Rare are those TV efforts that intend to start up new traditional television networks these days -- but ABC News and Univision News plan to achieve this with a new English-language news channel targeting bilingual Hispanic-Americans.The two media organizations did not disclose a name for the network or details such as distribution, but did say they plan to launch a Web site, mobile and social media content this summer -- and that the TV channel will debut in 2013.Citing soaring growth among Hispanic-Americans -- now 16% of the U.S. population (50 million) and headed to 30% in 2050 -- the news network will focus on the issues that are most relevant for U.S. Hispanics, including the economy, jobs, health care, immigration, education, politics, entertainment, health and wellness."Our powerful premier news brand, combined with the world’s leading Hispanic media company, will create the nation’s first news and lifestyle channel targeted to this quickly expanding and important community,” said Anne Sweeney, co-chair, Disney Media Networks and president, Disney/ABC Television Group, in a release.Cesar Conde, president, Univision Networks, said: “This alliance combines the expertise and brand strength of Univision News with ABC News’ leadership and is another example of Univision’s commitment to serving and empowering Hispanic America while connecting all audiences to Latino issues.”The ABC/Univision alliance touts a strong business/advertising environment -- that Hispanics have considerable spending power of over $1 trillion, and an increasing impact on social, economic and political trends.ABC and Univision plan to announce a management team this summer. The network will use news-gathering and production resources of ABC News and Univision News.
Subscription TV -- which accounts for 90% of all U.S. TV homes -- will continue to grow in total revenue in the coming years, largely as a result of consumers adding programming and services to their cable, satellite and telco video packages -- not adding more subscribers. The Cambridge, Mass. market researcher Pyramid Research says pay-TV revenue in North America is expected to grow by 25% in five years to $125 billion. The research company says all this comes despite a declining number of cable and other TV distribution pay TV subscribers. Pyramid says the total pay TV market was $99 billion at the end of 2011. Nielsen recently noted there were 103.5 million cable, satellite, and telco subscribers in the U.S. at the end of 2011. At the end of 2010 there were 105 million. This decline was mostly due to a decrease in cable subscribers -– down 5% to 60.5 million. Telco subscribers were up, while satellite subscribers were flat. Recent earning reports from the big cable TV operators -- Comcast, Time Warner, and Cablevision Systems among them -- all continue to tout a higher monthly average price tag per subscriber, a trend that has continued for a number of years. Cablevision Systems, for example, in its most recent earnings report says that its video customers' monthly average price tag grew almost 2% to $152.53 a month. Cable system operators continue to gain revenues with new digital equipment/services and higher-priced add-on pay TV movie and sports networks.
Looking to push more family-friendly prime-time TV programming, a key group of advertisers that are members of the Association of National Advertisers is starting up a print advertising campaign this month to coincide with the TV network upfront presentations. The group, Alliance for Family Entertainment, backed by 23 major advertisers, will run a print ad “open letter” that states: “high quality, relevant family TV shows are proven winners with viewers, advertisers and the networks.” If networks commit to those shows, AFE members will support those series with advertising dollars. The AFE group has been around in one form or another since 1998 -– initially as the Family Friendly Programming Forum. It has grown to the point where its 23 members' media spending contribute 30% of all TV advertising dollars. The print ad will run in The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Advertising Age and Variety. Through the years, the AFE has tried different financing and script support to foster family programming. It has had a hand in starting up more than 20 prime-time TV shows such as “Gilmore Girls,” “Everybody Hates Chris” and “Friday Night Lights.” “There’s no better time than the upfront, when all eyes are on what’s in the pipeline, to remind broadcast network chiefs and show creators the power of modern family programming,” explains Bob Liodice, president and chief executive officer of the ANA, in a release.
CBS is trying to establish a social media locus for conversation and interaction related to its programming across all dayparts as networks look to establish second-screen applications. “CBS Connect” looks to aggregate tweets and Facebook updates for programs ranging from “Price Is Right” to “Person of Interest.” Skype is the sponsor of the hub as group video conversation opportunities are available. Ipad, iPhone and Android users will be able to use a mobile version of CBS.com/connect. The site also looks to facilitate live chats with CBS stars and other talent, where questions can be submitted via Facebook and Twitter. A live chat with “Survivor” Jeff Probst is scheduled for May 9. Another is on tap during the East Coast season finale episode of “NCIS: Los Angeles” on May 15. CBS has looked to use social media as a venue for fan-talent interaction during tweet and social sweeps weeks. Marc DeBevoise, a senior vice president at CBS Interactive, stated: “Instead of continuing to confine our social initiatives to special event weeks, we wanted to recognize and take advantage of the fact that every CBS program is an ongoing social experience.”
