For some, the second-quarter TV scatter market is always a barometer of how the upfront TV market -- for the TV season to follow -- will perform. Now, a new research report confirms that assumption. Standard Media Index, a company that compiles actual TV and media-buying data from media agencies representing 75% of the market, says that both broadcast and cable networks took a hit in scatter volume during the second quarter of this year. Broadcast networks sank 7% to $457 million and cable networks dropped 4% to $860 million, according to SMI. These declines for broadcast and cable networks for the just-completed upfront TV market were in line with a number of other estimates from TV research and media companies. SMI also notes that in the first quarter of 2014, the scatter market for cable networks pulled in $688 million -- a 5.7% decline from the same period in 2013. Broadcast networks witnessed a 2.6% increase to $530 million. James Fennessy, chief commercial officer of SMI, says a key first-quarter result for broadcast was due to NBC’s strong Olympic performance. SMI also notes digital video revenues in the second-quarter 2014 totaled $720 million -- up 13% from the same period a year ago. In addition, national TV syndication pulled in $48 million in first-quarter 2014 scatter and $68 million in second-quarter scatter money. The three biggest growth categories in the second-quarter 2014 scatter market were pharmaceuticals, up 90.6% versus second-quarter 2013; entertainment, 49.1% higher; and food/produce/dairy, with a gain of 24.8%, per SMI. Much of the gain for pharmaceuticals, says Fennessy, was driven by Obamacare. Categories that declined included computers/software marketers, down 47.7%; consumer electronics, off 43.9%; and travel/tourism, down 21.9%. Looking at the best-performing TV networks -- cable or broadcast -- Univision had the best second-quarter growth, up 18.3%, with ESPN, next at 13.98%. Fennessy says Univision and ESPN gained from the strong World Cup performance. Scripps was the third-best, up 2.6% versus the second quarter of 2013.
Scripps Networks Interactive says it booked $1 billion in upfront advertising for the third year in a row -- despite holding back some ad inventory. Scripps -- the cable network group of Food Network, HGTV, and Cooking Channel -- says it posted mid-single cost per thousand price increases during the upfront selling period. Many TV networks held back some advertising inventory for the just-completed upfront selling period, and Scripps Network did the same. “We did hold back a little inventory. But we are always in a range. We still did pretty well,” says Burton Jablin, president of Scripps Networks, in an earnings call with analysts. As with other TV network group executives, Jablin’s assessment was that “a little bit has gone to digital. Advertisers are also holding back for the calendar year and in the scatter market.” For its second-quarter earnings reporting period, Scripps Networks said it had a 6.5% gain in advertising revenue of $486 million and a 4.1% gain in affiliate revenue of $188 million. Scripps also witnessed international revenues gain of 15% to $20.4 million. Overall revenue climbed 6.5% to $708 million. Net income was down 2.2% to $205 million. Scripps Networks Interactive was down 4.6% to $78.21 in mid-day trading.
Pushing its three key kids networks to higher revenue levels -- Nickelodeon, Nicktoons and TeenNick -- the Nickelodeon group of networks posted single-digit percentage revenue volume gains this kids upfront TV season. “Going in the market, we were in a good position,” says Jim Perry, head of advertising sales for Nickelodeon Group, with ratings overall higher by single digits -- especially higher viewership in Nicktoons and TeenNick. “We finished with volume up and pricing up and led the market in both areas,” says Perry, around single-digit percentage gains in each area. Perry estimates the overall kids market at around $750 million, down a bit overall from a year ago. He says Nickelodeon picked up share from its competitors. Estimates are that Nickelodeon networks collectively have a 60% share kids TV 2-11 viewing. In particular, Nickelodeon was looking to improve the price performance of its faster-growing networks -- Nicktoons and TeenNick, looking to package those networks in with the big Nickelodeon. In the first quarter, Nicktoons total day viewership climbed 6% to 180,000 average viewers; and then moved up to average 202,000 in the second quarter. TeenNick was up 85% to 211,000 in the first quarter, then grew to 254,000 in the second quarter. Nickelodeon slipped 3% to 1.802 million viewers in the first quarter, and then declined to 1.6 million in the second quarter. The aim was to package those networks because of their complementary audiences -- younger to older, ages 2-14. The effort was to “keep the viewer in the Nickelodeon ecosystem,” says Perry. One kids media-buying executive said there was some big sticker price shock at Nickelodeon’s upfront pricing. “They were trying to sell all three at the same price” -- which the buyer says resulted in a 15% to 20% overall cost-per-thousand viewer price increases in package deals when factoring in Nickelodeon, TeenNick and NickToons. “It was an education process, and there was a variety of responses,” says Perry, who declined to reveal pricing specifics. “But we ended up in the great place.” Perry insists there was overall reach and frequency, as well as CPM benefits for those TV marketers who bought in. Some of the growing categories, he said, included movie studios and retailers. Toys and movies marketers remain two of the biggest kids TV advertising categories, says Perry. After that comes consumer packaged goods. Food marketers remained a depressed category, says Perry, down from a year ago -- no longer major kids TV advertisers. A new growing category is wireless services/consumer electronic products and general electronic retailers targeted at kids TV viewers. Concerning Nickelodeon’s main competitor, Turner’s Cartoon Network, one executive close to the company said with its reduction in its programming hours -- due to expansion of Adult Swim -- it wrote some high single-digit CPM increases among its TV advertisers in the key 10 weeks of the pre-fourth-quarter holiday period. There were also high single-digit price increases in the pre-Easter and back to school fall periods. Executives also believe Cartoon Network overall upfront revenue volume declined year-to-year partly as a result of its programming schedule contraction. Total gross ratings points for Cartoon Network were 18% versus the year before.
