5 Jun 2014

NZ businesses urged to adapt

8:03 am on 5 June 2014

New Zealand businesses need to adapt faster to avoid losing out on growing spending on digital media, research shows.

PricewaterhouseCoopers' (PwC) Global Entertainment and Media Outlook for 2014-2018 predicts digital spending will grow by more than 10 percent year on year.

But traditional media do not fare well, with newspaper revenues forecast to drop an average of 4.8 percent a year and advertising revenues falling by 7.3 percent year-on-year.

Internet advertising, at an expected annual growth rate of 8 percent, is expected to overtake television advertising in 2018.

PwC partner Paul Brabin said the growth in digital spending was speeding up.

"What's different to probably our entertainment and media outlook last year is that we saw the balance starting to tip. This year we've seen that really accelerate quite quickly," Mr Brabin said.

"We've moved beyond that digital journey to this is actually the digital norm.

"Most businesses are really having to think about how they think about digital in terms of their current business strategy rather than just thinking about it as an extension of what they do in terms of their normal business."

The outlook also suggested New Zealand was lagging behind the rest of the world, with the country's entertainment industry expected to grow at an average annual rate of 3.3 percent, compared to a global growth rate of 5.5 percent.