You can produce a strip, prime time chat show, even with a high cost talent like Leno, for a fraction of the investment required for an hour drama or half hour sitcom. Period.  On the “Zucker is wise” front, you have lower cost, less risk of audience rejection of 95% of your original offerings (if they like Leno, they will just keep coming back and NBC can pre-book that), and you get to plant your flag in the “new”  10pm slot with a tried and true brand while others must follow.  If broadcast does become the repository for reality and event TV, NBC might reap the rewards of being first to embrace.

On the other side, you give up the major windfall that the occasional hit narrative delivers here and abroad for years and years to come in syndication. NO one will argue that chat is evergreen (though original reality formats may be).  I’m having a hard time trying to figure out how the move toward inexpensive programming will balance out against the loss of the annuity of a “Friends” or “Seinfeld”.  Part of the answer may be a top to bottom embrace of the need for reinvention of the overall approach to broadcast, cable, and digital and who becomes who in the content zoo.  I’m betting on NBC.

If the Leno project works, NBC owns 10pm and has the luxury of exporting the model and success to 8-10 pm.  NBC reinvents broadcast prime time.  Where do the dramas and quality narrative go?  NBC’s cable unit.  Their cable outlets have been their success story for years and, under Jeff Gaspin, have become quality content profit centers.  There is no reason why FX should own the quality ribbon. Of course, that move will necessitate lower production budgets and the current scripted programming sources will go kicking and screaming.  As Zucker mentioned however, lower cost doesn’t have to mean lower quality.  Examples of budget and content bravery abound.  Lower budgets, lower risk, even bigger windfalls when they find a hit—and the ability to genuinely brand their cable channels.

And what about digital?  NBC is banking on Hulu.  Fine for now.  But if they genuinely want to be the Mother of Reinvention, they must actively pursue a custom strategy for serving the digital landscape.  Yes, they will offer their shows on line.  Fine.  But for a growing and evolving digital generation it won’t be enough to shoehorn “TV” into the content offerings.  The audience will increasingly demand customized, personal, quality content that is crafted for who they are, where they consume, how they consume and what they wish to consume.  They won’t be sold, won’t be washed over with message, and won’t engage unless you invite them in.  No one has the answers yet. But if NBC wants to genuinely lead the way and reap the rewards of audience loyalty, THIS is where the tough work needs to be done.  What does the online user between 7 and 11pm want?  Has anyone really bothered to find out?  That answer will be the linchpin to success.

NBC will figure out the new world of  broadcast, it will build on its cable success and we’ll see if it can address digital.   If they bother with all three prongs, they will clean everyone’s clock by being the content source that creates the 360 degree, on demand, content and distribution plan that is the future.

In today’s Brandweek.com, T. L. Stanley, confirms our suspicions, and notes that brands are dipping a bit more than a toe into these waters and reaping the rewards.  Stanley outlines the key elements that make brand integration a genuine tool as opposed to the hail Mary of yesteryear.

This time around, content and brands are on more equal footing.  It’s no longer the juvenile business built around the “wow, I can put stuff into stuff on line and….”  These days, brands are (1) looking to get involved during the nascent stages of content development; (2) willing to accept less overt, less “salesy” integration; and (3) partnering with content producers who are willing to find ways to use integration organically with story and format.

Those three key elements make me hopeful for a true creative partnership between companies like mine and brands across virtually every vertical.  We would add a few more arguments to the mix as well as some wishes and warnings to keep this momentum going toward an effective brand / entertainment marriage.

When you look at the cost basis for digital branded entertainment, you can’t beat the potential ROI in terms awareness and even conversion.  But that is just the tip of the “why integrate” pyramid.  The opportunities and results also depend upon how well we can collectively  exploit the public’s increasing willingness to accept branding in content.  They have a specific set of demands that we need to deliver upon in everything we produce and distribute:

(1) make it engaging, entertaining, informative and great or shut up;

(2) make it authentic and honest (as opposed to a sore thumb interrupting my content);

(3) make it an invitation to connect with versus “buy” your brand; and

(4) earn my attention by delivering something of personal value (entertaining and something I care about).

If we develop and produce content that fits this bill, there will be no need to have another branded content nuclear winter.  Instead, our business with the brands will grow, develop, evolve and prosper.  The seedlings are all here, right now.  Creatives have a better understanding of how to pick and choose content that is customized for a given brand.  Brands are rightfully demanding to be involved early on.  Creatives’ fear that brands will “ruin” the content is not proving to be rational.  It behooves the brands to have their say while letting the producers produce (ahh, if only televison were like that).  All of this means that our ability to work with brands on more than just the on-the-nose, fact-based product content is here and, hopefully, here to stay.

