CBS might consider buying CNN -- should it be available as a result of a possible sale of Time Warner to 21st Century Fox."It's something I'm sure we'll look at if it becomes available," said Les Moonves, president/chief executive officer of CBS, speaking to reporters at the Television Critics Association on Thursday.Moonves added: "We've always talked about doing things with CNN in the past," referring to possible joint venture operations of the CNN and CBS News division, which have been rumored in the past.How about Time Warner itself? Not likely. Moonves says Time Warner in terms of market capitalization is much larger than CBS -- making it harder to make a deal.On Wednesday, news broke that 21st Century Fox had made an $80 billion cash and stock offer for Time Warner. Fox would need to divest CNN to avoid antitrust concerns. The New York Times first broke the news of the Fox move on Time Warner.Analysts believe the two companies make for a more compatible TV/movie/digital entertainment media company -- as both have recently separated from their respective print media operations.Moonves believes that amassing more TV sports properties is one major reason for 21st Century Fox to move toward Time Warner, which would add NBA, among other sports to its roster.CBS, along with Time Warner and a number of media companies, witnessed higher-spiking stock prices on the news of 21st Century Fox’s buying intentions of Time Warner.
A group of international investors has acquired a majority stake in Forbes Media LLC, including the entire stake of Elevation Media, the previous co-owners of the company along with the Forbes family. The Forbes family will retain a significant minority stake and will continue to play an active role in the company.Steve Forbes is staying on as chairman and editor in chief and president, while CEO Mike Perlis will continue to lead management. Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed. Forbes Media is being sold to Integrated Whale Media Investments, a group of investors including Integrated Asset Management, a Hong Kong-based investment company with holdings in telecommunications, finance and technology, and Wayne Hsieh, co-founder of ASUSTeK Computer Inc., a PC vendor and motherboard manufacturer. The investors will provide capital, financial expertise, and international relationships to help enlarge the Forbes footprint globally. According to the partners, Forbes Media is profitable and posted its best financial results in six years in 2013. The deal follows a concerted long-term push to reinvent the company as a digital publisher. In recent years, digital revenues grew to account for about half its total revenues, thanks in part to its pioneering efforts in native advertising, including Brand Voice, which allows advertisers to create custom online content that is then prominently displayed on the Forbes site and mobile channels. Forbes has also embraced programmatic sales, making online inventory available for public bidding on the company’s own ad exchange, the Forbes Audience Network. Like other business magazines, the company’s flagship print publication has suffered big declines in ad pages in recent years. According to figures from the Publishers Information Bureau, Forbes magazine saw total ad pages decline from 3,460 in 2004 to 1,644 in 2013, for a 52.5% decline over 10 years. More recently, ad pages fell 8.7% from 266 in the first quarter of 2013 to 243 in the first quarter of 2014. The Forbes family has been considering a sale for some time. Last year, the family put the entity on the auction block, hoping to attract buyers with a price of $400 million to $500 million, according to The Wall Street Journal -- but apparently no attractive offers were forthcoming at that time.
Online video startup FilmOn X is now arguing that it's entitled to a compulsory license to broadcast television shows. FilmOn X, backed by billionaire Alki David, says in court papers that the recent Supreme Court ruling against rival company Aereo supports the view that the streaming video startups are “cable systems,” which qualify for licenses. “As a cable system, FilmOn X is now entitled to the benefits of a compulsory license,” the company says in a status update filed on Wednesday with U.S. District Court Judge Charles Kocoras in the Northern District of Illinois. FilmOn X adds that it has already filed an application with the U.S. Copyright Office for licenses in 14 broadcast markets. FilmOn X, like Aereo, offers consumers the ability to stream television shows to smartphones and other devices via remote antennas. Both companies are embroiled in litigation with broadcast networks, which argue that the startups infringe copyright by transmitting television shows without licenses. All of the lawsuits involving FilmOn X, including the case in front of Kocoras, were placed on hold pending a Supreme Court decision in the first case broadcasters filed -- a lawsuit brought in federal court in New York against Aereo. The Supreme Court recently sided against Aereo in that matter, rejecting the company's argument that it merely offered remote digital antennas. Instead, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that the company infringed copyright by publicly performing television shows.Justice Stephen Breyer said in the majority opinion that Aereo's service resembled the service offered by cable companies, which must obtain licenses to transmit television shows. Aereo and FilmOn X now say that ruling means they are actually “cable systems” and allowed to stream television shows over the Internet, provided that they pay fees to broadcasters. The U.S. Copyright Office said earlier this week that it disagrees with that interpretation of the ruling. But the Copyright Office also said its position could change, depending on developments in Congress or the pending lawsuits. The matter before Kocoras dates to last November, when FilmOn X filed a preemptive lawsuit against Window to the World Communications, a Chicago-based PBS station. FilmOn X sought a declaratory judgment that its service was legal. Window to the World then countersued for copyright infringement. Window to the World tells Kocoras that it doesn't believe FilmOn X is entitled to a mandatory license. “The Supreme Court did not hold -- as FilmOn claims -- that Aereo is in fact a cable company, nor did it hold that Aereo is entitled to a compulsory license,” the broadcaster writes in court papers. This story has been updated.
