The key hits:

• Bloomberg Media’s total 2022 revenue increased by about 16% year over year.
• The publisher hit 450,000 paid subscribers in 2022, about 20% growth from 2021.
• “We’re in the jet stream of video advertising growth … You have to be in the right places when things slow down, [and advertisers are] not going to necessarily cut too much out of digital and video,” said Havens.

Last year, Bloomberg Media bullishly announced it was going to be entering its globalization era, starting by going head to head with the British press. These plans and proclamations came just before the economic slowdown kicked up dust for the media and advertising industries, but the ambition to create an international Bloomberg Media did not get pushed to the backburner, according to CEO Scott Havens.

Granted, 2022 didn’t have as significant revenue growth as 2021. Bloomberg Media’s revenue grew by almost 20%, per Havens, though the company is still calculating the final numbers, and it was impacted mostly by advertising declines in the second half of the year. But the company “did not pull back our spending or investment levels, [nor do] we anticipate, at this point, doing that.”

Moving into the new year, Havens is using the launch of Bloomberg U.K. as the blueprint for the company’s other international iterations, meaning the teams will be focusing more on local daily content. What’s more, artificial intelligence and other technology will be used to more quickly dub over video content and translate written stories into languages including Spanish, Japanese and German — something that’s typically done through licensing partnerships with regional media outlets.

Outside of the international expansion, Havens said he is also optimistic about investing further in television and digital video and using those to bolster its advertising business, especially when other forms of media are being cut from advertising budgets.

The following conversation has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity and readability.

How did 2022 turn out for Bloomberg Media? Did you see revenue growth in advertising after a turbulent second half of the year?

We had a good year; we grew roughly 16%. The first half on the ad side was definitely stronger for everybody [than] the second half, but we still managed to grow in the second half. We did not pull back our spending or investment levels [and] we don’t anticipate, at this point, doing that. We are leaning into our strategy and are confident we anticipate a similar growth rate in 2023.

There was a noticeable growth decrease for us — not a decrease …read more

Source:: Digiday

Author: Aaron