Marketing tech company Unruly, which has a focus on social video, on Thursday announced that it has partnered with Nielsen to bring the Nielsen Online Campaign Ratings (OCR) to its ad platform. The ratings allow advertisers to target specific audiences via online video ads. “With three-quarters of video views happening outside of YouTube, it’s more important than ever to reach audiences where they are watching and sharing videos,” stated Richard Kosinski, president of Unruly U.S. “And now with Unruly and Nielsen OCR, advertisers can be assured that their social video ads were not just viewed, but were also seen by their desired audience within Nielsen’s dataset. “Advertisers continue to struggle to keep pace with the evolving landscape associated with programmatic exchanges. Nielsen OCR provides clients with a deeper understanding of where their ads are being watched,” he added. Advertisers will be able to buy in-stream pre-roll video ads via Unruly against the Nielsen OCRs.
As part of a campaign to build awareness of its new recipe with more fruit filling, Pillsbury Toaster Strudel has partnered with Halfbrick, the makers of the popular video game app Fruit Ninja. The "More Fruit" campaign, designed to reach moms and Millennials, also includes an integration on the Food Network's "Rachael vs. Guy: Kids Cook-Off," a national TV spot, and digital and social media elements. With Fruit Ninja — a game in which the player tries to virtually slice fruit images thrown onto the screen — Toaster Strudel is sponsoring in-app challenges, and videos with flying fruit that will play after each completed mission. Players will also be rewarded with Toaster Strudel coupons and other Fruit Ninja incentives. The sponsored in-app experiences launch Aug. 7. In addition, the brand will host Fruit Ninja's first live "spectacle," at The Grove in Los Angeles, on Aug. 13. At the event, Guinness record-holding swordsman Isao Machii will slice fruit tossed his way by attendees, who will also be able to sample Toaster Strudel, play Fruit Ninja Kinect and pose for photos. Prior to the event, Fruit Ninja players will be offered a teaser video featuring Machii. To promote attendance, those in the L.A. area will see a teaser that includes details about the event. Toaster Strudel will also do outreach to L.A.-based bloggers. Post-event, game players will be offered a highlights video. Pillsbury Toaster Strudel, launched in 1985, "is constantly listening to consumers, and they told us that they wanted more fruit in the filling" without changing the product's taste, Polly Madsen, the brand's marketing manager, tells Marketing Daily. The partnership with Fruit Ninja, a favorite of both moms and Millennials, is an example of "engaging with our fans where they already live and play," Madsen says. She cites gaming industry research showing that 75% of moms play video games, and that gaming creates a bonding experience for families. According to stats cited by Fruit Ninja, the game is the second-most-downloaded app of all time (500 million downloads since its launch in 2010), and is played by 70 million monthly active users. The format for Toaster Strudel's integration on the Food Network's "Rachael vs. Guy: Kids Cook-Off," which is starting its second season this month, are short vignettes featuring teens being challenged to create recipes with Toaster Strudel and real fruit. The vignettes (which have both 60-second and 30-second versions) will first air during reruns of episodes from the show's first season on the Cooking Channel on Aug. 16, and during the Food Network's Season 1 marathon onAug. 17. Vignettes will then be integrated in the prim-etime Season 2 premiere on Aug. 17. They will receive additional exposure on the network during August and September, including during three encore airings of the Season 2 premiere. The vignettes will be promoted on Pillsbury and Toaster Strudel-specific social media, including the brand's Facebook page. The brand's Food Network partnership also includes an online sweepstakes with a grand prize of a trip to New York to visit the Food Network headquarters and get a cooking demo, and an insert in Food Network Magazine featuring breakfast recipes made with the pastries and fruit. The partnership will be promoted on digital and social media by Toaster Strudel, in addition to Food Network Channel promotions. Toaster Strudel's new "Made with More Fruit" 15-second television ad launched Aug. 4, and will air nationally across networks and cable through the beginning of November, reports Madsen. The "More Fruit" campaign will include paid digital advertising, primarily banner formats, running through the end of October. Olson is the lead creative agency on the Fruit Ninja partnership. The brand worked with Saatchi, Bromley and Zenith on the overall “More Fruit” campaign.
In its first-ever TV advertising outside the relatively nearby San Francisco DMA, the North Lake Tahoe Marketing Cooperative is targeting San Diego. The campaign was created by San Francisco-based School of Thought. It is important for destinations to diversify their market base, said Andy Chapman, chief marketing officer, North Lake Tahoe Marketing Cooperative. “The north California/Bay Area will always be an important part of our visitor mix, but San Diego and the entire Southern California marketplace is a primary destination market for our efforts,” Chapman says. The biggest challenge is the world-class outdoor recreation that San Diegans already have at their doorstep. “San Diego is a great market for North Lake Tahoe,” Chapman tells Marketing Daily. “San Diegans are very much into the outdoors and recreation is an important part of their daily lives.” Three understated 30-second TV spots let the scenery be the star. One commercial opens to close-up visuals of a sandy beach and stand-up paddleboards. Another shows mountain bikes zipping through a challenging off-road course. A third shows the simple joy of jumping off a dock. The spots quickly segue to what Lake Tahoe has that San Diego does not: Wide-open, uncrowded space. The tagline is “Another reason to make it a real summer.” The effort targets ages 25–55 “unplugged”-type adventure seekers. “One of the challenges we have when promoting North Lake Tahoe to San Diegans is the abundance of other vacation options available to them,” Chapman says. “From staycations on their local beaches to quick getaways up the coast. However, there is a great affinity between San Diegans and the Lake Tahoe region from both a summer and winter perspective.” The production schedule was difficult. As a public/private entity, the North Lake Tahoe Marketing Cooperative’s budgets are not determined until late June. Summer advertising needs to begin in July. The entire campaign was done in 7 days, from location scouting to three final spots, with the agency doubling as production company. The spots will run during prime time on 17 cable networks including Discovery, Travel Channel, CW, Food Network, Bravo, both as 30-second spots and as 15-second cut-downs. An additional radio spot will air on Top 40, classic rock, and variety format Clear Channel stations. (All San Diego DMA only.) The North Lake Tahoe Marketing Cooperative, based in Tahoe City, Calif., is a marketing partnership between the North Lake Tahoe Resort Association and the Incline Village Crystal Bay Visitors Bureau, designed to promote the entire North Lake Tahoe region, California and Nevada, under one advertising umbrella. gotahoenorth.com