Marin Software has developed a feature it hopes will help marketers create campaigns faster, as product stock data changes in real-time. The feature will change, pause and restart a campaign based on feed data. The move aims to automate, optimize and eliminate errors in campaigns as marketers attempt to manage product feed data across search, social and display channels. Changes have been made to Marin's Dynamic Campaigns platform. The inventory feed management tool integrates with Productsup, a cloud-based data management provider. Through Dynamic Campaigns, retailers align product inventory with information in online ad campaigns, explains Dan Morris, director of product marketing at Marin. Marketers are the new strategists, technologists, and scientists. The future of their business depends on it, but as inventory and product attributes change, retailers often struggle to maintain real-time information in creative ad pieces. Automation helps, and Marin's software allows marketers to set bid goals that vary by product, product category or business unit. For example, if an advertiser experiences a surge in inventory or needs to offload inventory due to seasonality, automatic bid rules are set to increase the promotion of certain products. Marin sets bids in the platform using an algorithm that considers the lifetime value for each product based on audience data collected across channels. Ad creative remains a major part of paid-search campaigns, so a bad or inaccurate ad will affect overall performance. Marin's Dynamic Campaigns platform automates the process, so the creative pieces for the ads have the most current product information. New product versions continually come into stock and marketers must update the ads. The platform will automatically pull the latest information into the ad, rather than require the marketers to pause the ad to make manual changes. This is done for any change in product SKU, price, brand, color, and more. Marketers can design the creative pieces for search ads in advance. When the inventory arrives, the campaigns begin. "Nothing is more frustrating to an online shopper than clicking on an ad only to find out it's out of stock or not the version advertised," Morris said. "Ads are deleted when inventory falls out of stock. It's based on feed data."
Don’t look for major changes among TV consumers with regard to TV equipment anytime soon.New research finds that 83% of adult broadband users are not even familiar with 4K/Ultra-HD TV sets, according to The Diffusion Group.Of those consumers who know about 4K, many are markedly sensitive to the high costs of these advanced sets, which can be priced $1,500 on the low end and up to $10,000 on the high end.At the $999 level for a 4K TV only 10.5% say they are “slightly likely to purchase,” 8.9% “moderately likely” to purchase, and 3.4% “definitely” would purchase. Moving up in price adds even more pressure. At $1,999, only 4% would be slightly likely to purchase, 1.9% moderately, and 1.3% definitely would purchase.Another major reason for those who are not considering the purchase of improved technology -- satisfaction with their current TV technology -- 26% said "they were perfectly comfortable with the televisions they currently use."Other studies note that TV networks/distributors in the U.S. are hardly moving to transmit and/or produce much 4K content -- also factoring in low prospects of high-end TV set sales.The research came from 1,500 online interviews, covering a wide range of media topics including various Internet-enabled video platforms, in-home and mobile/portable devices.
