| Today's Top Stories | | #1 | SC Johnson Reviewing $1B Global Media Buying Account
| | | Incumbents include Maxus as lead agency for all media buying, except for digital, which is overseen by PHD. In January, the consumer products giant shifted its global communications planning from Maxus to PHD. Driving the review, according to a report in Adweek, is SC Johnson COO Salman Amin. Both incumbents are participating in the review, which has been quietly underway for some time. A decision is expected later this month.
Why This Matters: SC Johnson is one of the largest advertisers worldwide with a large assortment of brands. With the company shifting planning from Maxus to PHD earlier, the buying review might not bode well for Maxus; however, with reviews, you never know.
Two Takes: Adweek | MediaPost
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| | #2 | 'Condé Nast Traveler' Making Pages Bigger, Moving To Higher-Quality Stock
| | | While many magazines are trimming their page size and going to cheaper, thinner paper, Condé Nast Traveler will increase its page size by two inches and use thicker paper both for the inside pages and cover, The New York Times reports. "It's going to feel like the luxury product that it is," says publisher Bill Wackermann. "What do you get in first class? More space."
Why This Matters: The move will allow advertisers to show off their products with more space and higher-quality reproduction. And Condé Nast Traveler has so far avoided the falloff in ad pages that has plagued many other print products. It increased its ad pages by 5.8% in 2014, with some of its high-end advertisers including Porsche, Maserati, Bulgari and Bottega Veneta.
A Take: NYT
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| | #3 | Study Finds Disconnect Between Consumers And Brands
| | | A study by IBM and Econsultancy finds brands are not delivering the level of customer experience that they think they are, a Digiday report says. While most brands believe they are providing a superior consumer experience, 63% of consumers say their favorite retailer doesn't understand them. And among all people who left providers in the banking, telecom, Internet and mobile industry in the past year, 30% did so because their previous provider failed them in some way.
Why This Matters: Despite lots of investment by companies in both infrastructure and solutions to build better relationships with customers, most still fail to meet the expectations of their customers and are at risk to lose them. The reason? Companies are not properly analyzing and interpreting data they get about their consumers.
A Take: Digiday
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#4 Staff Cuts At Packaged Goods Companies Could Hurt Multicultural Units (Ad Age)
#5 How Women Consume Media (Adweek)
#6 Mobile Key To Reaching Multicultural Audiences (Ad Age)
#7 Not Much Progress Being Made In Battle Against Online Ad Fraud (WSJ)
#8 Several Brands Spoke Out Against Indiana, Arkansas Religion Bills (Ad Age)
#9 Baby Center (15.9M Monthly U.S. Millennial Uniques) Must Keep Evolving (Digiday)
#10 American Marketing Association To Launch Rebranding Effort (Ad Age)
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|  | • 31.1
Percentage of U.S. restaurant brands that have an Instagram account, according to YesMail Market Intelligence. The next largest category holding Instagram accounts is Hotels with 30.8%, followed by retailers (23%).
– Reported by eMarketer
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| | MBPT Spotlight | More Sponsors Sending Greetings to Hallmark—Channels hope to continue to buck trend of slowing growth in cable advertising revenue
By Jon Lafayette
In an ad market loaded with cable networks registering lower ratings and declining advertising revenue, Hallmark Channel and Hallmark Movies & Mysteries have been bucking the trend and thriving.
Crown Media Holdings, which owns Hallmark networks, saw an ad revenue increase of 11% to $415.6 million in 2014. In the fourth quarter, a particularly tough one industry-wide, Crown's ad reve¬nue jumped 14% to $111.1 million.
Ed Georger, Crown Media Family Networks executive VP, advertising sales and digital me¬dia, wants to keep that momentum going in the coming upfront. "We're fortunate that we are in a position that not a lot of people are in I think when it comes to cable and ratings. So part of our strategy is to make sure that the cable marketplace doesn't get painted with one brushstroke," Georger says.
Georger credits Hallmark's ratings gains to investing in programming. In addition to the net's popular TV movies, it has launched three successful scripted series. In this up¬front, Hallmark will be selling season 4 of Andie McDowell's Cedar Cove and season 3 of When Calls the Heart. A Good Witch series, with Catherine Bell, star of several Hallmark Good Witch movies, premiered recently.
How are the network's original programming initiatives working with advertisers? And what is behind their increased belief in the Home & Family daytime show?
For more, click HERE (sub needed)
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| | Fates & Fortunes | • BETH PASCIUCCO was named managing director, global financial services practice leader and global client lead at Havas Worldwide. She will focus on developing growth strategies, acquisition marketing and brand and customer experiences across the financial sector and also have responsibility for some key client relationships. She will be based in New York. Pasciuccio was previously managing director and head of brand management and customer experience at AXA. She was also chief marketing officer, global wealth management group at Morgan Stanley.
• TIM O'SULLIVAN was appointed managing director of the North America region at Y&R's Labstore. He was most recently VP, managing director, consumer products group and shopper marketing at another Y&R unit, Hispanic market agency The Bravo Group, where he will continue to do some work as well. Prior to joining Y&R, O'Sullivan spent some 20 years at Procter & Gamble.
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| | What They're Watching | BROADCAST RATINGS
'A.D.' Opens Below 'The Bible'
NBC's A.D. The Bible Continued debuted short of the ratings The Bible drew when it premiered on History two years ago. Following A.D., the debut of American Odyssey was 25% below the premiere of Crisis in that same spot last March. NBC finished second on Sunday. ABC led the night with its annual airing of The Ten Commandments, which rose 40% from last year's Saturday airing. CBS, seeing declines for much of its lineup on Sunday, took third place. Madam Secretary sunk 21% while Battle Creek fell another 13%; both were lows for the rookie shows. The Good Wife was steady with last week. Fox rounded out the night with repeats.
