SARAJEVO, 24.06.2019. – When we talk about the situation in media field and commercial marketing market in Bosnia and Herzegovina, we can talk about the number of problems that disable market development of these two, rather important industries for any country, including Bosnia and Herzegovina. As marketing industry relies on the three pillars – commercial advertisers, media houses and agencies – let us analyse the stability situation, that is, let us observe the instability of every single of the three above listed pillars.
When we talk about commercial advertising, we somehow almost always fo- cus on agencies and media houses as our first priorities in regard with this issue. Commercial advertisers are almost always placed in the third place al- though, according to my personal opinion, they should be considered as most
important factor of the three above listed pillars, since agencies would have no one to sell their creative ideas to, and media would have no one to sell their space to, and thus would not be able to finance their plans for which they obvi- ously require financial means, that is, money.
When we analyse and observe commercial advertisers in Bosnia and Herzegovina (those that advertise and those that should advertise), then we can surely state that this particular part of commercial advertising industry is vastly underdeveloped. We have excel- lent agencies that are capable of providing services to international clients, we have media houses (more or less) but if we were to make careful and thorough selection, there have been those entities whose work has been recognised by the public and we do have advertisers that consider commercial advertising as mere expenditures and costs and they would, if possible and often by all means, be rather satisfied if they could somehow avoid and bypass spending money on commercial advertising. What may be considered as good news is the fact that the number of those entities that decide to invest their financial means and spend their money on advertising is very limited in BiH market. This means that the marketing potential is significant, but it still needs to be launched and started and also, commercial advertisers additional education is
necessary and required, since they should be taken care of, just like sensitive plants and herbs. Some agencies in BiH boast that they have never had to knock on clients’ door offering them business cooperation, instead they loud that cli- ents had to come to see them first instead. Commercial advertising potential relies on small and medium sized enterprises, although everyone is aiming for
the big companies and no one seems to be willing to invest in smaller enterpris- es. Currently, leading world companies launched their businesses literally from their garages (Microsoft and Apple). Also, Coca Cola was first produced in some small chemist shop. They were all small at the beginning. However, agen- cies only want the big ones and big ones consider themselves powerful and put pressure on agencies and media houses, that is, they cut the branch they sit on. They want agencies to act promptly and immediately and for lowest possible charges and they also put pressure on media houses, demanding great media discounts and special prices until they (one day) completely destroy them. And if and when this happen, where would they advertise then?
In order to get out of this magic circle, agencies should, at least those that are considered as big agencies, open a special position, that is, they should em- ploy and engage a person that would research the market concerning small and medium enterprises and their needs, visit these on regular basis and instigate them to invest money in commercial advertising. This should be done slowly and carefully.
It should be implemented on step by step basis, possibly, with no daily frustra- tion interfering. They should perhaps add a new link to their official web sites, titled for instance, Creative Boutique or something similar, inserting price lists of their services suitable and affordable for small and medium size enterpris- es, because perhaps, small size companies feel embarrassed and feel that they
need thousands of BAM to knock on agency door when requiring marketing services. They should be encouraged, additionally educated in this field and motivated.
As far as I am aware, no marketing agency in BiH is focused on small and me- dium sized enterprises.
If we were to follow common sense and apply logic, another pillar of commercial advertising are agencies that act as agents between advertisers and media houses. There are many things going on in this relationship, but let’s just say that they can be marked positively as a result of their creativity and profes- sionalism applied, although they may be divided into two groups and should perhaps be separated with a wall, where the remaining group should be thrown into rubbish bin. Their major disadvantage is that they do very little or in fact do nothing, as far as market development is concerned, including additional education of their potential clients and the fact that they are slower than agen- cies coming from neighbouring countries in terms of introducing new forms of commercial advertising and technologies as new tools and mechanisms that should be brought closer to their potential clients. Their greatest defect is that they, in their intention to develop the market, fail to use collective synergy and
refuse to, under any circumstances, accept to establish the association of adver- tising industry that should set and define the rules of marketing manners and insist on their implementation. Instead, they favour market anarchy which is exactly what has been happening for years in BiH market. The marketing rules should, above any other things, assist them in having protection from disloyal
and illegal competitive agencies from neighbouring countries, where certain agencies enter this market as if it were a jungle. Such association should help agencies (including media houses as well) to use collective synergy and addi- tionally educate and train their potential clients and challenge their need for
commercial advertising and once their potential clients do make a decision to invest in advertising, the agencies should then have fair and competitive fight in terms of who shall provide their clients with most appropriate services and prices. After all, this particular industry does require the law on advertising.