It’s iced tea season, and Lipton, perhaps the best-known brand among tea makers in the U.S., has teamed up with country artist Lady Antebellum for a new marketing campaign that attempts to leverage the positivity of the band’s persona with that of the drink. The campaign, which marks a coming together of Unilever (Lipton’s parent company) and the Pepsi Lipton Partnership (which distributes ready-to-drink teas under the Lipton brand), is the largest advertising undertaking Lipton has seen in several years, according to a company representative. (She declined to give numbers, but said spending would be double the outlay of last year.) The Lady Antebellum spots promote both the ready-to-drink tea as well as a new Tea & Honey to-go powder. In one commercial for the ready-to-drink tea, the band is shown backstage preparing to appear in front of a “hot” crowd. As they drink a bottle of Lipton iced tea, their bodies fill with silhouettes of water, tea leaves and sunshine. “When you put goodness inside, you can’t help but shine on the outside,” says a voiceover. A second commercial, for the Tea & Honey to-go powder, depicts the band delayed by a broken down tour bus on a hot day. After drinking a glass of instant iced tea, the band heads to a park for an impromptu performance. Both spots end with the tagline “Drink positive,” which is intended to express the spirit of both the brand and the band. “Lipton and Lady Antebellum share a positive and approachable style, and we’re excited to bring the ‘Drink Positive’ spirit to life—together—in a big way this year,” said Marc Hanson, an executive with the Lipton Pepsi Partnership, in a statement e-mailed to Marketing Daily. In addition to the commercials (which will each run in 15- and 30-second versions), the group will appear in a series of behind-the-scenes tour webisodes. In the videos (a first for the band), the group engages in a series of challenges to determine which band member knows the others the best. The campaign also includes print, radio, digital and retail elements as well as a Facebook sweepstakes that will offer fans a chance to meet the group in Nashville and win live music downloads. Lipton is also supporting the band’s benefit concert for Henryville, Ind., a community hit by devastating tornadoes last month. Lipton will match every $1 donation received through the cause’s Web site, www.rebuildinghenryville.com, up to $50,000.
The show isn’t on the air yet. Yet there are protests in anticipation of Howard Stern’s stint as a judge on NBC’s top-rated summer show, “America’s Got Talent.” If you are an NBC executive, you might say privately, “Thank you!” Marketing-wise, this is a plus for NBC, which has already been touting the show. One print ad shows other judges Sharon Osbourne and Howie Mandel covering Stern’s mouth. A TV promo shows the judges driving around with prospective talent being sucked onto the car like a magnet as it’s being driven. One group says Stern is associated with a "decades-long penchant for profanity." Mind you, did Stern offer profanity on other TV appearances he has made -- like on late-night shows and on PBS? Yes, he’s regularly on CBS’ “Late Show with David Letterman,” NBC’s “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” and even PBS’ “Charlie Rose.” Did you hear him speak profanely then? Hmm… I’m sure we would have heard about it. Big time. Stern is a smart guy and, more importantly, knows what his TV persona is. Stern will be tough and direct. But we have seen other judges do the exact same thing, like perhaps one Simon Cowell. It was Cowell who hired Stern to be a judge on “America’s Got Talent,” which he produces. NBC expects many more viewers due to Stern -- but perhaps not those you mighr expect. NBC says research has shown the show could grow its young women viewers. One pressure group, the one that would tell you some parents in the U.S. are on their side, is sending warnings that this “family” show – “America’s Got Talent” -- could take a turn for the worse. It warned some 91 companies who have advertised on the show in the past that they’ll be wasting their media dollars. Protest and boycotting before anything happens? If we could pre-arrest all possible criminals, many people would be happy. The movie “Minority Report” worked for some.
