• by Wayne Friedman , May 16, 2008

Fox will make a bold advertising move this fall for a couple of new dramas by cutting in half the number of prime-time advertising minutes to 5 minutes an hour.

Under an effort called "Remote Free TV," Fox will be cutting back national advertising inventory first on "Fringe," the new sci-fi drama from J.J. Abrams, which is scheduled to debut the last week in March. Fox made the announcement during its upfront presentation to advertisers and media-buying executives on Thursday in NYC.

Jon Nesvig, president of advertising sales of Fox, said the network would also look to cut back on the length of commercial pods--and would cut back somewhat on promotional time of other shows. Media-buying executives also speculated Fox would ask its affiliates to see whether they would cut back some commercial time.

For a long time, media buyers have complained about commercial clutter--that it was making their marketing messages less effective and that it caused viewer fatigue.

Typically, most one-hour prime-time network shows carry 10 minutes of national advertising per hour. But total non-program time on networks can be much more than that--anywhere between 14 minutes to 16 minutes--because it also includes local stations' advertising time as well as network TV promos.

Andy Donchin, executive VP/director of national broadcast for Carat USA, commended the move, saying it be a good experiment in giving advertisers what they always demanded. "We can see whether less clutter really offers benefits," he said.

Media buyers suggested the move should help raise the index between commercial to program ratings--which means that viewers would be watching more commercials. Generally, viewership drops off from program content to commercials by 2% to 6% depending on the network, program and time period. New C3 ratings--instituted last year--would, in theory, rise.

Irwin Gotlieb, global chief executive officer of Group M, praised the effort and said ongoing research of the Fox year-long plan would be beneficial in determining how viewers responded.

At the same time, program analysts wondered how Fox would continue to pay for such high-priced dramas--especially for those with sci-fi special effects. Typically, those dramas can cost anywhere from $2 million to $3 million and more an episode.

Fox also intends to offer up "Dollhouse" with only five minutes of national advertising time when it debuts in mid-season.