For more, click HERE
CABLE RATINGS
Final Four Shatters Cable Record
The 2015 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament continues to set records. Saturday's national semifinal game between Kentucky and Wisconsin—where the Badgers ended the Wildcats' quest for a perfect season—shattered the cable TV mark for college basketball, averaging 22.6 million viewers. The game, which aired across TBS, TNT and truTV, bested the previous high (Kentucky's win over Wisconsin in last year's Final Four) by 39% and was the most-viewed Final Four game in 19 years. The early game between Duke and Michigan State averaged 15.3 million viewers, up 31% from last year's first game and the most-viewed in that time slot in 10 years. The two games combined represented a 35% jump from last year with 18.9 million viewers.
For more, click HERE
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| Overnight Ratings: Sunday, April 5
| | 7 PM | | NET | SHOW | A18-49
Rating | TOTAL VIEWERS
(MILLIONS) | | ABC | THE TEN COMMANDMENTS (R) | 1.2 | 5.5 | | CBS | 60 MINUTES | 0.9 | 7.7 | | NBC | DATELINE | 0.8 | 3.8 | | FOX | THE SIMPSONS (R) (7)
BOB'S BURGERS
(R) (7:30) | 0.4
0.6
| 1.4
1.6
| | UNIVISION | AQUÍ Y AHORA
| 0.5 | 1.5 | | TELEMUNDO | RANGO | 0.5 | 1.2 |
| | 8 PM | | NET | SHOW | A18-49
Rating | TOTAL VIEWERS
(MILLIONS) | | ABC | THE TEN COMMANDMENTS (R) | 1.6 | 7.3 | | CBS | MADAM SECRETARY | 1.1 | 9.1 | | FOX | THE SIMPSONS (R) (8)
FAMILY GUY (R) (8:30) | 1.0
1.1 | 2.4
2.4 | | NBC | DATELINE: BIBLE STORIES | 1.0 | 4.6 | | UNIVISION | NUESTRA BELLEZA LATINA
| 0.8 | 2.3 | | TELEMUNDO | LA VOZ: KIDS
| 0.6 | 1.7 |
| | 9 PM | | NET | SHOW | A18-49
Rating | TOTAL VIEWERS
(MILLIONS) | | NBC | A.D. THE BIBLE CONTINUES | 2.3 | 9.5 | | ABC | THE TEN COMMANDMENTS (R) | 1.4 | 6.9 | | UNIVISION | NUESTRA BELLEZA LATINA
| 1.1 | 2.8 | | CBS | THE GOOD WIFE | 1.0 | 7.8 | | TELEMUNDO | LA VOZ: KIDS
| 0.8 | 2.2 | | FOX | THE LAST MAN ON EARTH (R) (9)
THE LAST MAN ON EARTH (R) (9:30) | 0.8
0.7
| 2.1
1.9
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| | 10 PM | | NET | SHOW | A18-49
Rating | TOTAL VIEWERS
(MILLIONS) | | ABC | THE TEN COMMANDMENTS (R) | 1.5 | 7.5 | | NBC | AMERICAN ODYSSEY | 1.2 | 5.4 | | UNIVISION | SAL Y PIMIENTA
| 1.0 | 2.5 | | CBS | BATTLE CREEK | 0.7 | 5.7 | | TELEMUNDO | SUELTA LA SOPA EXTRA
| 0.4 | 1.0 |
| | TOMORROW'S BIG RATINGS STORIES TODAY | • Two No. 1 Seeds Play for College Basketball Title
Duke (34-4) meets Wisconsin (36-3) in the NCAA Men's Basketball Championship title game on CBS live from Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis with tipoff scheduled for 9:18 p.m. Last year's championship game, won by Connecticut over Kentucky, drew 21.3 million viewers, down 9% from the 2013 title game. The upshot: CBS will win the 9-11 p.m. primetime portion of Monday night easily, but from 8-10 p.m. NBC will again televise The Voice and ABC will broadcast Dancing With the Stars, which on last year's comparable night averaged 12 million and 14 million viewers, respectively. So marketers have a great opportunity to reach mass audiences whether through sports or other types of entertainment shows on broadcast TV.
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| • For AMC, 'Saul' Good
The cable network's freshman drama Better Call Saul (10 p.m.) concludes its premiere season's 10-episode run. The Breaking Bad prequel has averaged 3.3 million viewers and a 1.3 18-49 demo rating, following a special Sunday premiere episode leading out of The Walking Dead that drew 6.9 million viewers. After moving to its regular Monday night slot, Saul has averaged 2.8 million viewers. The upshot: Saul seems to be a hit for AMC, drawing solid numbers for the network, which soon will say good bye to Mad Men.
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| • History's 'Outlaws' On Hiatus
History Channel airs the season 2 finale (10 p.m.) of reality series Appalachian Outlaws, which focuses on the battle in the backwoods of West Virginia among growers and sellers of ginseng. The show moved to Monday nights this season, leading out of Swamp People, and took a bit of a viewership hit from season 1, when it had a much bigger lead-in from Pawn Stars and averaged 2.5 million viewers and 0.9 in the demo on Thursdays. The upshot: Despite the weaker lead-in, Appalachian Outlaws is competitive with an average of a 0.6 in the demo and 1.8 million viewers, especially considering the last 10 episodes went head-to-head with AMC scripted hit Better Call Saul.
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| Media Buyer & Planner Today
Editorial Team
John Consoli, Contributing Editor
Phone: 201-314-0424 | Send Email
Jon Lafayette, Business Editor, Broadcasting & Cable
Phone: 917-281-4735 | Send Email
Brian Moran, Managing Editor, Broadcasting & Cable
Phone: 917-281-4708 | Send Email
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