these awards are submitted by respondents to the survey and the winner was selected by a panel of previous winners using specially selected criteria. These awards cannot be won more than once by any nominee.

He talked to MC Jason Goliath after the awards show.

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From Rome to ROMI

By Rob Smuts

Like Pliny the Elder (ex Africa semper aliquid novi) most marketers keep looking to find something new from Africa, but it’s not always easy to find the key to measurable ROMI, even in a temptingly under-marketed and under-supplied African market.

At the core of this, seemingly lies the lack of access to robust media and marketing data, and marketing insights. In the recently published World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) Marketing in Africa 2015 report 50% of marketers indicated that accurate ROMI analysis is “impossible”. Interestingly though, if we probe the data further, we discover that 55% of these same marketers indicate that “media audience measurement is sufficiently robust and reliable” in these regions.

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A tale of two magazines

By Rob Smuts

The recent closure of heat magazine made me think about the state of the magazine industry in general. It’s easy to be swayed by all the negativity around print media overall and magazines in particular. Consumer magazines’ circulation numbers continue to slide, mobile is taking over, etc. Don’t even mention programmatic!

But my gut feel tells me a different story, so I started digging a bit deeper.

Sure, consumer magazines are under significant circulation and advertising pressure. The official ABC circulation figures for the period October to December 2014 contain some real shockers.

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Consumer behaviour in a streaming world

By Rob Smuts

Whether consumers use over the top services delivered via satellite or the internet, the reality of the new television world is one that consists of what used to be called on demand video. These days I prefer to use the term streaming content, as it more accurately describes what, especially, young people are doing these days.

Having access to the world’s content comes natural for a new wave of consumers.

Activities such as binge watching is gaining strength with streaming content services. Back in the day you had to have the physical DVD box set for all the episodes of a television show in order to binge-watch.

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Media research in 2014

By Rob Smuts

As the media industry transforms, so should the media research advertisers depend on to make decisions. It used to be that each release of the venerable All Media and Products Survey (Amps) signalled the most important event in media research in South Africa.

In fact, without the traditional Amps media research, can we possibly make any advertising placement decisions that are any good? At this time, probably not. But what does the future hold for media research?

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The impact of fragmentation of TV Audiences / The Rise of Digital

By Rob Smuts

How long will television continue to take the lion’s share of advertising spend in our South African market? How will the fragmentation of TV impact media decision-making?

Recently released Internet Advertising Bureau and PwC data on advertising spend in the UK indicate total UK digital ad spend went up 15% year-on-year to £6.3bn in 2013. Mobile ad spend doubled to break the £1bn mark and now accounts for £1 in £6 of digital advertising in the UK.

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Media research body Saarf is critical for media strategy

ROB SMUTS explains why Saarf is critical to our industry and why destroying it would be the biggest mistake we could make

The South African Advertising Research Foundation (Saarf) is different from the rest of the media research world. Saarf has been the envy of the international research world because many other countries have failed to develop processes and methodologies to measure media audiences in an independent way.

Saarf was launched in 1975 and what set it apart from the rest of the world were three visionary developments.

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