Consumers are more willing to embrace longer form web series covering every genre.  New narrative series, including our —here comes the shamless plug—–”Operation Midnight Climax”, a dramatic series about a true-life black ops, mind control CIA experiment, are getting a lot of attention.  “In the Motherhood” and “Haute and Bothered”, for example, have been seen millions of times.  Perhaps we aren’t far away from brands thinking of shows like this, as a go-to branding device as opposed to an experiment?

What happens next depends upon both sides of the equation.  Brands need to step up, spend on digital content, stop retreating to the more traditional media, and deliver quality content to the consumer “on their terms”.  We producers need to do our part to make sure brands and consumers have a positive experience so that we don’t have to wait another 6 or 7 years to have at it again. If we all stick to the rules of engagement outlined above, I think we might just turn this into a business.

Pfizer is pulling off a branding master stroke.  They are giving away certain prescription drugs to those who have lost their jobs and health insurance due to the recession.  Put yourself in the consumers’ shoes.  “I’m broke.  I can’t afford the meds that I have relied upon.  I really need them.  Wait, the drug company is going to let me have them for free until I get back on my feet?  Wow.”   These consumers are never going to forget this.  Pfizer delivers a message of caring about their audience, they deliver a tangible, high stakes benefit, and they do so at a time of need.  Nice.

Hyundai pulled off the same move even earlier with their “we’ll buy it back” offer.  In each of these instances, the brands showed up and stepped up for the consumer on the consumers’ terms.  That is the part that makes it memorable and that makes for brand loyalty. From the time the mouse removed the thorn from the lion’s paw to today, a friend, in those times of need, is a friend indeed.  Like the lion, the public won’t forget.  Now all we have to do is get brands to apply these same principles in all of their efforts, at all times.

In an Ad Age article today, several key marketing executives point out that the worst may be over and that it is time for brands to start branding again.   Richard McDonald, senior VP-global marketing of Fender, the musical instrument brand makes it clear that the time is now. “The cost of raw materials is going up, and marketing is the only thing that offsets those increases. You have to build brand value and spend on marketing.”

It will be interesting to see how these brave souls do.  By no longer taking the Ostrich approach, will they get a leg up on competition, attract new consumer converts and otherwise grab market share?  Maybe the bigger question is that which I posed in the last post.  What about the brands like Hershey that decided to damn the recession, spend last Fall when the sky was falling and zig when all others were zagging into the long, spend not winter?   My guess is that both will be rewarded, but that those genuinely brave brand souls will show a more quantitative, qualitative, and measurable bang for their buck.

Will the spending surge be different this time?  Will marketing dollars flow toward digital as opposed to the traditional?  Stay tuned.

In short, one could argue that ALL consumers are becoming Simplifiers looking for value, experience, and a participatory relationship with brands.  All we have to do is embrace the equation and do the math.

Peter J. Schankowitz

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Times are tough, especially if you’re planning a wedding.  As the business of weddings changes, happily engaged couples are also adjusting their plans by hosting their own interactive websites in lieu of invites, and using video registries (don’t forget to ask for the Shamwow!) to cut back.  One question you might want to ask if you’re planning a wedding: do I really need to hire a wedding videographer or can I enlist the talents of my wedding party?  If you abhor the idea of anyone but an esteemed video professional capturing the emotion of your day, stop reading this post, type “wedding video” into Google and start perusing the over 26 million choices.

Consider this: we have video cameras on almost every type of smart-phone (even the new, upcoming iPhone).  We have tape-less HD video cameras that fit into the palm of your hand.  You can even broadcast live video from your phone with sites like Qik.  One of my favorite parts in a wedding video is the interview portion where your esteemed videographer and his/her 3200k floodlight that melts the rouge off Aunt Barbara and makes Uncle Jerome squint, sets out to capture “personal moments”.  This is effective, but is it really personal?

If your goal is to capture the emotion of the day, then what might a UGC wedding be like?  You’ve painstakingly narrowed down that list of attendees and been careful to only include those you consider worthy of the money you spent on their meal.  Why not make them earn it?  Every one of your invites could be armed with a digital video camera or still camera, capturing the tender and hilarious moments as they unfold.  You could ask people to document peoples’ journey to the wedding and other moments leading up to, during and following your special day.  These “moments” could be cut together into one large video or several pieces.  You could ask friends and family to cut their own DVD version or people could host individual video clips on a free, video site like Vimeo.

Wedding stories are memorable because they’re personal.  And sometimes what happens is worth mentioning and is just as important as what is carefully rehearsed, forgotten and then laughed at later.  A UGC wedding would uniquely capture perhaps the single most relevant day in your life, where you’re surrounded by the people you love the most, in a way you may not get to experience again.  My only suggestion would be, to refrain from making UGC or professional video a part of your bachelor/bachelorette party and wedding night…..then again, wouldn’t that make a great website!

Zach Jordan

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