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Zalaznick, Once a Programming Force at NBCUniversal, Is Leaving

September 27, 2013 by

Lauren Zalaznick, whose leadership at Bravo turned that cable network into a lucrative asset for its parent, NBCUniversal, is leaving the company, Steve Burke, the chief executive of NBCUniversal, told the staff in a memo released on Friday.

Because Ms. Zalaznick had already been moved away from control of Bravo and several other divisions she had led, including Oxygen, the Style network and Telemundo, to an amorphous position overseeing new business opportunities, mainly on the digital side, her departure was not seen as surprise inside the company.

NBC’s decision to release the news not in an official announcement but rather through a memo — and on a Friday afternoon — signaled the company’s desire to simply move on without calling undue attention to Ms. Zalaznick’s departure.

In his memo, Mr. Burke merely mentioned Ms. Zalaznick’s leaving and praised her contributions. No reason for her departure was included. But longtime NBC executives — who insisted on not being identified because the memo was intended to be the only company comment on the move — suggested that the departure was a result of an internal power struggle with NBCUniversal’s other top cable entertainment executive, Bonnie Hammer.

In February, Mr. Burke promoted Ms. Hammer to a position overseeing all NBC cable entertainment properties, including those previously led by Ms. Zalaznick.

The new role assigned to Ms. Zalaznick never seemed a perfect fit, several executives who worked with her said, because her strengths were on the operational side of the business, running entertainment networks, with an emphasis on quirky, creative ideas.

Those served her extremely well at Bravo, which she turned into a center for pop-culture programming, identifying and marketing hits like “Project Runway,” “Top Chef” and the many iterations of “Real Housewives.”

Ms. Zalaznick offered no comment. Nor was any mention made of her specific plans for the future. But one senior NBC executive, who has worked with Ms. Zalaznick, described her as upbeat about future moves. “She will pop up somewhere,” the executive said. “And it will be in an operational job that has something to do with pop culture. That’s where she shines.”

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/28/business/media/zalaznick-once-a-programming-force-at-nbcuniversal-is-leaving.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Media Business Tagged With: , ,

Advertising: Mun2 Relies Heavily on Reality Shows Starring Celebrities

April 16, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Diana Mogollón, the general manager of Mun2, and Joe Bernard, the channel’s senior vice president for sales, spoke to a small group of reporters in a warehouse space for the presentation, known as an upfront, where networks introduce their new offerings to advertisers and media buyers.

Among the shows expected to make their debut in 2014 are “Viva los Vargas” a reality series based on Fernando Vargas, a retired Mexican-American boxer, and his family life in Las Vegas. “Reinas de Realty” features two Latinas who are trying to build a real estate business in Southern California and “live the American dream one casa at a time.” “Horoscopos” will follow the daily lives of Vicky and Marisol Terrazas, the two lead singers in the Mexican band Horoscopos de Durango.

The last season of “I Love Jenni,” the reality show featuring Jenni Rivera, the Mexican-American singer and television star who died in a plane crash in December, started on Sunday night and drew 366,000 viewers. “She was our star; she was our friend,” said Ms. Mogollón. Regarding the decision to broadcast the last season of the show, she said, “We met with Jenni’s family and together we decided, in Jenni’s words, to finish what we started.”

Additional programming for the 2013 season will include the second seasons of “Larrymania,” a reality show featuring the Mexican singer Larry Hernández, and “Dub Latino,” a show that profiles Latino celebrities.

Mun2 executives also announced a partnership with Telemundo to show a majority of soccer games from the English Premier League in Spanish.

In a video shown before executives and performers took the stage, Mun2 highlighted the fact that it was viewed in 35 million homes and had 26 million video streams last year. The median age of the Mun2 audience is 29, and 52 percent of them are bilingual, in English and Spanish. Mr. Bernard said the channel had signed 30 new advertisers, in categories like wireless, automotive, family dining and “even Starbucks.”

After the presentation, which included appearances by Mr. Hernández, the Terrazas sisters, and Mr. Vargas and his wife, executives were asked whether Spanish-language reality programming, like Mr. Hernández’s show, would have English subtitles. Ms. Mogollón said yes, similar to how the network handles its telenovelas. “It’s about being authentic,” Ms. Mogollon said. “We don’t want to peg ourselves to one or the other.”

Sergio Alcocer, the president and chief creative officer at LatinWorks, an Austin, Tex.-based advertising agency focusing on Hispanic consumers, said the heavy lineup of reality programming that Mun2 was planning was preferable to importing programming from Latin America. “The reality format is an interesting way to capture the U.S. Latino experience,” which is different from that of Latin Americans, he said in an e-mail.

“The big question in our industry now is, How do we make our brands relevant for young Latinos that speak both languages and consume less mass media?” Mr. Alcocer added.