Interpublic Group reported a 5.4% revenue gain in the second quarter to $1.85 billion with organic revenue growth -- which excludes the impact of acquisitions, divestitures and currency fluctuations -- of 4.7%. Organic growth in the U.S. was 2.9%, while growth in other markets averaged 7.1%. Net income in Q2 was up 20% to $103.7 million. For the first half, which IPG CEO Michael Roth said was “very solid overall,” revenue was up nearly 6% with organic growth of 5.6%. Net income nearly tripled to $81.3 million. The company’s financial position, Roth said, is “the best it’s been in years.” Roth said that the company was on target to “exceed” previous full-year guidance that it would achieve organic growth of between 3% and 4%, although it cautioned analysts and investors on a Friday morning earnings call that second-half results would be “tempered” compared to the first half, given some 2013 client losses that the company has to cycle through. In the second quarter, growth included increases across a broad range of client sectors such as retail, health care, financial services, automotive, and food and beverage, Roth reported on the call. In the U.S., second-quarter growth was led by company’s digital specialists such as RG/A and Huge, Mediabrands, McCann and the PR-led Constituency Management Group. Internationally, most regions produced substantive growth -- including the UK region, which had organic growth of 16.4%, while the Latin American region showed 7.4% growth with Asia-Pacific up 4.4%. The one weak spot remains struggling Continental Europe, which posted an organic decline of 1.4%. Results in the region continue to be inconsistent with some countries up (Germany and Spain) and others still in decline (France, Italy). For the first half of the year, Roth said, “growth reflected positive contributions from advertising, digital, marketing services and media … As we have said previously, in addition to revenue growth, cost discipline and margin enhancement are a top priority for this year, and we are executing against that objective.” Asked to comment on the ongoing media consolidation, Roth said it might provide added leverage to media owners and “make it more difficult to negotiate” with them. “But it adds to our value because that’s what we do.” On the programmatic front, Roth described this week’s deal between ABC and Magna as an “experiment” and “not a large” one. Premium inventory, he added, will be the last to go programmatic. But he said that “eventually it will be a part of it. Automation is moving forward and collaboration is the way to do it.”
There is still no word on when Twitter plans to launch its “Buy now” button -- sightings of which have been reported for weeks. In the meantime, the micro-blogging leader is ramping up its ecommerce efforts with the acquisition of CardSpring. Founded in 2011, CardSpring is a payments infrastructure start-up that helps merchants work with publishers to create online-to-offline promotions, according to Nathan Hubbard, Head of Commerce at Twitter. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. With CardSpring’s help, consumers can easily redeem deals they rack up online simply by swiping their credit cards at a physical point of purchase. CardSpring fits nicely into Twitter’s philosophy “regarding the best ways to bring in-the-moment commerce experiences to our users,” Hubbard explained in a blog post this week. Along with such card-linked offers, CardSpring powers CardSpring Connect -- a commerce analytics system connected to merchants' existing in-store point of sale systems. With Connect, businesses can track how their sales are connected to various online promotions. As Hubbard pointed out, Twitter has been steadily building out its ecommerce capabilities. “We’ve already given users the ability to get deals and discounts, surprise someone with a coffee, or even add items to their online shopping cart -- all directly from a Tweet,” he noted. The subject of much speculation and scrutiny, the world continues to wait for the official debut of Twitter’s “Buy now” button. Beating Twitter to the punch, Facebook this week said it has started testing a “Buy” button in news feed ads and page posts. Facebook has also been testing other call-to-action options in ads, including “Sign Up,” “Book Travel” and “Shop Now.”
Rosetta Stone's new, integrated campaign is a big departure from anything the company has done before for at least one big reason: it's about the mission, not the iconic yellow box. The company, which is expanding beyond the language category into areas like cognitive training, and childhood education products — and also away from that yellow box and into a digital product and commerce model — wants Millennials to know that it is purpose driven: learn another language and help make the world smaller and more cooperative, while giving yourself entrance to other cultures. Says Kelly Poling, VP marketing, strategy and operations: "What most marketers recognize is that this is a highly lucrative population, and 50% of Millennials worldwide are under 30; by 2018 they will have more spending power than any in history. And we have always known we have a really good product for them; this audience over-indexes for travel and for its global outlook." She adds that Millennials also represent 70% of all spend on language learning, "so we saw an opportunity to launch a campaign that did a better job of telling our story." The effort, via Chicago-based Energy BBDO, includes TV, print