How to Harness the Media Evolution -The Big TV Conference

The first Big TV Conference, held in NYC in September, focused on a range of issues in the TV ecosystem from a variety of perspectives. But the Leit motif of the two day event revolved around data and its impact on the business. To buyers and sellers, data is as vital as ever. To content creators, data plays a greater role in understanding what is resonating with viewers, becoming, by extension, a crucial part of the creative process.

Framing the Issues

With radical transformation impacting traditional business models, how can companies manage the future? Domenic Dimeglio, Senior Vice President Distribution and Operations, CBS Interactive, framed the discussion by asking, “what is the business model that fills in the white space with consumers?” while Robert Weisbord, Chief Revenue Officer, Sinclair Broadcast Group, noted, “There has to be something unique about the offering.”

Executives can no longer complacently work towards simply meeting short term goals. Annual revenue budgets are only the start. “We have to prepare for a different marketplace with streaming cord cutting and much more data,” stated Jon Steinlauf, Chief U.S. Advertising Sales Officer, Discovery. It often requires creating internal teams focused strictly on the future. “We have a team within Discovery that was further along than we were to position better for the future,” Steinlauf added.

For Krishan Bhatia, Executive Vice President, Business Operations and Strategy, NBCUniversal, “Because we are a global distribution and content company, we spent two to three years integrating our portfolio to create value together.” This macro level approach could not be achieved unless there is internal cooperation and buy-in. “Culture is a driver of success,” he concluded.

Audiences

Kathleen Finch, Chief Lifestyle Brands Officer, Discovery, when asked how she would reach audiences of the future noted that it will be, “hard to know what the market will bear,” in terms of costs. “I don’t know what I am spending,” she added. The real challenge is measurement which, as Adam Rattner, Executive Vice President, Managing Director, Samsung, Starcom, explained, “Until we get great measurement it will be hard to monetize.”

For Lisa Heimann, Executive Vice President, Corporate Research and Strategy, NBCUniversal, “No one data source is good for anything. Which data is good at answering what questions?” She added, “Sometimes we need a census data set, sometimes we need to connect to viewing using panel data. The key is how we are looking at and using that data. Sometimes we look at specific sources and other times we rely on data science group using machine learning and AI.” For her it is essentially comes down to a mix of all data sources.

“We have to go beyond looking at overnight ratings,” she warned, but added, “Well, maybe for sports or news but it is dangerously unreliable. Not all viewing is captured by Nielsen,” because content across platforms, “need to have the same ad load.”

Advertisers

Advertisers are demanding two things from content providers; “Transparency of data for cross platform measurement and the creation of really compelling content. These are CEO-level questions,” stated Rattner.  For Sam Armando, Senior Vice President National Video Intelligence and Investment, Spark Foundry, there are measurement challenges that need to be addressed. “Clients want single source measurement to capture viewers across all screens,” he stated, “We have a lot more (data) pieces but the pieces don’t fit together.”

Researchers are stepping up to meet advertiser needs. Tom Ziangus, Senior Vice President, Research, AMC Networks is committed to, “Closing the loop,” in the consumer journey and, “Working closely with agency partners,” on addressing this challenge. “It is all about collaboration,” as he added, “We must figure it out together. What are the best practices and learning from our mistakes.” Don Robert, Executive Vice President, A+E Networks, confirmed that approach. “We take a consultative approach to try and figure it out. We are very committed and believe in the power of TV.”

Content Creators

There is considerable work being done to track and quantify how people discover and sample shows, “how they catch up and which programs they stick with and which ones they don’t,” noted Heimann.  “Content is forever now. How can we optimize it? Sometimes it is more down the road.”

For Courtney Thomasma, Executive Director, BBC America, AMC Networks, “We have more data than we know what to do it. We have ten times the amount of data than we had ten years ago. There is the danger of getting lost in the noise and quantity of data. How do we fuse? Who has access?” she asked.  Her solution is, “more experienced research minds to strategize the data,” which I heartily support.

And the numbers don’t have to be big for a show to be considered a success. Passion for a show counts which requires a, “Holistic sense of who our audiences are and weighting which audiences are most valuable for us,’ she added. Using research insights from one passionate show can often lead to the next. Using data insights, BBCA realized that Killing Eve was a good replacement when Orphan Black, with a passionate fan base, ended its run.

For Donna D’Alessandro, Senior Vice President, Programming and Strategy Insights, Discovery,  who started her career in Research, the challenge is the, “need to look fresh and real in speaking to a consumer right now”  because programmers only have a short window to engage the viewer. “If a viewer turns it on and thinks, it’s not for me, they will turn it off and never come back.”

Conclusion

With all of the challenges and opportunities in this Brave New World of Media, Ziangus summed it up rather succinctly. “We are a lot smarter and a lot dumber,” he quipped. That rings true to me. For all of the data acumen and insights we harvest, sometimes it seems as if we have more questions than answers. And that is perhaps the biggest challenge of all.

This article first appeared in www.MediaVillage.com