Latest news with #DemoDirect
Yahoo
14-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
How Warner Bros. Discovery is letting brands tap ‘newstalgia' for its IP
This story was originally published on Marketing Dive. To receive daily news and insights, subscribe to our free daily Marketing Dive newsletter. NEW YORK — Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) kicked off the final day of the 2025 upfronts by comparing the media ecosystem to something featured on an episode of HGTV favorite 'Fixer Upper': a house that worked beautifully for so long but doesn't meet its owners' needs anymore. 'It's time to renovate, modernize the design, improve efficiencies and build something even more valuable for the years ahead,' said Ryan Gould, co-president of U.S. advertising sales for the company. 'We see this as an opportunity to collectively rethink, reimagine and reinvent our industry.' At The Theater at Madison Square Garden on Wednesday (May 14), WBD made its pitch as the blueprint for a remodeled media company, three years since it was formed via merger and two years since it launched its flagship Max streaming service. And in a move acknowledging the importance of brand equity, the service will return to the HBO Max name this summer. 'You're probably thinking, 'Wow, these guys really love to rebrand.' Well, we know it's been about a few years, so that's probably our track record,' joked Shauna Spenley, global CMO for streaming at WBD. The rebrand comes on the heels of the streamer's success. The service has doubled its U.S. ad-supported subscribers in the last year, with nearly half of new subscribers choosing that option, and had its best month ever in April, with viewership up 20% year-over-year. The new-old name could also help it cut through a cluttered media landscape. 'Streaming has become a lot like fast fashion,' Spenley said. 'People are saying, 'I'd rather have one great sweater than five.'' WBD will look to address efficiency with the launch of two new solutions: DemoDirect and Neo. The former simplifies and unifies traditional demographic-based buying across the company's portfolio and promises unified scale, quality control, customizable campaigns and cross-platform extension, giving ad buyers one plan, one CPM and one invoice. The latter is a new ad platform that brings the company's premium video inventory — spanning streaming, linear, free ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) and syndication — into one interface with real-time transparency and full control over ad buys. The company also revealed WBD Storyverse, a new initiative that seeks to give advertisers access to its vast troves of IP for custom campaigns and other amplification across its platforms. Executives noted the success that brands including State Farm (with its Batman-focused March Madness campaign) and Unilever's Hellmann's (with its Super Bowl reboot of 'When Harry Met Sally') have had integrating with classic WBD content. Along with access to the WBD portfolio, brand partners will receive access to in-house strategists and creative experts, production resources, and distribution and third-party licensing support. Executives called out the ability of brands to engage with younger consumers who are just now discovering WBD classics including 'The Matrix,' 'Family Matters' and 'Friends.' 'Gen Z and millennials are embracing these timeless franchises, reboots, series and sequels,' Gould said. 'We're tapping into the massive library of our content, all to help you create 'newstalgia': campaigns that build culture in fresh and unexpected ways.' The new advertiser solutions build on previously introduced tools designed to maximize impact, reduce waste and improve transparency. Moments, a contextual tool powered by Kerv's artificial intelligence technology, led to a six-times increase in consumer actions, while commerce-focused Shop with Max tools led to a 12-times increase in product page visits. Meanwhile, WBD's converged media product StreamX led to a 14% average incremental reach and lowered cost per impression. 'We're building the future of our own design together,' said Bobby Voltaggio, co-president of U.S. advertising sales at WBD. 'You can expect us to continue taking bold leaps forward, embracing the new technology to unlock it with more potential, giving you more power and control to drive truly great results.' Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Yahoo
14-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Inside the Warner Bros. Discovery Upfront: Branding Whiplash and 'The ‘White Lotus' Effect'