components, and radio. But the majority of media spend is digital with a heavy social media component, as well as mobile, online video and, obviously, search and display. The highlight of the digital side of the effort is via a partnership with Vice, which has developed online video webisodes to air both on the Vice distribution network and also on Rosetta Stone's own online channels. The videos, developed with Energy BBDO, comprise four vignettes following four real people learning a language with Rosetta Stone, then taking a trip to another country where that language is spoken, and using the language to continue learning. The end product is between eight and twelve minutes long, per Poling. Jonathan Linder, VP creative director at Energy BBDO, tells Marketing Daily that the agency worked with Vice around casting and conceptualization, "and they went and produced it. They really did their own thing." The first online video, which aired on Vice this week, features a Millennial learner and soccer fan. He uses Rosetta Stone to learn German, and then heads to Germany, where we follow his experiences interacting with Germans and watching the team in the World Cup. "And that was extremely serendipitous for us, obviously," says Poling. "Watching him use Rosetta Stone and seeing how it facilitates a better experience is very authentic, and the pinnacle is his going to the game and hanging out with the German 'hooligans'; it shows how Rosetta Stone facilitates real human connections." The TV spot focuses on how people who learn new languages are able to share experiences with people from other places, and that "if everyone learned just one more language, the world would be a more tolerant place, a happier place. In short, a smaller place." Tag: "Create a Smaller World." The TV buy is with channels that the company hasn't focused on historically: ESPN, FX, MTV, VH1, and channels like Adult Swim, and Comedy Central. "We'll be in a number of places where you imagine Millennials spend time, But we are doing the majority of media online," says Poling. She tells Marketing Daily that the creative, around the smaller-world theme, "is really less a tagline and more of us to trying to do a better job of articulating who we are as a brand," says Poling. "Ultimately, we believe that we want to make the world a smaller and smarter, and a more creative and collaborative place. That's at the core of company." She adds that the effort signals more broadly that it's a new day at Rosetta Stone. "We aren't just the iconic yellow boxes at the airport kiosk. We are heavily digitally focused now: the majority of our sales are through digital products versus that yellow box," she says. "So we want talk about how innovative our products are; that, for example we have 33 apps in the App Store right now." Linder says the agency came up with the backbone of the idea around "Imagine the world in which everyone learned just one more language" (the opening line of the TV spot), and that it was a question that would become the guiding principle for the campaign. "It helped inspire all of the pieces of the campaign," he says.
Some 57% of the buying process -- marketing's territory -- gets done before customers interact with sales. Search, social and other online media continue to force the shift. The change requires marketing and sales teams to work more closely together to understand how changes in the buying funnel impact their respective teams, per a study from SAP and Harvard Business Review Analytic Service. Marketers need to work with sales teams to help them learn how to penetrate the sales process that happens without them, said Johann Wrede, customer engagement solutions, global senior director of solution marketing at SAP. "Salespeople need to be more active on social media, but in a non-salesy kind of way," he said. "They need to participate in LinkedIn groups or have a blog. These are marketing skills." The model aims to help sales and marketing gain insight, collaborate with "empowered" online consumers, and understand the individual buyer, especially when it comes to business-to-business transactions. The change begins with moving from a customer relationship management strategy to customer engagement, as consumers bounce through non-linear buying processes. "CRM is a dated approach," Wrede said. "It's easy to integrate the technology, but much more difficult to create strategies that change the culture of a business." The study aims to help companies transition from CRM to CE. "Winning at Sales in a Buyer-Empowered World" focuses on sales organizations, but hidden in the context are key ideas affecting marketing departments in the same way such as "65% of sales organizations say rising customer expectations are their number one challenge" and "37% of businesses expect revenue increases when applying analytics best practices to sales." One thing is certain -- marketing and sales need to work more closely to understand how changes in the buying funnel impact their respective teams. Wrede said changes that impact sales teams also impact marketers. "Customer expectations increases impact teams, as do competition, product lines and tools like big data, mobility and predictive insights," he said. "Sales and marketing are beginning to converge. Sales teams need more marketing skills and marketing teams need more sales skills." Since customers are now in control of the funnel, there's no line that signals when it's time for marketers to hand the job to sales.