Unless you don’t believe Nielsen -- and there are people in this camp -- 98% of premium video viewing remained on traditional TV as of the fourth quarter 2011, all after many years of growing digital video platforms. Factor in that 98% number with another interesting number: 90.4% of U.S. TV homes – 103.5 million households -- get their TV via cable, satellite or telco operators, and 11 million over-the-air. By this account, all the efforts to make TV Everywhere are already being paid for upfront. The owners of the TV Everywhere initiatives -- TV content owners and their traditional video distributors -- say all this will come at no cost to the consumer. Still, 11 million or so homes will suffer. Around half of those homes -- 5 million -- have broadband and will continue to scope the still-free areas of Hulu, YouTube and other places for a hodgepodge of premium video from those programmers who don’t want to entirely shut out potentially paying customers down the line. But the big question is: Will this seemingly no-cost TV Everywhere price tag stay the same down the road? My guess: Nope. Once cable companies and others saturate their coffers from digital and voice service revenue in the coming years, they’ll need something else to boost earnings. Cable operators and the rest will tell you TV Everywhere is an enhancement – that they want to give consumers more access to the programming that most are already paying for. That’s very philanthropic of them. Were they holding back stuff in the past? Sure, if you weren’t already a subscriber to HBO or premium sports cable networks, you weren’t expecting to get that programming for free on digital platforms, were you? Shifts in those existing subscription TV services look like this: In 2011, U.S. cable operators slipped 1.5%, going to 60.5 million subscribers; satellite providers were flat at 34.5 million; telecos rose 15%, landing at 8.5 million. Right now, over-the-air TV homes are making some shifts in looking to use broadband as a complement -- but that’s from a small base. Broadcast-only homes with broadband homes grew 14% -- 631,000, to 5.1 million. Still, this isn’t what would be called “scale” -- in other words, anything that would result in big media revenues. For that, focus on two numbers mentioned earlier – 98% and 90.4%. That will tell you much about current business intentions.
Once a quarter, Nielsen takes a break from ruining the mood of TV executives who can’t understand why their shows don’t get higher ratings, and delivers the calming message that all is generally OK in the TV industry. Last week was no different. Nielsen’s Cross Platform Report for the fourth quarter of 2011 showed once again that for all the hyperventilating about Hulu, Netflix, Rokku, Apple TV, Blu-ray players, iPads, smartphones and other potential TV-busting devices, television viewing habits remain largely unchanged. As someone who formerly helped prepare this report, I know that it’s almost impossible to find something new to say about these results, which largely remain the same quarter to quarter, and even year to year. Oh, device penetration evolves and there are occasional movements within demographics, but the fundamental fact is the same every quarter: People watch a ginormous amount of television. Once again the report tells us that the average American watches nearly five hours of television a day, 98% of which is consumed on a traditional television. And with Americans still gobbling up HD television sets (eight million more homes have them than the year before), TV viewing numbers will probably stay high for the foreseeable future. After all, why buy an HDTV if you’re not going to watch it? To the extent that there are any surprises, it’s that there are no surprises. It’s remarkably hard to change the habits of the American TV viewer. Even now, more than ten years after the introduction of the DVR, only 8% of TV viewing is timeshifted (and about half of that is watched the same day it’s recorded.) And even four years after the launch of Hulu and other online services, Internet viewing represents only 2% of all video consumed. If there is a Trojan horse in the American living room, it could be the once-lowly game console, which gives viewers easy access to movies, television shows and other online content. Given that there are now more consoles than DVRs in the average home, it’s not surprising that viewers spent 30% more time on consoles in Q4 2011 than during the same period in 2010. Nielsen reports that the number of people viewing video on smartphones is up 36% over last year. But even so, total viewing remains miniscule, with the average American watching only eight minutes of video on a smartphone per month. This number will probably never be very big because of the unsatisfactory experience of watching television on such a small screen. Tablet viewing, on the other hand, will be a different story. The number of iPads now in circulation is relatively small compared to television usage, but tablet viewing, with its high quality and convenience, will grow as penetration increases. One Nielsen finding that generated a fair amount of news media attention was the small decrease in total video viewing. This decline -- about a minute and a half per day -- could be a statistical rounding error, or it could mean that the engorgement of the American home with new video platforms devices has finally made a dent in the viewing of traditional television. To better understand this trend, if there is one, we would need to look more closely at year-over-year demographic behavior, which Nielsen does not include in the report. The dirty little secret behind the steady decades-long rise in total television viewing is that it’s been driven in part by the aging of the population. Each year another cohort of Baby Boomers ages into the 65+ demographic, where the average viewer watches 47 hours of television per week. It would be particularly interesting to know what’s going on with the 18-34 demographic. This is the group most attuned to new technologies and most apt to cut the cord with their local cable or satellite provider. If their viewing shows a decline, this could be a long-term worrisome trend for the television industry. But even if 18 to 34 year olds are disinclined to watch ad-supported television the traditional way, two things have to be in place for them to move to other platforms: 1) watching television over the Internet has to be as easy to watch as tuning into a regular television; and 2) there needs to be as much content online as there is on traditional television. As it turns out, watching television online can be very simple. MLB.TV and Netflix are both easily accessible with the right device, but the content is still limited. Yes, it’s possible to cobble together an evening of Internet television (particularly if you’re willing to do it illegally) but who wants to be monkeying around with URLs and PayPal accounts when you can just turn on a regular TV to get your daily five-hour-a-day fix of television? So until more content is available online, we can expect the Cross Platform Report to be valuable, but not that ground-breaking. Which should be a relief to the television industry.