Who should initiate its passing and should draft its content? Association and association only. Only through such association, the experts can make their contribution in writing and drafting the law on advertising. Anything apart from this would be enforced solution to this problem. But, having in mind that many crucial laws in this country have been initiated and launched by outer factors, adver- tisers perhaps also wait from someone from the outside to solve and sort out this problematic issue for them. Thus, panel discussion covering this rather sensitive issue, was held one month ago and was organized by the European Commission officials in association with the Association of BiH Journalists, Media Centre and Council of Europe. We are grateful for their help, but if I were representing an agency or advertisers, I would feel embarrassed if Euro- pean Commission had to conduct the survey and research, showing the results on who I were, how I should act in the future and what I should do in order to
be what I want. Although, as media representative, I still feel slightly embar- rassed. The fact that European Commission had to finance the releasing of the article, in regard with the survey, research and panel, since no media house had professional consciousness and were completely unaware about the crucial im- portance regarding the discussion that was held a month ago in the European Commission building, does speak about media houses and their unawareness regarding this problem.
It would be pointless to talk about the significance of media industry in relation with the development of democracy, economy, culture, art and all other social fields. Surveys and researches conducted at the European Union level proved and confirmed that one euro invested in advertising industry generates
four euros of GDP so consequently, it seems senseless to launch any further discussion regarding the significance of advertising industry and its impact on the development of economy and living standard in any society. In order to utilize media and advertising sectors with the purpose of accomplishing the
above mentioned benefits and goals, we should all work on their development, organise them properly and enable them to follow modern trends, including continual advancement of their quality level. Media industry has been changing constantly under the influence of digital media sources, including technology development. Traditional media, particularly printed media, can hardly survive at present by having their editions sold at newsagent shops, including the selling of their ads, because they have been constantly forced to seek new business models in order to sustain in the local market. They often establish other businesses from which they finance daily newspapers and magazines. By applying new changes in media, changes in advertising industry shall follow accordingly.
Everything seems to be changing globally, except in Bosnia and Herzegovina, where things are still the same or even worse, they are going backwards. No one seems to be interested in making concrete steps in regard with media industry and advertising industry as well. Every talk about this issue ends up with con- clusions that our market is jeopardized or even endangered with “intruders”, that is, media houses and agencies coming from neighbouring countries and that our poor media houses and agencies are not adequately protected by the state. Media owners and entrepreneurs are convinced that media market in
Bosnia and Herzegovina is most open market in Europe. In order to release such thesis and theories, one should be familiar with European media market, instead of just commenting the situation in Serbia or Croatia only (and these so called experts have never even been anywhere apart from Serbia and Croatia,
yet they have the audacity to make comments and remarks about the situation in EU countries), presenting thus the public with personal and unofficial views and opinions about this issue and with complete ignorance about European market and it is regulated. Cable TV operators cross borders and provide their potential clients with an opportunity to advertise in BiH market. What duties they have in respect with tax bodies in BiH should concern tax office official authorities, instead of having Communication Regulatory Agency using their competence and enforcing certain rules, such as darkening the screen when certain TV channels from neighbouring countries broadcast particular sport
venues. In order to protect local television and public services and their in- ability, the CRA has deprived public audience in BiH with possibility to watch live sport venues that our local televisions do not broadcast, because they can- not pay for TV rights for these sports event and they have no money because they are incapable of making money. Therefore, BiH general audience have no possibility to watch world events and they seem to be hostages held between the useless televisions, along with even more useless marketing on one hand, and the force imposed by the Communication Regulatory Agency on the other hand. So much about BiH market as being considered as the most open market
in Europe, as claimed in the article posted in previous E – Bulletin edition issued by BiH Journalists.
As far as media is concerned, an old saying perhaps best resembles present situation in BiH, wand this old saying is: “Small plash is full of crocodiles”. There are too many media on this market.
If we were too follow European standards, I should say that we are amongst the very few countries with the largest number of media houses operating in our market in comparison with the population if BiH. Based on what? Based on media literacy, based on developed economy that is capable of financing
media houses through advertisements, or based on habits of consuming media contents and quality of contents..? No! None of these parameters could be used to be described and to be considered as media heaven, so the question is how come we ended up with such number of media houses operating in BiH market and who created such enormous media scene anyway? We could say they were most probably created the local political parties, so they (media houses) could implement general political interests. We could hardly talk about free and in- dependent media field in BiH, regardless to how some people tend to prove otherwise. There are very few media houses that operate independently from political influences. Just by taking a look at most popular daily newspapers (in terms of edition figures) and weekly magazines, and after having read the editorials posted by their chief editors, we can identify and recognize politi- cal biasness and their “ethnic” jerseys. Also, by looking at local media houses
(cantonal televisions and radio stations), that make up significant part of media scene, we can see that they are completely dependent on political authorities that support them financially. They are often poor in terms of contents and production quality (printed material and television), as they are struggling in their fight to win over the decreasing part of marketing share in the local market and they use all means necessary in their fight. Who suffers the most in these kinds of battles? Of course, it’s the readers, viewers and listeners.
This text is a part of E-Bulletin– tenth edition of special serial of BHN online bulletin implemented through the “Media and Public Reputation” (origin. “Mediji i javni ugled”) project, also representing a contribution to public debate regarding the transparency of media ownership and upholding and encouraging the passing of set of laws aimed to advance media field and information market in BiH.