• by David Goetzl  @dgoetzl, May 17, 2006

When News Corp. announced plans to launch MyNetworkTV in February, the company made an aggressive bid to lure affiliates by offering them an abnormal amount of advertising time to sell locally. Now, network executives are making a similarly determined effort to attract advertisers to fill the five minutes an hour they've held for themselves.

In the network's first-ever upfront presentation Tuesday, MNTV executives broke slightly from the upfront tradition of appealing to advertisers with broad pitches about the excellence of a network's programming environment and its demographic potential. Instead, they took a more focused, "let's make a deal" approach by offering marketers a range of product integration opportunities, more "A" positions and less clutter, and--when was the last time this was heard from an upfront stage?--top-notch backroom operations.

Since News Corp. units own, produce, and distribute all the programs on MNTV, the network has few--if any--bureaucratic hurdles preventing product integration, MTNV's ad sales chief Bob Cesa said. The result is a user-friendly process with traditional product placement, virtual product placement, and brand integration into continuing story lines available.

"There is no third party to impede our brand immersion ideas," Cesa said.

Cesa also promised advertisers more "A" positions--the first commercial in a break that networks often reserve for their own promos--and shorter commercial breaks in a move to reduce clutter. He said the fledgling network would have the same strong backroom operations as other Fox Broadcasting Co. units, making the network easy and reliable to do business with. And the network--which targets the 18-to-49 demo--will be rated by NTI, Nielsen's general market rating metric, allowing advertisers to measure its performance against major networks.

"We've changed our business to reflect the needs of the marketplace," Cesa said.

Executives also pushed MyNetworkTV.com as a platform for advertisers to extend their on-air campaigns. The site will offer more than 3,000 video clips related to the programming--with sponsorship opportunities attached--which users can send to other Web users or a friend's mobile phone. As with fellow News Corp. property MySpace, the Web site--which will launch before the network debuts--will emphasize social networking.

MyNetworkTV--formed by News Corp. principally to provide programming for 10 of its local stations left without a network affiliation due to the combination of UPN and The WB to form The CW--now has clearance in 82 percent of the country, and expects to top 90 percent by its Sept. 5 launch. One of the incentives for affiliates to sign up is MNTV's offer of nine minutes of ad time an hour, which they can sell themselves, three times more than the norm.

Although the network had originally indicated that it would offer reality, game show and newsmagazine programs, it plans to fill its 12 hours a week entirely with "short dramatic series" that employ the telenovela concept popular in other countries and on Spanish-language television in the United States.

The hour-long soap operas will air new episodes five nights a week, followed by a recap show on Saturday (Sunday is dark). Each story line will go for 13 weeks as drama builds toward a crescendo. "Providing a sense of urgency for viewers, each episode ends with a cliffhanger," Jack Abernathy, CEO of Fox Television Stations, told the well-attended gathering at New York's Hilton Theatre.

MNTV, a joint venture between the Fox station group and fellow News Corp. unit Twentieth Television, plans to air original episodes of the telenovelas 52 weeks a year.

The two nightly series will carry the titles "Desire" (in the 8 o'clock hour) and "Secret Obsessions" (at 9 o'clock). As new story lines and characters are introduced every 13 weeks, the franchises will take on new secondary monikers.

For example, MNTV will launch with "Desire: Table for Three"--the story of two brothers who are forced to flee Jersey by the Mafia and end up in Beverly Hills falling in love with the same woman--and "Secret Obsessions: Fashion House" starring Bo Derek, who runs a glamorous fashion house and gets entangled in a love triangle involving her son that jeopardizes the business.

Installments of the franchises scheduled for 2007 include "Desire: Art of Betrayal," "Secret Obsessions: Watch Over Me," "Desire: Rules of Deception," and "Secret Obsessions: A Dangerous Love." Aiming to reach a broad demographic, the shows each feature multicultural casts.

At the upfront, MNTV executives emphasized repeatedly that telenovela strip programming has been successful in more than 100 countries. And, like the reality genre imported several years ago, they believe it will resonate stateside.

Roger Ailes, Chairman of Fox Television Stations, said the traditional network "economic and production models are broken"--a shot at The CW, the other new network set to debut this fall, and others. MNTV sought to reinvent the network-affiliate relationship by offering affiliates 9 minutes an hour of ad time to sell locally, while keeping just five for itself (The CW is offering affiliates only three minutes an hour, the same as other major networks). Also, unlike The CW and others, MNTV is receiving no reverse compensation.

On Monday, MNTV scored a coup by convincing Tribune Broadcasting--which has 10-year affiliation agreements for 16 of its stations with The CW--to affiliate its Philadelphia, Atlanta, and Seattle stations with MNTV. The former WB stations, all in top-15 markets, were left without a network affiliation after The CW formation, and could have opted to go independent.

MNTV said the network's launch this summer will be supported by a multimillion-dollar marketing campaign across many platforms.