However unusual it may seem, a company as big and powerful as British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), is not so keen at revealing its budgetary information. How appropriate it is to have one of their most known principles the one that states that the company “has a long tradition of making information available and accessible”.
Now it’s been revealed that one of the world’s most known media corporations is annually spending over £1.6m solely on digital marketing. Surprisingly, BBC issued a statement where it claims that most of the marketing is delivered “at little or no cost”!
According to the Freedom of Information (FOI) inquiries published earlier in December 2021, they needed to deliver a report on the budget spent over 2009-2010 for overall Internet marketing actions. They were supposed to make a list of all the marketing strategies, methods, and break down the costs according to each point separately.
The company answered with information that clearly shows their expenditures divided amongst Twitter, SEO principles applied into the design of their website, and marketing messages that appear only on their site.
But their budget is also partly directed towards some specific groups – youth, or children. BBC reaches these groups with digital marketing inventory (paid search marketing, and display advertising – banners, buttons, Media Placement Units). The company’s expenditures for marketing in 2009/10 were £1.62m, mainly digital display advertising and search marketing.
BBC pays lesser amounts as digital marketing spent “across the BBC which is funded by the individual production areas”.
The interesting fact is that BBC doesn’t employ an SEO firm for their digital marketing activities whatsoever. According to the listing of expenses, it seems that SEO is not being employed whatsoever.
It does seem rather queer that information on the 2009-10 budget still remains a secret. A “long tradition of keeping information available and accessible”, I’d say.