Honda likes to flip the typically mundane summer sell-down (otherwise known as summer clearance) campaign template on its head. Instead of the usual "parade 'o cars" tier 2 TV ads, the automaker has been doing offbeat social media campaigns inviting consumer participation to get people to dealerships for deals. Last summer, for instance, Honda touted summer sales with real-time offbeat videos based on consumer tweets. This time it's about “Cheerance” where, in addition to traditional media executions, Honda is launching a social flotilla of humorous videos, off-beat installations, GIFs, events and a partnership with YouTube celeb du jour, Andrew Hales. All of it is around the idea of creating unexpected cheer -- something everyone probably needs right now, assuming world peace and a cure for ebola doesn't happen in the next 24 hours. The campaign running this week, launched with an introduction video that sets up the scheme. The content is tagged with a Honda Summer Clearance Event call to action. Hales is promoting the program with two videos on his own channel LAHWF YouTube channel, where he dances with strangers, among other things. The video content includes candid-camera type footage of unsuspecting people getting cheered in a couple of ways: they might encounter piñatas at various locations, and Honda has a “Stand Here for Cheer” box in busy areas. A person who stands in the painted box gets a surprise, but a good one. Honda says it might involve, for example, a sax player serenade. Honda also showed up at a beach with a “Cheer Detector” that “found” a buried treasure chest whose contents were shared with onlookers. Honda is also partnering with Pandora, which is running a custom "Cheerance" pop music playlist. Honda is also running radio ads in top DMA's, including drive-time radio segments featuring comedian Steve Simeone, who voices two 60-second, custom-made “Summer Cheerance” comedy bits during commercial breaks. Honda's campaign Web site is hosting the candid guerrilla video grabs of Honda’s impromptu cheer happenings. “Summer Cheerance” pre-roll appears before humorous videos on social channels. Banner ads are running on sites like as Cars.com, KBB.com and Edmunds.com and Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Honda says it is also running "Summer Cheerance" pre-roll creative before humorous videos sites like YouTube. Print ads are in People, Sports Illustrated and local newspapers in top DMAs. Network radio spots will also air during the event. But no self-respecting clearance campaign would be without at least some TV. Honda's Summer Clearance Sales Event has six spots including Spanish-language versions referencing last year’s Vine video campaign by responding to tweets, and offering a solution: a new car. Honda says network placements for the TV spots will be on “The Bachelorette,” “New Girl,” “24” and “MasterChef” and on national cable networks such as Bravo, Discovery, TBS and HGTV. Honda is also using the effort to support a cause with which Honda motorcycles and the Honda riders club has had an association with over the years, the Pediatric Brain Tumor Foundation, to which the automaker will donate $100,000, but only if the automaker reaches a goal of cheering up three million people by week’s end. The Web site has a counter keeping a running tally.
Spoiler alert: adorable cat in business suit appears in this ad. NJ-based Affinity Federal Credit Union wants to rid the world of fat-cat bankers, and playing the role of said fat cat is... an adorable fat cat. Two bankers pitch their fat-cat boss on the reasons why customer satisfaction decreases yearly. The fat cat interjects, explaining the reason he entered the banking business: to make money to spend on supreme cat houses, an endless supply of catnip and a trophy cat. Affinity Federal Credit Union encourages consumers to explore alternate banking needs sans fat cats. See it here, created by DiMassimo Goldstein.
The best advice that retired NBA star Charles Barkley can give current NBA player James Harden in Foot Locker's back-to-school campaign is to have a short-term memory... and wear Foot Locker gear. The advantage of having a "Short Memory," according to Barkley, is you never had a bad game. Even when Harden reminds Barkley of his epic fails, he remains clueless, with no recollection of such instances. Barkley defers to Scottie Pippen for further conformation of the benefits of a shirt memory. Pippen gleefully replies: "I'm the greatest Chicago Bull of all time." "Start Fresh," closes the ad, seen here, and created by BBDO New York.
In this modern age of technology, the typical home-buying manta of "location, location, location," has morphed into "accuracy, accuracy, accuracy," when it comes to looking at real estate listings online. Realtor.com launched a pair of TV ads highlighting the importance of such accuracy. In "Mom," a woman and her synchronized family search for a new house. The kids make their sandwiches in the same order and dad pushes them on the swings with precision accuracy -- until he falls out of rhythm and falls on his rear. Given outdated listings, the family show up at an open house only to find a man in his bathrobe, eating baked beans from the can. They switch real estate apps going forward. See it here. A pair of "Doghouse Architects" are looking for a home for themselves and Mr. Sausage. With listing updates every 15 minutes, realtor.com found everyone a home, even Mr. Sausage. Watch it here. Pereira & O'Dell New York created the campaign, directed by Daniel Strange of Uber Content.
