| | Media Buyer & Planner Today | | | | | | | | | #1 Hulu Presenting Sponsor of NBA Playoffs on TNT | | Fresh off signing up as the presenting sponsor of the National Hockey League's Stanley Cup Playoffs, the subscription video-on-demand service has now inked a deal with Turner to be presenting sponsor of TNT's coverage of the NBA playoffs, Broadcasting & Cable and other media outlets report. The deal includes sponsorship first round, conference semifinals and Western Conference Finals coverage on TNT. As part of the deal, Hulu will air traditional ads, but will also run custom branded content featuring the NBA on TNT's on-air talent. A "Presented by Hulu" tag will appear on the NBA on TNT's opening graphic cards, and there will be on screen custom billboards and scoreboards throughout each game during all three playoff rounds. Meanwhile, Turner has sold some new types of ads. Advertisers including Straight Talk Wireless were sold the entire 60-second timeouts to fill with their own content. Other advertisers doing branded content include Mountain Dew Kickstart and Jack Daniels. Other key sponsors include: American Express (Halftime Show); Autotrader (Tip-Off Show); Kia (Inside the NBA); and State Farm (Audio Assist). | | WHY THIS MATTERS: Hulu is being aggressive, trying to reach millennial sports fans to sell them on its streaming services, and both the NHL and NBA have younger viewer bases than MLB and NFL. | | Two Takes: B&C | MediaPost | | | | #2 Initiative Awarded Amazon Studios Account | | Interpublic Group agency Initiative has been awarded media planning and buying duties for Amazon Studios, as part of an agency consolidation, as first reported by Adweek's Agency Spy. Initiative has held the Amazon ecommerce media account since 2013 when it initially won the account away from WPP and GroupM media agency Mindshare. IPG won another review late last year that kept the $1 billion ad spending Amazon account with the holding company and Initiative, but that did not include Amazon Studios. Under the new deal, it does. Initiative's Los Angeles office will oversee the account. | | WHY THIS MATTERS: Amazon Studios plans to get more aggressive in its series production, spending some $5 billion a year on new series. And it recently brought in former NBC exec Jennifer Salke to head the Studios, with plans to more aggressively market its programming production. | | A Take: Adweek | | | | #3 Gore-Tex Consolidates at Dentsu Aegis | | W.L. Gore & Associates announced a consolidation of its global media account for its fabric division, eliminating 10-plus independent and holding company agencies, but keeping Dentus media agency Carat, Adweek reports. Gore-Tex's waterproof fabric membrane is used in the making of many brand name sports apparel and footwear products, including Adidas, Under Armour, Oakley, Patagonia, Converse and The North Face. In addition to Carat, other Dentsu Aegis Network agencies who will handle Gore-Tex media in the U.S., Europe and Asia-Pacific include Gravity and Amnet. "We're happy to extend our relationship [with Dentsu] into a global partnership that will help us to transform Gore's standard of innovation and excellence to the world of channel planning and media buying," said Sacha Welters of the Gore Fabrics Division. In 2017, AKQA was awarded the consolidated Gore-Tex creative account. | | WHY THIS MATTERS: More and more brands are consolidating global accounts from multiple agencies to just one agency or agencies within only one holding company. So this is part of a trend. Gore-Tex is not a huge account but did spend $1.5 million on U.S. marketing last year, according to Kantar Media, up from $688,000 in 2016. But globally, Adweek reports, it spent somewhere in the low eight digits. | | A Take: Adweek | |
| | |
| | 80.1 | | Percentage of North America internet users who say they would be comfortable sharing personal information directly with a brand for the purposes of personalizing marketing messages, according to a survey by Vision Critical. However, just 16.7% says they would be OK with sharing this type of information through third parties. | – Reported by eMarketer
| |
| | | |
| | CBS Wins With Consistent Comedies | by Michael Malone
CBS took Thursday ratings honors with its high-powered comedies, which led to a 1.4 in viewers 18-49, per the Nielsen overnights, and a 6 share. That beat the 1.2/5 that ABC put up.
Big Bang Theory did a 2.3 on CBS, and Young Sheldon a 1.9, both shows flat. Mom did a flat 1.4 and Life in Pieces grew 22% to 1.1, before SWAT went up 13% to 0.9. ABC had Grey's Anatomy at 1.6 and Station 19 at 1.0, then Scandal at 0.9. All three were level with last week.
Fox and NBC both did a 0.7/3. For Fox, Gotham rated a flat 0.7 and Showtime at the Apollo grew 17% to 0.7.
For NBC, Superstore scored a 0.8 and A.P. Bio a 0.6, both flat. After a Will & Grace repeat, Champions lost 20% for a 0.4, before Chicago Fire rated a flat 1.0.
Univision scored a 0.5/2.
The CW did a 0.4/2, with Supernatural down 17% to 0.5 and Arrow at a flat 0.4.
Telemundo also rated a 0.4/2. | |
| | | |
| • BRUCE CRAWFORD will retire from his position as chairman of the Omnicom Group board its annual meeting on May 22 and will be succeeded by current CEO JOHN WREN, who will assume both titles. Crawford has been Omnicom board chairman since 1995. Wren was elected president of Omnicom in 1996 and became CEO in 1997.
• STEVE CHUNG was named to the newly created position of chief digital officer at Fox Television Stations. He joins Fox from Frankly Inc., the cloud platform he founded and served as CEO. Prior to that, he held executive roles at Goldman Sachs, CDNetworks, BlueRun Ventures, We Heart It and Dragon TV.
| |
| | | | |
