Sales Execs Claim Strong Hand Going Into Upfront

It could be Groundhog Day at the upfront.

As most parts of the television industry go through revolutionary change as technology gives viewers more choices, the main way advertising is bought the annual upfront bazaar stubbornly refuses to get canceled.

Despite all the talk about data, automation, programmatic, audience buying and precision targeting, TV networks will sell about $19 billion worth of advertising during a series of one-on-one negotiations usually sealed with handshakes between high-level executives. Indeed, the upfront has outlived the terms of many of the executives who've predicted its demise.

This year's upfront is also expected to be a rerun of last year's strong market, if you listen to top network sales executives. Scatter in second quarter is extremely strong and that's across the board, Jo Ann Ross, president and chief revenue officer at CBS, said. We are well-positioned going into upfront. It's the same every year. You do the math. It's supply and demand.

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I think we continue to see broadcast being strong, said Rita Ferro, president, advertising sales, at Disney/ABC Television, who conceded that clients are concerned because ratings are down and they don't want to pay double-digit increases. I totally get that.

CBS president and chief revenue officer Jo Ann Ross struck up the band at last years upfront.

According to Bruce Lefkowitz, executive vice president for ad sales at Fox Networks Group, there are two undeniable facts and you can't argue them. And that is ratings supply continues to shrink and demand continues to be relatively consistent. Those things historically translate to a strong upfront.

With media company ad-sales departments consolidated to sell larger portfolios, each network has its own priorities going into the upfront. It's all about deal-making, Lefkowitz said. It's no longer just looking at the math. But I think you'd be hard-pressed to have anyone on either side of the desk not acknowledge that it's a strong marketplace.

I think the idea that it will be a stronger market than last year is a pretty safe assumption, concurred Mark Marshall, executive vice president of entertainment at NBCUniversal.

Shake It Up

NBCU has been trying to shake things up. Last year, NBCU said it was earmarking $1 billion of its inventory for campaigns based on data-driven audience segments.

Data has become a big buzzword in the TV advertising business. Some networks are hoping that by shifting from using shrinking Nielsen ratings based on broad demographics, such as women 18-49, to specific marketing targets, they can make TV ad campaigns more efficient and effective and TV inventory more valuable.

While NBCU didn't hit the billion-dollar target, we had growth across the board in it, Marshall said. More and more people want to test and be involved on that side of it.

This year, NBCU has joined 21st Century Fox, Turner and Viacom in the OpenAP consortium, which aims to standardize data-driven targets and make audiences simpler to buy. Marshall expects audience buying to be a part of most of its upfront conversations.

NBCU also introduced a new metric called CFlight, which it will use to count all of the people viewing ads in its programs, whether they air on broadcast or are streamed on digital platforms. NBCU wants to use CFlight to monetize all of the eyeballs it attracts, while at the same time putting advertisers in front of as many consumers as possible.

Marshall said CFlight was getting a great reception from agencies as an excellent step toward the kind of cross-platform measurement the industry needs.

Forward Together

Disney/ABC's Ferro noted that many networks have sold ads based on a combination of linear and digital viewership for years.

We all want to get to a place where we have one currency across all screens and instances, she said. I don't think it's that easy to do. If not we would have done it already.

Last year, Disney/ABC consolidated the ad sales units for its broadcast, cable and kids units under Ferro. This year, cable network Freeform will be getting some attention at the ABC upfront presentation, which will use the theme Forward Together.

This year, Disney put the ad sales teams for both Disney/ABC Television and ESPN in one division under Kevin Mayer, chairman of direct-to-consumer and international, clearing the way for clients to make deals that span all of the company's assets.

This month, Disney launched Luminate, which is creating data-driven advertising products for ABC, ESPN, Freeform and Disney's other TV networks.

Now we have one boss, and it actually makes working together easier to do from a client perspective, Ferro said. We've done a bunch of client and agency pitches together [with ESPN] and there's real opportunity that comes from those, and we think there's going to be even more as this accelerates around the data and technology and product play to really drive that forward.

Having Freeform at the upfront follows a joint development meeting between ABC and Freeform.

We got amazing feedback from clients, Ferro said. They loved having them together because it really resonates when you have that content, you can actually see the difference in what the audience is that you're delivering across those platforms.

ABC News will also be a part of the presentation. In the last 12 months, I think there is no content that has been more relevant than news content, Ferro said.

CBS also realigned its ad sales org

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