As a meta-comment on TV itself, the phrase “jump the shark" is now the age of the average bare-chested contestant on “Survivor.” Could it be, therefore, that as an expression, “jump the shark “ has perhaps jumped the shark? Certainly, it’s such a knowing, insider-ish take on TV that by now it has become a reference to a reference. Even the writers on “Arrested Development” slyly recreated the action for Henry Winkler’s character in one episode, as have writers for “The Simpsons (The phrase was famously coined after Fonzie himself waterskied in his leather jacket on a special episode of “Happy Days.” Ay!) So, if jump the shark is indeed getting long in the tooth (or two sets of teeth), what could succeed it as a way of describing an outlandishly fake and grasping, attention-seeking gimmick? How about “toss the leg”? That’s as in “toss the prosthetic leg” -- the one with the hellaciously pricey Jimmy Choo shoe attached to the foot that "Real Housewife of New York City" amputee Aviva Drescher actually used as a projectile weapon on RHONY’s recent season closer. Apparently having the limb disengaged and at the ready, she hurled the latest designer accessory across the table at Le Cirque, in the direction of her fellow housewives, while announcing that it was the only “artificial” thing about her. (Changing the expression from “ladies who lunch” to “ladies who launch.”) Where to begin? With the fact that Bravo actually promoted the shot of the well-shod device lying on the floor, poignant and bereft like a sad orphan, all season, so it was no great surprise? (But it was still a shock in this, um, well-heeled context.) Or that the producers and casting execs apparently hired Aviva last year with the famous Chekhov line about the revolver in mind (If you see it in the first act, it has to go off by the third)? Otherwise, she hasn’t contributed much to the story line, except for all her various complaints and neuroses, and the fascinating revelation that asthma can be caused by reflux. (Her disgusting, sex-crazed, X-rated father and creepy, sex-crazed ex-husband are another story.) But you see, I’m already getting in too deep. I’m not proud that I know way too much about it, but by now watching has devolved into a guilty non-pleasure. And I swear I’m not going to continue. (Really, I mean it!) I got pissed at Aviva when she and Carole Radziwill (a respected journalist and TV producer, who probably made a big mistake agreeing to be on the show at all), sunk to new lows by engaging in an epic on-camera fight. That’s when the single-limbed one, who probably lied about not using a ghostwriter for her own book, “Leggy Blonde” accused Carole of having a ghost for her books. Aviva maintained that writing her memoir in one summer was "easy," just like "writing a long email." And Carole, a real writer (and no housewife), burned. A writers’ fight on RHONY? This was not only a “toss the leg” moment, it practically sunk the show and our entire civilization. Because as people have stopped reading books, celebrities are the only ones who get to write them. Since it started in 2006, the whole franchise has become a revolving door of narcissistic, ever-desperate, variously false-eyelashed, hair-extended, nipped-n-boosted contenders, all ready to put their crumbling marriages/ felonious or cheating spouses/embarrassed children on camera in exchange for the promise of possible book/fashion/liquor/music/underwear/handbag/microwave oven tie-in deals and the possibility of being worshipped. This makes watching the actual “reality” of the show rather tiresome. Also, they have learned from their predecessors that brawlers get more screen time. So if they are not monsters to begin with, these Housewives-come-lately all learn to play them on TV. The series was actually misnamed from the start, as these characters were neither real nor housewives. The gold standard is Bethenny Frankel, one of the original "Real Housewives of New York" -- a single workaholic entrepreneur, a chef by training who barely eats but had a rabid appetite for work, fame and fortune. After several seasons of filming, she was able to sell her SkinnyGirl Margaritas line of for $100 million. (It has since expanded considerably.) Also during that time, viewers got the pleasure of seeing her sitting, pants down, on the toilet waving a pregnancy wand, freshly out of her urine stream, to announce to the cameras that she was pregnant. This augured a special wedding program, (she married the father, Jason Hobby) and a new family series, “Bethenny Ever After.” But the show was cut short as the marriage turned into an epic divorce battle. You’d think that the reverse fairy tale of Bethenny’s life would dampen the ardor of some of the others, but it has not. Then again, “toss the leg” is an outgrowth of the scene that put the whole series on the map: “Toss the table” with Teresa Giudice, the New Jersey Housewife who overturned a table at a dinner with the force of ten men, while calling fellow Housewife Danielle a “prostitution/whore” in front of her children. Even Teresa, the mother of four daughters, would probably admit to not having a terrific grasp on the English language or grammar, but to the chagrin of writers everywhere, her books are on the bestseller lists of the The New York Times, and she constantly adds to her food empire. She needs to: she and her husband Joe have been indicted for tax fraud and other crimes in the off-season, and the pall of a possible prison term hangs over this season of the Jersey Housewives like a blingy sword of Damocles. A cautionary tale? Never. Indeed, Aviva understood that each episode has to have at least one table-tossing tentpole event -- and she, okay, went out on a limb. The promo material for her book says: “When Aviva was six years-old, she was in a farm accident when her left foot got severely hurt at a friend’s upstate New York dairy farm. A few months later her leg was amputated as a result of that accident. Aviva has never let this tragedy define who she is.” No, she hasn’t. Except for having scene after scene on RHONY in which she talks about removing her leg to swim, or falls. In another episode, she is sent to have a pedicure. Then, of course, she came up with the projectile stunt as a way to deal with her fellow sharks. But as Woody Allen said: “A relationship is like a shark. It has to keep moving. And what we have on our hands is, unfortunately, a dead shark.” Actually, with RHONY, what we have on our hands is a dead shark, with a Jimmy Choo shoe on it. Indeed, there are enough last-legs joke to go around. Whether she is a nightmare or just playing one on TV, Aviva is one cold fish. And the whole leg-toss has sunk the show, and the franchise. RIP, Real Housewives. You’ve got no more legs to stand on.
Native advertising is here. But where else can you find “camouflage” advertising? The next wave might not have the same result. HBO’s “Last Week Tonight with John Oliver” took a bunch of swings at native advertising, including the CEO of Time Inc. -- who at best seems to shrug his shoulders over the fact that “native” advertising might be blurring traditional church and state considerations. In that regard, if “native” is just another shrug of shoulders for digital consumers, what will this mean for consumers ten years from now? Previous concerns -- or outrage -- came from TV’s big growth in branded entertainment that started around a decade and a half ago. This involved everything from those slightly too-long video shots of, say, a Ford SUV in a crime procedural drama to cosmetic manufacturers sponsoring makeover shows. As Oliver noted, research still says consumers can’t tell the difference between real news and “native” sponsored-advertising news most of the time. If you are a digital publisher, you might just throw up your hands: “Hey, we do label it ‘sponsored content.’ It’s not my problem if readers can’t remember that.” And that’s just the point. So much information now comes at people from all angles that it’s hard to remember where stuff came from. Everything looks the same -- even when labeled. Is it right that big-font headlines tout “Seven things you can do with your toaster besides making toast” followed by much smaller type noting that the story is sponsored by your favorite toaster-maker? Native advertising-pushers tout the need for more “storytelling” as the big reason the practice will continue. Since consumers continue to consume this type of content, marketer’s monetization efforts proceed. But is it a satisfying story, a story you want to hear, or a story that makes you go “hmmm”? Mark this down: Publishers in the future will come back to this line of reasoning as the next generation looks to mix it up with editorial -- just as those creators of 60-second and 30-second commercials talked up “storytelling” and “messaging.” In-theater customers can also view three- and sometimes four-minute movie trailers and get a nice story as well. Tipping point? Not tipping over that anyone might really see. Advertising may continue to be camouflaged, as content expands exponentially. Hiding in the bushes, those in fatigues will probably see most of their prey slip away. And for those caught, the value will be vague.
