☀️ Just How Well Is NETFLIX's Ad Tier Doing
Sports HULU gets a name & logo / John Wick gets new spinoff / APPLE gets new heist series
Mornin! This is Sean McNulty (connect with me on LinkedIn here if ya like), and here’s the Hollywood + Media news to know on THURSDAY, May 16, 2024.
Where let’s round out our fine week highlighting that SVOD and FAST advertising is the place to be for marketers (and their 💰) . . . with this NY Times read highlighting a significant social media advertising inefficiency issue, and ongoing sexual predator problem that it still has.
This was quite a read — a woman selling children’s jewelry via IG posts, featuring images of a 5-year-old girl modeling the items, selected a campaign aimed at reaching users interested in “parenting, children, ballet” and other topics that were noted for appeal to female demos.
Upon activation, the ads went to almost entirely adult men. When the Times replicated the campaign themselves, the ads got a similar result, and “drew the attention of convicted sex offenders and other men whose accounts indicated a sexual interest in children or who wrote sexual messages.”
So, maybe TV has a future after all! Although, now that I think about it — kinda odd that I didn’t hear the term “brand safety” once in the Upfronts presentations I attended this week 🤔 (for the record, The Wakeup and its author are very brand friendly, and has all of the “I’s” you love — KPIs, ROIs, FBIs — whatever ya need).
PLUS: Sports HULU, it’s been real — meet VENU!
Yes, that’s the name the FOX/WBD/DIS contingent is going with for their new sports-centric streaming bundle. Oh it’s pronounced “venue” btw, which . . . kinda has DAZN-overtones to me personally (although nowhere near as bad). Just kinda reads “veenu” to me.
Either way — we’ll see how long Sports HULU sticks around. Here’s the logo and an animation.
THEN: The WNBA GOLDEN STATE expansion team launching next season will be called the VALKYRIES.
AND: Here are all of the NFL team schedules for this season, including the CHIEFS in one of the NETFLIX Christmas Day games #AVerySwiftChristmas (a film which I’m sure will be coming to NETFLIX in 2025).
The CHIEFS are also playing AMAZON’s Black Friday game this year vs. the RAIDERS. Really hope Mahomes and Travis stay healthy this year.
WAKEUP BOX OFFICE POLL
IF is tracking around $40 Million this weekend, so let’s go with 3 brackets:
HOUSEKEEPING: After a long Upfronts week, and the fact that many of you are flying back to LA today which hopefully makes for a slow news cycle — I may take the day off tomorrow if it’s a relatively slow day.