Nine: Home of The Arias

Nine’s Program Director, Hamish Turner, and 9TheFix’s Editor, Ashley Spencer, speak about the return of the ARIA Awards to Nine on November 28, joining Nine’s slate of premium live events, including the TV Week Logies and the Academy Awards. Nine will cover the ARIAS across all platforms, including Channel Nine, 9TheFix and 9Honey, for a truly integrated experience.

Turner said: “There has been a real renaissance with Australian music over the last ten years with acts like SIA on the international stage, Vance Joy, Troye Sivan and Tame Impala, so there is great interest in how artists are performing locally and internationally. That is why it is such a great brand to have as part of the Nine family.

“Music is at the core of shaping our youth culture. It has the unique ability to talk to people on an intimate level. Music informs their style, culture and behaviour.

“The great thing about being aligned to a brand like the ARIAS is that it is a celebration of excellence within the music category.

Spencer said: “9TheFix is the home of big entertainment events online and this year we are going to be the home of the ARIAS. We will have everything ARIAS, from the weeks leading up – announcing the nominees and presenters – to the presentation of the awards, getting ready throughout the day, getting glammed up, and everything throughout the night. We’ll have red carpet action, viral show moments, and what you don’t see on TV.

“The great thing about the ARIAS red carpet is that you never know what to expect. It’s a little bit crazy, it’s a little bit fun. In past years we’ve seen Matt Okine dress up as the SIA dancer from her Chandelier video and Drake. We will have all of those can’t-miss moments, completely unexpected. You will never know what’s going to happen. That’s why the ARIAS is a must-tune-in event.”

Speak to your Nine sales representative for broadcast and digital opportunities.

The Effect of Video Advertising Across Different Platforms

Groundbreaking research from respected marketing science academic Professor Karen Nelson-Field has uncovered new insights into how and why video advertising works for brands across different media platforms. 

The first tranche of Professor Nelson-Field’s Benchmark Series, commissioned by ThinkTV, makes a number of significant findings that are designed to help advertisers and their agencies get the best out of video advertising.

Professor Nelson-Field used bespoke A.I. machine-learning technology and eye-tracking software to minimise human bias in her team’s data gathering.

The study found that advertisements viewed by consumers on Facebook, YouTube and TV all generated a positive sales impact for brands.

Of those platforms, TV advertising generated the greatest sales impact and attention, scoring significantly higher than Facebook and YouTube on both measures, with Facebook ahead of YouTube.

Click here to read the full piece on Think TV.

Nine wins ratings for seventh week in a row

Nine has extended its ratings resurgence, beating Seven in main channel share for a seventh week running.

With 26 weeks of the 40-week official ratings year now complete, Seven has won 16 weeks of the year, while Nine has won ten.

The strong performance of The Block has helped Nine haul back Seven which at one point looked set to romp home with a win for the year in near-record time.

Nine won every weekday evening in all the key demographics, from Monday to Friday, while AFL helped Seven to wins on Friday and Saturday. Ten didn’t do better than third all week.

Click here to read the full piece on Mumbrella.

Nine’s Growth Strategy

‘Premium revenue and digital upside will drive future growth’ – Nine’s CEO

There are many factor driving Nine’s improved performance this year, but a couple of indicators that have been largely overlooked by the media will be vital for driving success in the future.

This year, Nine has been much more effective at squeezing more revenue out of commercial partnerships and a big part of Nine’s future will revolve around getting all of its platforms and touch points to work towards growing revenue.

After acknowledging Nine’s excellent local content slate, which has rolled out tent pole hits like the revamped Married At First Sight and wildly successful Australian Ninja Warrior, CEO Hugh Marks tells AdNews its the integrations piece and a 16% lift in ‘premium revenue’ that has helped the network turnaround its performance this year (see graphic below).

“We re also understanding better and engaging better with how we work with clients across our shows and our platforms and that’s starting to deliver us results in a revenue sense,” he said.

Click here to read the full piece on AdNews.

9Now Rebrands As Platform Passes Four Million Sign-Up Mark

Nine’s popular broadcast video on demand (BVOD) platform 9Now has passed the four million sign-up mark and is preparing to launch a new series of television ads to drive more user growth.

The announcement comes as Nine prepares to overhaul the 9Now brand to be closer to the Channel Nine brand and drive up consumer awareness of the platform.

“Nine has led the Australian television industry in asking consumers to sign on and this data is hugely important for both a better consumer and advertiser experience,” said Alex Parsons, Nine’s Chief Digital Officer.