Growing digital revenues are a nice bonus for broadcast stations. But are they growing fast enough? Borrell Associates estimates that local TV-related digital advertising sales will get to $2.9 billion this year -- about 6.5% of all local TV revenue. Borrell notes that some TV companies see as little as 3% of their ad revenues from digital, others as high as 8%. But Borrell notes how well stations “could be doing.” Local TV-related digital advertising sales will rise a modest 7.4% this year. down from a 14.9% gain in 2013. This might sound reasonable in comparison to overall TV revenues. BIA/Kelsey says traditional station advertising will be $19.9 billion in 2014 – an 8.2% gain from $18.4 billion in 2013 - mostly due to political and Olympic revenue. Stations may have a lot of work to do. Overall local digital advertising - will climb 42.5% this year to $35.2 billion. Newspaper and directories -- though under more pressure than other media -- already glean twice TV stations’ share of digital advertising dollars, or around 12% to 13%. But there’s good news for digital platforms that are heavy into video content. Much more than on other digital ad platforms, marketers are willing to pay premium pricing for big, impactful video content. Borrell points out that video CPMs are still well above display advertising, averaging $23.70 -- down a small 5% from $25.03 in 2013. The problem is how to garner new business going forward, with the digital marketplace overcrowded and fragmented. No matter. Borrell believes stations need to be much more aggressive to make digital 25% or more of their total revenue within five years. That would be a rapid rise. But we agree that stations need to get close to these goals -- and fast. They have their work cut out for them.
Stephen David of the eponymous production company that he founded in 2010 is an Emmy-nominated executive producer who was named to Realscreen’s Global 100 list earlier this year. He says, “I started working as a screenwriter for several studios out in Los Angeles, and then was hired onto the creative team of NBC’s ‘The Apprentice.’ So I ended up combining my background in dramatic writing and non-fiction producing, and that’s where this hybrid world came from – mixing these two genres together.” Stephen’s hybrid abilities are put to good use in his newest series of projects for several different TV networks – each show tackling big topics throughout history. He says, “My next project coming out is a fully scripted event series for History called ‘Sons of Liberty,’ which tells the story of how the Revolutionary War started." I sat down with Stephen and asked him the following questions: CW: Stephen, tell us about the making of “Sons of Liberty.” SD: With “Sons of Liberty” we wanted to portray the story behind the Revolutionary War – which tends to get skimmed over….I know that I was surprised when I learned the real history. It is being filmed in Romania and stars Ben Barnes (“The Chronicles of Narnia”) as Sam Adams, Michael Raymond-James (“Jack Reacher,” ”True Blood”) as Paul Revere, Rafe Spall (“Prometheus,” “Life of Pi") as John Hancock, Henry Thomas (“E.T.,” “Legends of the Fall”) as John Adams and Dean Norris (“Breaking Bad,” “Under the Dome,”) as diplomat Benjamin Franklin. I think audiences are going be truly surprised to see how the actors have interpreted these iconic figures. CW: What draws you to history? SD: It’s not so much that I’m drawn to history. It’s more that I’m fascinated by what people really did. The true stories, the character motivations… some of the things these people did – if you made it up, it wouldn’t be believable. CW: Are your non-fiction series editorialized in any way? How do you avoid slanting history? SD: With our shows, we’re always trying to find a new way of looking at history – a new thesis, a new lens… But we try to avoid passing judgment on whether what these historical figures did was right or wrong. We let the audiences decide for themselves. For example, with "Sons of Liberty,” we wanted to portray the story behind the Revolutionary War – which tends to get skimmed over. But in many ways, it’s a far more interesting, exciting story to tell. CW: How do your screenwriting skills play into your producing skills? Are there ever any inner creative conflicts you have to navigate – writer vs. producer? SD: The hardest thing is trying to figure out what you put into these shows given the amount of time, episodes and budget you have to tell your story. As a writer, you fall in love with certain stories – but as a producer you realize that sometimes you won’t be able to tell those stories. CW: Is content king? SD: I don’t know that I understand distribution models well enough to completely answer that – but I can tell you that content is king for me. Storytelling is what we love doing most. CW: What is your definition of television? SD: The definition has changed for me over the past ten years. The fact that I can watch a show or a movie or any form of entertainment on my phone while I’m riding on the subway is amazing. So for me, any screen I happen to be watching is a television, in a sense. CW: 2014 has been a big year for you, with multiple Emmy nominations, and “Sons of Liberty.” What else do you have in the works? SD: Luckily, we’re getting to work on a lot of really interesting projects for a variety of networks, some of which are in the hybrid format, like “The World Wars,” and others are fully scripted such as “Sons of Liberty.” Our next hybrid series is called “American Genius”, which we’re doing with National Geographic. It’s about the greatest inventor rivalries that fueled some of the most innovative developments in history. We have several other projects that have not yet been announced, but we’re extremely excited to be working on them and can’t wait to share more… CW: How has the programming pipeline changed since you started in the business? SD: There are significantly more television channels now then there were when I first started in the business. And all these channels have a strong desire to do interesting things. So there’s a lot of genre-bending going on in television that makes it a very exciting time to be a content creator. CW: Looking ahead, how do you see the media landscape evolving over the next three to fiveyears? SD: I think as we see more and more screens available through various mediums, we’re going to see a proliferation of innovative content as networks push to grab eyeballs. Ten years ago, you could have said the word “docudrama” or “factual television” and it probably wouldn’t have meant much to anyone. Media is constantly evolving – it’s very exciting to be a part of that larger process, however the landscape may change.