The following is a transcription of a telephone call September 26, 2014 between William J. Baer, assistant attorney general, Antitrust Division, U.S. Department of Justice and Brian Roberts, CEO of Comcast. The subject is the proposed $46 billion merger between Comcast and Time Warner Cable. ROBERTS: You’re speaking to Brian. This call may be recorded for quality purposes. How can I assist you today? BAER: Mr. Roberts, Bill Baer calling from Justice. Just wanted to give you a heads up about our antitrust review of your merger. We have nothing in writing to show you yet, but this is unofficial notification of our recommendation to the Attorney General. We’re just not going to let this go through. ROBERTS: Help me understand this, okay? Why would you not let the nation’s largest cable provider be even larger? Why wouldn’t you want the Number 1 rated internet service to be even Number 1-erer? BAER: Well, Number 1-erishness goes to exactly our concerns. We’re nervous, of course, about undue leverage over cable customers and content providers. But it’s the broadband concentration that most concerns us. It would be 40% of our nation’s economy, 40% of our communications, 40% of our entertainment, 40% of our information -- in essence, 40% of our entire society would go through your pipes. That’s more concentration than we are comfortable with. ROBERTS: Why wouldn’t you want that going through the fastest network, the Number 1 network? BAER: Well, I’m just telling you we don’t want one gigantic company to control… ROBERTS: You know, we’ve been a U.S. company for 51 years. It’s been going great for you, okay? I’m just trying to understand why you’d suddenly want us to stop growing, okay? BAER: I’m just calling you to inform you that the merger will not go through. ROBERTS: I’m trying to help you, okay? BAER: How does it help me for you to argue with me when I’m simply giving you the courtesy of a call about our decision? ROBERTS: It sounds like you don’t want to go over this information with me. BAER: No, I just have gone over the information. ROBERTS: Will you approve the AT&T- DirecTV merger? BAER: I’m declining to state. Can you go to the next question? ROBERTS: If you so hate “concentration,” okay -- will you disapprove their merger? BAER: I’m declining to state. Please go to the next question. ROBERTS: You don’t want good service? You don’t want something that works? BAER: Do you understand that the decision is made? ROBERTS: My job is to help you understand why you should approve this merger. BAER: Do you understand that the decision is made? Yes or no? ROBERTS: You sound like you feel that I’m try to argue with you. BAER: Do you understand that the decision is made? Yes or no? ROBERTS: If that’s really what you want to do, please visit one of our stores and return 20 million Time Warner modems. BAER: I’m not going to visit one of your stores. ROBERTS: Okay, I want to thank you for being a great part of the Oppressive Regulatory State. Thank you very much. Have a great day.
Creating brand magic is no longer an elusive alchemy. Two top SapientNitro executives, Gaston Legorburu, Worldwide Chief Creative Officer and Darren McColl, Global Chief Brand Strategy Officer, think they’ve cracked the code. Their recent book, “Storyscaping: Stop Creating Ads, Start Creating Worlds,” details how marketers are moving from storytelling to storyscaping. In short, they’ve gone from using pictures and words to crafting engaging experiences that encourage consumers to becoming part of the brand story. Citing clever campaigns to prove the success of storyscaping, the authors offer a 21st-century approach to advertising and marketing they believe will solidify that crucial emotional link between brands and buyers. In creative terms, think of Storyscaping like a 3D film. It provides enhanced depth perception and a greater immersive experience. Storyscaping steps out of the two-dimensional world by creating the opportunity for authentic interactions between a brand and a consumer. Legorburu and McColl recognize that building stories around brands is becoming obsolete. Getting a message through clutter? Old school. Storyscaping provides key strategies to get consumers to buy — and care — about a brand. They lay out a blueprint: Develop an organizing idea, define a brand’s purpose and learn to target a core audience. That way, a company can secure an immersive storyscape experience to harness consumer loyalty on and offline. To demonstrate the power of storyscaping, the duo point to the X Games, ESPN’s rapidly expanding online action sports network. X Game’s Storyscaping was built around the Organizing Idea, which boiled down to two words: “activate awesome.” That was a result of gaining insight into Brand Purpose (“bring new and go huge”); product offer (expanding content, new events and activities); and customer behavior (“avid” fans and “two-way players”). As ESPN mapped out the engagement landscape around the X Game, it ensured events were more connected to the fans cross-platform. The viewing experience itself connected two separate audiences — fans present at the event with those watching from at home through The HypeMeter, a real-time interactive engine. Trick Track, a second screen feature, provided real-time statistics and results – which gave fans a chance to engage anywhere. “Activating awesome” has become the core of new immersive world, bringing together fans at home and at a live event – across social content, broadcast and action — in one space. The app has held first place in the iTunes for 12 days, and over the year, digital engagement measures skyrocketed 100% or more. Another brilliant example of storyscaping is Vail Resort, the ski resort collection. The Organizing Idea (“Unleash the Mountain”) was to build a world originating on the slopes, and kept alive long after guests left the resort via smartphones. Pro photographers captured high-quality images (EpicMix), which were automatically uploaded to guest accounts for free via the embedded chip in their lift passes. EpicMix Racing allowed guests to compete against their friends or Olympic Medalists while viewing and sharing their accomplishments on any device or platform. As a result, Storyscaping has helped Vail Resort gain 500,000 members, and 180 million social post impressions. “Storyscape,” a smart, helpful guide for marketers, insists it’s no longer just about ads and storytelling or 360-degree marketing. It is about applying Systems Thinking to creating a brand’s Story System, where each individual narrative is connected by a “comma” and becomes part of cohesive and engaging journey for the consumers. Who wants to argue with success?Storyscaping: Stop Creating Ads, Start Creating Worlds; Wiley; 256 pages