Taking a seat at The Theater at Madison Square Garden on Wednesday morning, I scanned the crowd, soaking wet from the rain, and wondered how many gathered at the Warner Bros. Discovery upfront had any idea that they were about to get punked. Two years after shoving the rebrand of streamer Max (née HBO Max) down advertiser throats, the 'HBO' is being surgically reattached to the platform on which the company's future hinges. Curiously, this development wasn't front-loaded in the presentation. It came 30 minutes in, after multiple mentions of 'Max,' when Casey Bloys arrived. More from The Hollywood Reporter Returning the HBO to Max Is Latest Sign of Potential Warner Bros. Discovery Split HGTV Is Going to Renovate the 'Bachelor' Mansion Warners Reverses Course: Changes Max's Name Back to HBO Max 'With the course we are on and the strong momentum we're enjoying,' said Bloys, 'we believe HBO Max far better represents our current consumer proposition.' The proposition was received in the room with laughter and a smattering of 'oh wows,' though no one appeared to interpret the news as a joke. If anybody was grieving Max, they did so quietly or they skipped right to acceptance. 'The good news is I have a drawer full of stationery from the last round,' said the Chairman and CEO, HBO and Max Content, whose title likely changed mid-presentation. 'So I'm all set.' An annual brag-fest thrown with the sole purpose of selling advertising space is an unusual venue to wave a white flag, but Bloys had fun with it — as did Max (Ahem, HBO Max) CMO Shauna Spenley. She went through her own spiel in front of a mocked-up meme of HBO Go, HBO Now, HBO Max and Max all sharing the same screen. Though Warner Bros. Discover CEO David Zaslav was notably absent from the pageantry, there was no shortage of executives. In fact, the company was the first this week to populate its presentation with more suits than actors. There was a lot of telling, not showing, especially when newly installed co-presidents of ad sales, Ryan Gould and Robert Voltaggio, frontloaded the presentation with an extended spiel about various branded initiatives: something called 'Storyverse,' an in-house studio called 'Courageous' and sales tools DemoDirect and NEO. A pre-recorded Conan O'Brien attempted to explain how the latter worked, but he took it about as seriously as expected. Are there not conference rooms and Zoom calls for this stuff? The strongest case for advertising came with the so-called 'White Lotus Effect,' which got more oxygen than any other single piece of programming. Spenley cited ample brand partnerships and noted the correlation between the show's locales with tourism booms. 'I don't want to brag, but it feels like we're building national economies out here,' she said. The screen behind Spenley switched to a tile of White Lotus tweets. One read, 'I wonder what Lachlan and Saxon are doing for National Sibling Day,' much to the room's delight. So bullish is WBD on media buyers' appetite for The White Lotus, cast members Carrie Coon, Michelle Monaghan and Leslie Bibb (aka 'The Big Blonde Blob') opened the show with a cute bit during which they complimented each other's skin with increasing puffery. 'Are we slipping back into character?' Asked Coon. 'Because if we are, I'm going to need a cocktail.' Me too, Carrie. But the star power diminished after that, only rebounding at the very last minute when Shaquille O'Neal joined DC's James Gunn and Peter Safran to screen the latest Superman trailer. As one of several media giants boasting a storied film studio to present this week, it was notable how little attention was paid to WBD's film slate. The stunning success of Sinners, its own movie, got more attention during Michael B. Jordan's cameo at the Amazon pitch. Instead, the presentation devoted its precious time to other matters … like CNN CEO Mark Thompson heralding the arrival of a new weather app and Tony Shalhoub (God bless him) opining for minutes on the universality of bread. After 90 minutes, there was finally time to acknowledge that Minecraft, which just grossed $1 billion at the global box office, will eventually land on HBO Max. Before the too-little-too-late nod to movies — before everything, in fact — the start of the show was heralded by someone from Actors Equity dressed up like one of those demonic nuns from the Dune movies. As people settled into their seats for what would be a nearly two-hour ordeal, her cryptic voice over promised 'a creative endeavor that will redefine what's possible' and 'a future that will lead the culture and heighten entertainment.' It was a comically lofty promise that, not unlike NBCUniversal's just two days earlier, didn't quite pan out on stage. But who am I to hate on somebody for drinking a bit too much of their own sand worm juice? Best of The Hollywood Reporter 22 of the Most Shocking Character Deaths in Television History A 'Star Wars' Timeline: All the Movies and TV Shows in the Franchise 'Yellowstone' and the Sprawling Dutton Family Tree, Explained