The over-the-top (OTT) video stream is starting to become more like a rapids. Driven by subscription services like Netflix and Hulu, the off-air streaming of video to living room main screen via connected TVs or streaming boxes like Apple TV and Roku will outstrip DVD revenues in the next five years, Strategy Analytics projected yesterday. Apple’s Apple TV is among several boxes now in millions of American homes, and according to ABC News, it is revealing its own patterns of video viewing. Only a month after launching the ABC News channel on Apple TV, the media company reports that 50% more live ABC News video is being streamed across Apple TV than from desktop and mobile combined. ABC News’s app offers a combination of live, local, network VOD, archival and clips content in its Apple TV app/channel. It is a kind of smorgasbord that is letting users explore the various ways in which they may want to consume news content. There are various live streams as well as hourly news updates for quick catch-up consumption. It launched last month with local content from nine major markets, and now has expanded to three more. Apparently, putting digital video from lean-on mode on devices and back to its original lean-back mode on TVs has a dramatic impact on amount and length of use. Reporting on just the first month’s experience, ABC News finds that Apple TV viewers spend 65% more time per visit than on the desktop. ABC News is starting to use the channel as a vehicle for premiering feature investigative reports. The live feed is the most popular resource on the channel and accounts for 20% of usage. Most interestingly, the OTT news experience belies decades-old patterns of providing the daily round-ups in the 7 p.m. network newscast. Viewing peaks at 9 p.m. ET. ABCNews did not the disclose the raw number of viewers accessing its content across the Apple TV channel. But it is revealing that those users familiar with the channel on their Apple TV deck are using it much like TV news in that breaking news drives use. The most views for ABC News on Apple TV occurred on July 17 during the Malaysian air disaster. Apple has been aggressively expanding the selection of content on Apple TV in recent months, and longtime Apple partner Disney/ABC has been leading the charge in developing new content access models. In the early days of the first video iPod, for instance, it was ABC and Disney that provided some of the first a la carte episode downloads. Now authenticated users can see live and VOD content from ESPN, Disney Channel and ABC news and entertainment on Apple TV. The next big challenges for the platform will be managing the cluttered interface and competing with services on connected TVs. There is still much to be done in helping Apple TV users filter and find the content they want. An app architecture is even more cumbersome than channel surfing or digital grids. What the system needs is some of the push alerting mechanisms common to the iOS and Android ecosystems. In fact, Apple TV partners might consider more synchronization of OTT content with smartphone and their alerting infrastructure. Many of us are already using an iPhone as a remote control for Apple TV, yet the app itself is barely used beyond this functionality. TV is still the interface problem. And even as video content seems to migrate back to the best screen available in the living room, the mobile device may be the best solution to discovery.
There are a lot of ideas that you can kind of nod your head at, but then on closer inspection think "how on earth would it actually be done?" Most media professionals would have some empathy with local and regional news publishers who are struggling with declining print revenues and trying to establish a foothold in digital. The trouble is, the BBC is already there -- and is the country's number one news source with teams dedicated to both national and local news coverage. When print was the only game in town, it didn't matter. The BBC did tv and radio and the newspaper companies sold print. Now they have come together to face off in digital, there is a massive problem. On the one hand we have commercial organisations that say they cannot compete on a level playing field against a state-owned broadcaster with a massive, guaranteed budget. On the other, we have the country's most trusted news source from a corporation that is not allowed to run advertising. Surely, however, if the BBC shared traffic with local papers, which would then surround the item with advertising, you would have a situation where regional publishers are being given content, paid for by the state, to pin adverts around. That can't be right, but then commercial publishers facing the death of print having to go through newsroom and sales team "realignments" because they can't compete with state-funded content is also far from ideal. Could there be a solution? Look at BBC Worldwide. It sells content and merchandise around the world. Watch its channel abroad and you can't help but be surprised at the advert breaks -- and of course, when you watch BBC programmes abroad that have been sold to a foreign channel, there is usually an advertising break. In fact, you only need look at channels such as Dave that repackage BBC content at home, complete with frequent ad breaks. So how about this: why doesn't the same model get applied to local media? Why don't publishers and the BBC come to an agreement that they can have written, audio and video content on their sites in exchange for a royalty? The BBC would get a new revenue stream without itself having to break a taboo and run advertising, and the local media companies would get access to the great content they say is making their corporate lives so hard. What former BBC tech supremo, Ashley Highfield, now chief exec of Johnston Press, is calling for today seems a little overly optimistic. Should the BBC really have a quota of traffic it should send to local media? I can't really see that working. Where would you set the level and why would people who want to receive BBC content, that they have funded, be redirected to a local newspaper site they didn't intend to visit? To me, by far the fairest thing to do is to come up with a remuneration package through which local commercial media can use BBC content. It might be a news story presented as a BBC story, perhaps with a small table detailing the last six or most popular six or so stories from the BBC -- which when clicked on are displayed within that local media company's Web site with their advertising. The money side could either be a monthly or weekly fee for unfettered access or perhaps a fee could be charged every time an article, audio stream or video is consumed. It would appear that this is the closest the regional press can get to a win-win situation. People wouldn't have to leave their sites to get BBC local news information and they could buy in top-quality content they can monetise. Of course, what they can't really hope for is the BBC sending traffic their way. That really does sound like a pipe dream to me. Get the calculators out and come to a BBC Worldwide-style deal. That has to be the best solution -- surely?
