DIGITAL REPORT The biggest challenge this year will be online and offline collaboration Carat s David Verklin Eight movers and shakers cite top digital trend or challenge PAGE S 6 Advertising Age March 5 2007 S 1 Live Earth concert is the greatest showcase for what our services can do MSN s Joanne Bradford Q and A with chief media officer of the Microsoft portal PAGE S 2 Special Report STICKING POINT Other online giants have tried before but MSN has found an online content model that draws people into portal By ABBEY KLAASSEN aklaassen crain com madison meets vine but how does Hollywood meet Silicon Valley Or does it Those are questions that have plagued the online ad industry for the past two years as broadband penetration has grown people have shown a willingness to plop down in front of the computer monitor for everything from three minute clips to three hour baseball games and a robust market for online video advertising has developed Online giants response to this environment has varied but it doesn t indicate a mass drive toward generating new content yet Google hasn t shown any interest in creating its own content AOL has been an early proponent of aggregation working See CONTENT on Page S 2 E UK MD LIA WIL S 2 March 5 2007 Advertising Age Content DIGITAL REPORT One of the first series spawned was Chef to the Rescue meant to be an edgier approach to food programming MSN shopped it around to the usual package goods marketers and Kraft From Page S 1 with corporate sibling Warner Bros to syndi Foods was interested But Kraft said suburban cate second run TV shows Yahoo took a moms were less interested in sitting down to strong stance and then reversed it Mi watch funny entertaining cooking content oncrosoft on the other hand has most recently line than they were in using content that bet much of its content efforts on branded en would help them plan better meals Could tertainment MSN program the show in that direction Yahoo hedged from its early stance in Having the marketer at the table right away which Lloyd Braun said a little too much a little helped guide the direction Ms Troberman says too soon declaring he would create an I Love She took the idea back to the creative folks at Lucy moment on the internet a phenome Reveille where we had our moments she says non in other words that would rival the one in of the reception to the change in direction But 1950s TV when one in four households we learned a lot about the consumer who really watched Lucille Ball was the target for this kind of programming Perhaps even hiring someone like Mr Microsoft knew it had to create online conBraun a successful TV executive who green tent differently from how the big budget stulighted such hits as ABC s Lost and Desper dio world goes about making hit TV shows Afate Housewives set the bar too high Today ter all the economics are very different Mr Yahoo does have the seeds of a very successful Bennett says in the case of The Big Debate model in its online show The Nine where a they created for the price it would cost to charismatic VJ counts down the top nine make a fairly low budget 22 minute TV pi webfinds of the web that day lot 20 three minute episodes The trick is eschewing established writers directors and talREVEILLE DEAL ROLLING ent in favor of up and comers They re edgier Just months after Mr Braun issued a bit of a and less expensive Mr Bennett says mea culpa a new stance much more humble Marketers are figuring that out as well Anand realistic Microsoft Corp announced am heuser Busch has launched Bud tv relying on bitious content plans of its own Last year at such talent and American Express Co has a Microsoft s Strategic Account Summit it tout content studio ed a content deal with TV production company Despite the interest in online branded enReveille that would bring a new model to the tertainment one of the biggest challenges reway content is done on the web mains building up strong enough Marketers have learned as we ve reach and frequency to break all learned painfully some of the modthrough els that have worked in other media Building an audience takes time don t work very well online says on the web because usage is so distribGayle Troberman senior directoruted even more than diversified TV branded entertainment and experiviewing of today Ms Troberman ences team at MSN says While some brands have proFor the MSN portal which already BENNETT duced stellar virals for every one attracted a massive audience the funthat s a hit many go unwatched and damental question was how to get unnoticed people to spend more time on the site MSN maintains that a big portal Big growth comes from deepencan provide frequency needed to ing the relationship with the audibuild an audience Kraft s investing ence says Rob Bennett general in a season of Chef to the Rescue manager entertainment and video gave us six months to get it right she services at MSN If you can get TROBERMAN says We can find those consumers everyone to do one or two or three across Live Mail Messenger Office more things you become a more central part of Live the MSN home page MSNBC even their online experience they become more Xbox and remind them to come back loyal and they become more valuable to adAdds Eric Bader senior VP digital at Mevertisers dia Vest New York which worked with MSN That was the primary reasoning behind on behalf of Kraft If you want to put on a film adding original content to MSN The portal festival a long way from the highway good launched its first original material last year luck But if you have an exit and a lot of signage with a show called Fan Club which followed around it you re going to do better an Illinois minor league baseball team the Of course there s a trade off to partnering Schaumburg Flyers It was interactive view with the people who have distribution Video ers could vote for the lineup and be voyeurs in assets owned solely by an advertiser as opthe dugout and locker room The show didn t posed to those co created with an online partget great audience numbers but it proved that ner aren t beholden to the restrictions of a mepeople viewing the series stayed on the site dia company and can travel around the web longer and became more involved however the marketer likes and Mr Bader Microsoft s Reveille partnership was creat says can be amortized over other exposures be ed last spring MSN would seed a production it on a brand s own site on TV or on video onfund that Reveille could draw upon to