The most recent Nielsen Monthly Online Ratings showed that 9Now was the number one commercial broadcast video on demand platform in Australia in June with a unique audience of 2.349 million.

The brand overhaul will see the 9Now logo aligning with the Channel Nine logo to allow for seamless integration with Nine’s on-air promotion.

The rebrand will also coincide with a major marketing campaign to continue to drive growth, with the first of a series of 9Now TV ads launching on Sunday. 

The first ad features the host of The Block, Scott Cam, and this year’s Blockheads showing how 9Now video content can be consumed “anytime, anywhere”. Other ads for 9Now, featuring major Nine talent, will roll out over the next 12 months. 

“9Now is a platform that has in the space of just 18 months built a strong toehold in the Australian BVOD market,” said Niamh Collins, Nine’s General Manager of Video.

“This rebrand and broader marketing campaign will help 9Now reach a new level of growth and help consumers realise the many different platforms Nine’s content is now available on.”

Since its launch in January 2016, 9Now has been rolled out via the web, iOS, Android, Telstra TV, HBBTV, Apple TV, Google Chromecast, Fetch TV, PlayStation 4 and Sony Smart TVs with Samsung, while LG is coming soon.

For more information:
Nic Christensen
Head of Trade and Internal Communications 
0404 460 607 
nchristensen@nine.com.au

Christmas Marketing Platform

Christmas with the Australian Women’s Weekly returns on Saturday November 25 at 7pm.  The annual Christmas special will feature seasonally themed inspirations from the team behind Australia’s highest selling magazine.  It presents a strong cross platform opportunity to integrate clients’ brands in the lead-up to Christmas across television, print, digital and social. 

Last year’s special reached over 870K viewers nationally, and was demographically rich with 40% of female viewers 16-39, 37% of female viewers 25-54, and 41% with GB and CH. 

The 2017 show includes integration opportunities for brands within cooking, fashion, craft, retail and gifts, and home segments.

Contact your nine representative for integration opportunities.

Source: OzTam Metro and Regional Consolidated data, Australian Women’s Weekly Special 20/11/2016

NRL Finals Series: A Powerful Marketing Platform

The NRL finals are one of Australia’s most powerful marketing platforms.

Nine’s Director of Sport, Tom Malone, says the shift of the NRL season to four games of free-to-air rugby league a week represents one of the biggest and most powerful marketing platforms available to brands.

“I think it’s one of the best things about this NRL season. With games on Thursday night, Friday night and now Saturday night – which brings a whole new group of viewers to rugby league – as well as Sunday afternoon, we are making it a big run-up to the finals,” Malone said.  “That is an incredibly powerful platform for marketers to reach a cumulative audience of four million in four days.”

Malone said the 2017 season was throwing up an interesting mix of teams from different states battling to make the NRL Grand Final on October 1. 

“The Melbourne Storm are definitely out in front. However, the Roosters, Broncos, Cowboys, Eels and Sharks are all still in with a chance. I wouldn’t write off Manly or the Panthers either, who are also making a run for the top eight.

“There is a real cluster in the middle of the top eight and the question is who will be the other team in the Grand Final, because everyone expects the Storm to be there.”

Malone said that for marketers, the great power of the NRL was contained  in the fans’ enthusiasm for the game – and getting highly engaged at finals time. 

 “Consumers are not sitting back, they are ‘leaning in’, barracking for their team or someone else’s team, and it’s a really important platform for marketers to be part of,” he said.

 Demographically, despite perceptions of a male skew, the NRL audience is quite diverse.

“The NRL finals are not just about blokes,” Malone said. “Mums, grandparents, kids, sisters, brothers – everyone gets into it because at this time of year everyone has a team. 

Importantly for marketers, the NRL season feeds into a very strong summer of sport for Nine, which includes key periods such as Father’s Day and Christmas, when consumers are thinking about buying presents, spending, and what they will be doing for holidays.

 “We have a huge slate of great sports programming coming up on Channel Nine,” Malone said. “After the NRL season we go into netball for the Constellation Cup between Australia and New Zealand, marked by that fierce trans-Tasman rivalry. That will be exclusively live and free on Nine.

“We will also have the first ever coverage of the women’s Ashes in cricket, which will be huge. Then we have the men’s One Day Internationals and the T20, plus netball, with the Fast Five over two days –it was a huge success last year and will be again this year.

“Then we hit the men’s Ashes, Australia versus England, which promises to be one of the biggest cricket series in this country for a long time. 

“The Ashes starts on November 23 in Brisbane, then we head to Adelaide with the day/night Ashes test, then to Perth for the last ever Ashes test at the WACA.  From there we head to Melbourne on Boxing Day, before for the New Year’s Day test in Sydney.