At Cannes this year there was a lot of big talk about big ideas – the need for grand branding concepts that could both etch their way into public consciousness but also communicate effectively across a fragmented new mediascape. All brands want to be admired for contributing to our lives, the better angels of our humanity, world peace. Yeah, everyone wants to teach the world to sing. But sometimes a little idea has a better chance of registering with consumers over the long haul if its cleverness is iterated modestly but consistently, even mercilessly. Enter (waddling) the Aflac Duck. Irritatingly ubiquitous? Yes. Typically more silly than funny and eminently forgettable? Yup. But the simple use of comic branding and identifying a company and its product lightheartedly with the intrinsically foppish duck has been relentless. Why a duck? As Chico Marx asked in the Marx Brothers’ classic “Cocoanuts”. It trades on that basic insight some marketer must have had years ago: the brand sounds like a quack. Run with it boys. And run the damned idea into the ground until every blessed soul in America is familiar with an otherwise obscure personal insurance product. Mission accomplished. Sometimes frequency trumps creative cleverness. It works on Henny Youngman’s classic comic principal: just keep firing off the one liners through the audience groans. There is bound to be something in there someone will grin at least. Take my duck…please. The latest run of duckvertising from Aflac targets a specific brand promise of quick claim resolution. But the series highlights the competence of the brand by contrasting it with the duck’s ineptitude in all other endeavors. A duck striking classic Yoga poses and trying to be in repose generally is a set up for light comedy. It all seems to be a slightly tortured road to underscore the brand's point about quick claim resolution. And perhaps the tactic involves forcing the viewer to make some sense of the online slapstick and engage more deeply in order to make the tiny logical hop to the brand message. The duck mascot achieved its primary purpose years ago. It took one of our least favorite business segments, insurance, and made it feel inviting or at least a lot more harmless than an evening with an insurance salesman. Mission accomplished. Fortune magazine has consistently recognized Aflac as one of the country’s most admired companies. Now let’s have some fun with the duck. What interests me about the ad is its rapid fire gag structure, not unlike Henny Youngman. The spot has a brief set up and then becomes a series of two or three second rapid fire sight gags, none of which is as funny as the cumulative effect of tiny giggles ending in the duck snoozing from exhaustion on the Yoga mat. Other episodes in the campaign have our duck on the golf course (“AFLAC” quacked as obscenity in a sand trap) and involved in a DIY project (wings handling power tools). Unlike the Geico gecko, the original branding concept for the mascot precludes him talking. All the better. At his best, the duck is a near-silent comedian trading on a string of sight gags. The structure resembles a cartoon short of the 1930s from the Fleischer Brothers Studio. In many ways the fight for our attention in the cluttered TV space invigorates old media formats. The simple silent and brief sight gag is consumable with a glance and while the TV viewer is engaged in ad pod conversations with a spouse or while half-glancing at the second screen in her hand. At his worst, the antics are predictable and too often lead to an “Aflac” utterance that seems anxious we will forget the brand. No chance of that now. What Aflac is missing is the opportunity to leverage the duck more effectively. In the very formats the TV spots are unconsciously using, Vine and Instagram. They work in small bits and glances that could be broken down easily into a string of mobile social media posts. Surprisingly, the makers of these spots haven’t cultivated either social media feed to this end. On Twitter they just slap the full spots into the feed. And here is an occasion where newer forms of media could actually spark more creativity in legacy media. If the makers of the Aflac spot have Instagram/Vine redistribution in mind they might make the elements in the spots even funnier if they were built from the ground up as standalones. After all, the series plays into one of the dominant genres of the Internet – funny animals. How did Aflac not see this? My feeling is the Aflac duck has insinuated itself so deeply into our own consciousness that we as media consumers should have a more direct voice in his future direction. Make him funnier. There is great potential here being wasted on light comedy and TV spots with merciless frequency. Take our duck, please.
YouTube — star-maker, entertainment distributor, quirky pet archive and ad channel, — has topped the positive Buzz rankings with American men this summer. With a BrandIndex Buzz score of 27.4 the Google video brand has edged out Amazon and Subway for top spot during the month of July. Although YouTube has frequently featured in our BrandIndex ranking lists, this represents a strong six-point uptick since the same period last year when the video channel was only the fourteenth ranked brand for men. YouTube has long established itself as the go-to viral launch location for budding video stars, trailers, TV clips, music videos and is currently receiving over a billion unique global visitors every month. Although the FIFA World Cup end over a month ago, the World Cup content is still generating hits for the newly converted male soccer fans. The Men’s top Buzz list for July is dominated by various flavors of media: YouTube, Netflix, and one traditional broadcast network, History Channel all make the men’s Top 10. This summer Netflix started inviting filmmakers to create documentary content specifically for the channel and Sundance hit "The Battered Bastards of Baseball" debuted in mid-July. History Channel’s late spring programing was headlined with “World Wars,” while“Top Gear” returned for season four in July. Technology is represented on the men’s top ten by the big two, Samsung and Apple. Number two Amazon.com and home store Lowe’s represent the retail category. Ford is top auto brand. Brands appearing on both the women and men’s Top 10 are Netflix, YouTube, Amazon and Subway. Netflix, however, tops the women’s list, which also includes Walgreens and more female-targeted brands like Dawn and Dove. For men, the biggest Buzz improver in comparison to the same month in 2013 is Men’s Wearhouse. The brand suffered a dip in perception last summer after founder George Zimmer left the company, but achieved an impressive 19.1-point bounce with men since this time last year. Food Network and Carnival both made significant gains after some rocky media events in the last couple of years, however, both these brands also appear on the women’s Top 5 gainers list. Six Flags and CNN Headline News round out the men’s top gainer lists, although CNN is still in negative perception with an aggregate July score of -10. BrandIndex’s Buzz score asks adults "If you've heard anything about the brand in the last two weeks, through advertising, news or word of mouth, was it positive or negative?” Buzz scores represent the net sentiment generated across all media for over 1,300 brands in the U.S.
