Every year marketers and brands flock to Televisions’ Upfronts, to hear the new network line ups and get a preview of the coming years television strategy.  A month before the Upfronts kick off, TV networks are already sharing the spotlight–and potential media dollars–with this month’s NewFronts. Thanks to a long list of buzzworthy announcements, celebrity appearances, and corporate interest this year’s NewFronts signify the continued growth in importance of digital media and advertising. Started in 2008 by Digitas as a way to “bring together content creators, distributors, talent and brands to harness creative media opportunities made possible in the age of digital marketing,” the NewFronts conference has managed to become one of the most important conferences in the digital content realm. Brands like Hulu, AOL, Yahoo, and Google’s YouTube give presentations on their upcoming year’s content in order to attract advertising dollars. In 2008, these presentations were intended to convince marketers and agencies to shift more of their budgets into digital advertising, but as more marketers have already been convinced, the conference no longer helps marketers decide if they’ll invest their advertising dollars digitally, but tells them where. With almost 13% growth in the past year alone, digital advertising now comprises almost 30% of U.S. ad spend. This year’s NewFronts have already brought news that Hulu will pick up all 9 seasons of Seinfeld, a huge announcement that will surely draw in many advertising dollars. As the conference grows in size and importance– alongside the digital advertising sector as a whole– we will come to expect more and more of these big announcements every year.

What Sparks Our Fire: Knowing that we’ll be spending a good chunk of the month of June binge watching Seinfeld