While Mun2 tries to court the millennial Latino, executives at Telemundo are preparing for their network presentation on May 14. It will include a new slate of telenovelas, including one called “Dama y Obrero” that will feature a love story between an upper-class woman and a working-class man. The show keeps the theme but flips the roles of one of Telemundo’s previous telenovelas, “Una Maid en Manhattan.” In that show, based on the American film “Maid in Manhattan,” the working-class love interest was a woman who is a maid.

“Latinas love to see what we like to call modern, independent achievers,” said Jacqueline Hernández, the chief operating officer at Telemundo.

Telemundo will also present a children’s version of the popular NBC show “The Voice” called “La Voz Kids.” Scheduled for Sunday night, it will feature singers ages 7 to 14 and will be hosted by Daisy Fuentes and Jorge Bernal. To accompany the debut of the show, Telemundo will unveil a mobile application that will allow viewers to peruse social media feeds and access additional content like backstage interviews. The app, which was created using a second screen platform called Zeebox, will be sponsored by ATT.

“Advertisers are extremely interested in multiplatform,” Ms. Hernandez said.

Last year, the network showed its first ever bilingual branded entertainment Web series, called Mia Mundo, which included sponsorships by Verizon Wireless and Chevrolet. The series has been renewed for a second season with Verizon and General Motors as sponsors.

Telemundo executives have been visiting with advertisers in advance of the official upfront presentation this year and are showcasing concepts for two new branded entertainment series. One includes a traveling chef who helps people make fast and healthy meals, the other is a series about a group of college friends. So far, neither has signed a sponsor.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/17/business/media/mun2-relies-heavily-on-reality-shows-starring-celebrities.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

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Product Placements Find Fresh Territory in Telenovelas

August 29, 2011 by Leave a Comment

Coming off a strong upfront season — when advertisers buy commercial time before the season — the two major Spanish language television networks, Telemundo and Univision, are lining up more opportunities for advertisers wanting to incorporate their products into their telenovelas.

While the idea of product placement, or as marketers prefer to call it, branded entertainment, is far from new, the campaigns are becoming increasingly sophisticated with elements that take the products from the telenovela to the Web and mobile devices.

In the Corazón campaign, viewers can watch what the network is calling “webvelas” featuring parallel story lines of original content starring Carlos Ferro, playing Camilo Andrade, and Cynthia Olavarría, playing Sofia Palacios. The mini-Web series, which will be called “Y Vuelvo a Ti,” features the characters doing things like paying for a meal using a Chase debit card or using a Chase ATM.

“You don’t normally think about financial advertisers getting involved in story lines,” said Dan Lovinger, executive vice president for advertising sales and integrated marketing at Telemundo, part of the NBCUniversal unit of Comcast. “It’s a subtle, organic, conscientious effort to make Chase a part of our world.”

Viewers can visit a Chase microsite for the show, follow the series on Facebook, watch it on their mobile phones and get text messages prompting them to tune in to the show or to go online. They can also download music from the Chase commercials and enter a contest to win a behind-the-scenes tour of the Telemundo studios. Mr. Lovinger described the strategy as “organic, but pervasive.”

Telemundo’s biggest competitor, Univision Communications, also has ramped up its product placements with advertisers like General Motors and Domino’s pizza incorporated directly into story lines for its show “Eva Luna,” about an advertising agency.

For a promotion involving the Buick Regal last season, the show’s lead character wins the account and shows the Buick team a commercial the agency created. That same commercial aired on the network and its affiliates apart from the show. In other episodes, the characters were shown ordering pizza from Domino’s for a late-night work session.

“It can’t be contrived, it has to be real,” said Steve Tihanyi, the director of branded entertainment and marketing alliances at General Motors. “In a way it was art imitating life, or life imitating art.”

General Motors will also feature its cars in a new Univision telenovela called “Talisman.”

“As integration has become more and more important for our advertising partners we keep raising the bar on what solutions we can offer,” said David Lawenda, president of advertising sales and marketing for Univision.

Until January, the network carried programming created by the Mexican TV giant Televisa, which limited options for brand integration since the shows were already filmed before being distributed through Univision. Because of the partnership with Televisa, Univision can now work on product placement in Televisa-produced content.

In this year’s upfront presentation, Univision reported commercial sales between $1.7 billion and $1.8 billion. “There’s no question that our dollar-volume growth was largely due to some of these major branded entertainment sponsorships that we sold,” Mr. Lawenda said.

“I think the ultimate possibility is actually to create an entire novela with an advertising partner,” said Mr. Lovinger, of Telemundo. According to Adweek, Telemundo reported a 20 percent increase in upfront sales from last year, to around $400 million.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: August 28, 2011

An earlier version of this article incorrectly referred to Univision’s capabilities in its partnership with Televisa. Univision has filmed its own telenovelas before; the partnership does not allow it to film them for the first time.

The article also incorrectly quoted David Lawenda, president of advertising sales and marketing for Univision. He said there was no question that the company’s dollar-volume growth, not dollar-value growth, was the result of major sponsorships.

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=d061a7008cdfe0202cd3f73078d85ca1

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