You hear this all the time, and probably heard it about every five seconds at Comic Con. Kids today live in their own world, like, totally. Why don’t more people listen to their own words? It’s all true. Earlier this week, Variety noted the “surprising” results of a study it commissioned that says six of the of the 10 most influential persons among Americans aged 13-18 are YouTube stars. This is not startling, at all, but as far as goofy surveys go at least this is one that gets me to say, loud, “Seeeeeee?” The thing is, people between the ages of 13 and 18 eventually become people between the ages of 24 and 35, and in the intervening years, they’ll find a bunch of other people they like a lot. It’s the age of discovery, and I don’t say it with an “oh-they’re-so-fickle” sneer. It’s just true. Some of their old favorites might make the cut, but others will be added. Still the question is, why hasn’t the wider world heard of Ian Andrew Hecox or Anthony Padilla? They are, collectively, the guys who populate the Smosh YouTube channel with a sort of juvenile joyousness that, even if you’re momentarily offended, is inevitably low-rent and perfectly low-brow humor. (Oh, and more than 18 million subscribers and over 3 billion views.) A little bit of Smosh may go a long way, but it’s only offered up in little bits. They know what they’re doing. Hecox and Padilla topped Variety’s list, as reported by Suzanne Ault. The survey seems more than a little rigged, in truth. Variety’s poll was done by brand strategist Jeetendr Sehdev, who assembled 20 personalities the respondents would be asked about—half of them consisting of YouTubers with the most subscribers, the rest celebrities from film and TV who have the highest Q scores with 13-17 year old consumers. Variety says 1,500 test panelists were asked how those 20 “stacked up in terms of approachability, authenticity and other criteria considered aspects of their overall influence.” In other words, the respondents had a glam, but limited, pool to choose from, so don’t think badly of Today’s Wayward Youth that President or Mrs.Obama, or John Boehner for that matter, didn’t make the cut. The point is, after Hecox and Padilla came the Fine Bros. (Benny and Rafi), and Felix Arvid Ulf Kjellberg, who the YouTube world knows as PewDiePie, followed by KSI and Ryan Higa. The only non-YouTubers on the list are Paul Walker (he’s now dead), Jennifer Lawrence and Katy Perry (who certainly is no stranger to YouTube, but probably wouldn’t be described first and foremost as a YouTube invention.) The other YouTuber on the list is weird YouTube comedian/parodist guy Shane Dawson. Sehdev deduced that the top scoring YouTubers have traits of all good influencers: relatable, engaging, intimate, authentic, candid, risk-taking. (Want that all in one package? Watch this Shane Dawson YouTube post from five days ago.) Those are all the things, that, most of the time Hollywood stars aren’t, with (for the sake of this list) the notable exception of Jennifer Lawrence, who sometimes seems to be re-living the sitcom life of Lucille Ball. Variety’s Ault seems to lament that all those good YouTube traits risk getting lost when and if those channel hosts become stars, and that’s probably more than half true. We might get a good chance to find out when YouTube star Grace Helbig—perfectly lovable, perpetually seemingly unprepared—shoots a comedy talk show pilot for E!. It’s an interesting box for Helbig or other YouTube stars that the unvarnished, low-budget, shot-from-the-bedroom “qualities” of YouTube are exactly what it is likely to get lost on a more mass-market stage and almost certainly at a by-the-numbers joint like E! that lives by exploiting packaged PR-driven/trendoid schlock. And so it goes, as it did back when there was a music business and raw indie bands got signed and over-produced into obscurity. Someday…someday…there might be a reliable way to get a mainstream audience for a non-mainstream talent, but it’s not easy. You kind of wish Helbig, and Smosh, can find a next level without losing themselves. Right now, that’s probably what makes them relatable to a bunch of young YouTube viewers who, in their own lives, face the same age-old dilemma. pj@mediapost.com
Learning from the way consumers jump devices and media, BloomReach rolled out its Personalized Discovery Platform that uses Web and mobile data to make smarter recommendations. It learns from every consumer interaction to personalize content across channels and hardware. Retailers no longer need to stock merchandise in stores to sell them online. Ecommerce sites made that possible. Many have become marketplaces like Amazon. They sell the products online and drop-ship the items from the manufacturer to the consumer. This means they can add as many products as they want. They just need an awesome site search engine and tool to personalize the discovery of the items. The Personalized Discovery Platform based on BloomReach's Web relevance engine integrates data from across a company's applications to personalize content on retail and brand Web sites. It shares data from organic search, paid search and social, among other media. The technology breaks down data silos as consumers move and interact with mobile sites, Web sites and apps, as well as across desktops, smartphones and tablets. The technology doesn't rely on demographic and historical data. It cognitively predicts the most relevant content for each consumer anonymously, even for those who do not log in, and gives real-time access to product and page data that lets marketers act on insights, explains Raj De Datta, co-founder and CEO of BloomReach. Consumer expectations have changed, yet the technology powering discovery on behalf of these Web sites has not. "A lot of Web sites around the world still look like Yahoo circa 1998, rather than Google or Facebook circa 2014," he said, adding that consumers now expect a personalized discovery platform. Consumers clicking through an email to Nike's Web site might type in "ankle support" when searching for running shoes. The technology aims to provide more relevant search results from the site's engine because it connects consumer data and interactions from the email marketing campaign with the online site search experience. Even if the interaction began on the desktop, the consumer might complete it on her mobile device. BloomReach's technology identifies the jump in devices and media to personalize the experience. Finding the perfect product on the site becomes incredibly difficult, unless the retailer supports search with a personalization tool. Tilly's operates 197 stores in 32 states and stocks a very large assortment of brands and merchandise. The company wanted a platform to ensure success when consumers would search for products across all its channels. By implementing BloomReach Organic Search and SNAP for Mobile the company saw a 20% increase in organic traffic and 11% increase in conversions on mobile--all from the ability to integrate data across devices and media. De Datta said delivering on this type of experience isn't easy because companies might need to connect six or seven data silos and a common technology might not power the system.