Viceland

A new ad model for TV?

 

I’ve written about VICE several times over the past couple of years.

I became a fan of their news specials produced for HBO. Vice has expanded rapidly. Earlier this year, they took over H2, formerly the History Channel 2 on cable TV.

Their 24-hour channel is known as Viceland.

You may be interested because they are bucking the trend for ever tinier attention spans and the celebrity-fueled news of the broadcast networks.

They offer 12- to 15-minute pieces on important issues not often covered by CNN and FOX.

Plus, their young reporters, as well as the way they report these stories, have brought them younger viewers, something most News “experts” said was impossible.

The new channel, Viceland, has a maximum of 8 minutes of commercials an hour. That is significantly less than any of the other news offerings on TV.

And in certain shows or dayparts there might not even be commercials, with the potential for programming to be sponsored in different ways, a person familiar with the network said.

Commercial clutter has been one of the biggest complaints among TV advertisers.”

If advertisers realize there are too many spots in each break (and too many breaks) on TV, you know they have to be thinking the same thing about Radio.

If you’re running a radio station or cluster, you should be thinking of new ways to produce higher revenue while reducing overall commercial minutes.

Why couldn’t Ford sponsor your Morning Show, with six 60-second spots each hour, and on-air billboards by your talent?

How do you know Geico won’t pony up to “own” your Middays or Afternoons with a similar arrangement?

Exclusivity, and less clutter, will almost certainly result in less frequent tune-out, especially in-car.

It’s an interesting thought for creative GMs and owners.

You can dig deeper by reading the full Ad Age article HERE.