“The slate of upcoming sports programming on Channel Nine is phenomenal. I don’t think it has ever been bigger: NRL finals, netball, the women’s Ashes, the men’s Ashes – it’s going to be huge.”

Family Food Fight: Helping Australians to Bring Exciting but Achievable Food to the Table

Nine is set to launch an exciting new food format later this year that Adrian Swift, Head of Content Production and Development, says is different to anything on Australian television.

Family Food Fight is the quest to find Australia’s greatest cooking family,” said Swift. “It is about the family that brings the most interesting, exciting but achievable food to the table.

“My Kitchen Rules is about the contestants, it’s not actually about the food. Masterchef is about finding Australia’s best amateur cook. But with Family Food Fight we’re here to find Australia’s best family cook.”

Family Food Fight will feature six families from a variety of ethnic and other backgrounds.

“I think your family can be your flatmates, your friends, or it can be your actual family,”  Swift said. “The focus of this show is how people from different cultures and backgrounds cook those dishes that we all might be able to cook the following Saturday.”

The senior Nine programming executive noted that the objective was for viewers to see the dishes featured on the show as achievable to make. 

“Viewers want to learn how to do these dishes cleverly, cheaply, quickly, with flair and panache that might involve some Italian or Greek magic on the side,” said Swift.

The judges on  Family Food Fight are chef/restaurateur Matt Moran, pastry chef Anna Polyviou, and foodie and cookbook author Hayden Quinn, who will all judge the families’ culinary creations.

Internationally renowned food writer and critic Tom Parker Bowles will also appear as a guest judge, adding another dimension to the program.

“Matt Moran is one of Australia’s greatest chefs, and where his heart lies is much more about simple, really good ingredients, for simply and beautifully cooked food,” Swift said.

“Anna Polyviou is Australia’s best pastry chef, and then we have Hayden Quinn, whose stock in trade is finding great produce and turning it into simple but tasty meals. Tom Parker Bowles is there because he is a great food critic, he has seen every kind of meal come and go, and we thought he would be fascinating addition to the mix.”

Swift said he had two clear goals for Family Food Fight viewers.

“What we are hoping is (a) that people are going to cook these dishes on the weekend, and (b) we are all going to see something of ourselves in these cooking families – it’s a very warm, very positive, very relatable program. They are just families like us who are trying to make the best food they can, using what they know about food, cooking and ingredients.

“It doesn’t matter what culture you come from, your relationship with food is very similar. Family Food Fight has a good multicultural message, and also a good food message.”

Honey Spot: Start a Fresh Conversation with Australian Women

Honey Spot is a new, smarter way to start a fresh conversation with the modern Australian woman and keep your brand top of mind. 

This fun, friendly and credible native solution includes access to Nine’s talent portfolio consisting of some of the most loved and well known Aussie women, informative interstitial broadcast content on 9Life, editorially integrated digital video and content, and amplification across one of the largest social ecosystems in the country. 

It’s a new way to take your brand wherever women are and tap into what they value the most. 

Our new Honey Spot packages will provide a powerful opportunity to tell your brand story.

 

Contact your Nine sales representative to find out more.

2017 NRL Telstra Premiership Finals Series & Grand Final

The 2017 Holden State of Origin was the biggest series in history, with a record 10.2 million viewers tuning in to watch.  Don’t miss out on the next great chapter, with the 2017 NRL Finals Series and Grand Final, which will showcase unpredictable and unscripted entertainment.

The road to the footy finals is here, with 4 blockbuster games every week, including new Saturday nights, Live and Free on Nine’s Wide World of Sports.

The 2016 NRL Grand Final was the highest rating in history, with 2.67 million viewers tuning in to watch across the 5 city metro. It also demonstrated strong year-on-year audience growth with total people increasing by 8.6%, people 25-54 by 9%, people 16-39 by 14.4%, and GB+CH by 4%.

The 2016 NRL Finals Series and Grand Final reached a massive 7.18 million viewers across the 5 city metro.

The best seat in the house is on Nine, with the NRL delivering consistent ratings, huge reach, a highly engaged audience and strong brand recall for clients.
The NRL Finals Series kicks off from September 8, LIVE and EXCLUSIVE on Nine’s Wide World of Sports.

Source: NRL Finals Series and Grand Final cumulative reach based on Oztam Consolidated 28 day metro data, 9 September – 2 October 2016, including includes pre+post game and the GF presentation and entertainment.. 2016 Grand Final audience based on 5 city metro and year on year growth based on consolidated 28 day metro data.