Bravo, "Bravo."
The April 12th, 2007 online issue of MediaWeek announced that Bravo Television Network has planned a new programming schedule to attract a new market that they call the “Affluencers.”
The “Affluencers,” women 18-49, are the product of higher education, earn a comfortable salary of $75, 000 annually, and are trendsetters among their demographic. To reach this target more effectively, Bravo is creating new original programs, set to air on Thursday nights, while maintaining the schedule for its widely successful shows like Top Chef and Project Runway, which air on Wednesday nights.
By scheduling a lineup of new, original series to air on Thursday night, advertisers on the Bravo network will be able to place advertisements related to weekend activities (going to the movies, shopping, spending money in general) closer (in time) to the weekend itself. The network is also placing a greater emphasis on digital elements like blogs and websites which include interactive elements to encourage viewer involvement while, and after, programs are airing. Alongside digital elements, Bravo also plans to add more mobile opportunities to the mobile Web sites they have already put in place.
It is obvious that the network has successfully conducted and analyzed research that resulted in a very specific target audience. Because the network has data showing a growth in the market of women 18-49 by 19% in just the first quarter of 2007, I think the decision to create more programs similar to those already popular with this market will pay off for both the network and advertisers. The new schedule, airing the new programs on a prime night of the week like Thursday, provides advertisers the opportunity to increase recency with their ads closer to times of purchase.
The plan’s use of internet, digital and mobile elements will also likely be effective considering that a large percentage of their target market has already shown interest and involvement in the blogs already created by Bravo to operate in-tune with their more popular programs.
Overall, I think Bravo’s new schedule and their plans to involve more digital and mobile elements in order to attract the target market of “Affluencers” is well thought out and planned, and includes many elements which will allow them to increase reach in as many ways possible.
The MediaWeek article can be accessed through the following link:
http://www.mediaweek.com/mw/news/spotlight/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003565786
posted by lhass @ 12:13 PM
5 Comments
5 Comments:
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This new move by Bravo is an interesting model of targeting to specific markets, as we talked about in class. The “Affluencers” seem to be the perfect example of people who want to be marketed to in a certain way, and on top of that, might be “offended” if marketed to in the wrong way. There might be more to this new move than commercial spots for advertisers. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was also a lot of product placement employed in the shows targeted at this specific group. The target will probably be particularly receptive to experiential marketing techniques, such as the mobile messages that Bravo intends to use as well as the interactive blogging experiences, which can enter into a work day in front of the computer. First things first, Bravo most likely did research to see where the “Affluencers” spend their limited free time to determine where and how to advertise for their Thursday night line-ups. Potential advertising techniques used to increase reach to this market may include incorporating messages into the happy hour scenes in big cities with many hot spots for young professionals. Bravo is attempting to build a bond with this up-and-coming market that will only become involved with their shows and messages if they feel it will be in some way beneficial to them and worth their valuable time.
I also agree with Kim and Lauren in how this market seems to be a great target to increase Bravo viewers. If Bravo is seeing a potential increase in viewers due to other shows such as the Wednesday night line-up, than sticking with that target market can only be beneficial. It also opens up opportunity to not only advertise on the new Thursday night line-up, but it allows advertisers to advertise on Wednesday and Thursday to increase frequency. They can also kick off the new shows by advertising them during the popular Wednesday night shows. Since it's the same target market for both nights, I think frequency is the focus because Bravo will most likely have many of the same viewers for both nights. It also, like Lauren said, will increase recency due to the upcoming weekend the next day. If the target is exposed to an ad first on Wednesday and then sees it again on Thursday night, it's much more likely to stick in the consumer's minds to carry out potential purchases over the weekend. The only thing I guess I'm interested in is if Bravo has looked at expanding to other target markets or if this particular market will undoubtedly do better than another potential target. There is a lot of opportunity with having the same target market back to back Wednesday and Thursday and an increase in frequency and recency seem to be an important focus.
I believe targeting this new and specific target market will strongly help the Bravo broadcasting company. As Kim said, this can greatly increase Bravo's consumer base, as long as they give the target market what they want and not offend them in the mean time. This is an interesting market to attempt to deliver to, but I have seen a few other networks that also seem to be attempting to target the same 18-40 year old working women demographic. Recently such channels as Oxygen, owned by Oprah Winfry, have been broadcasting shows for the working women class. This technique of targeting "Affluencers" is a new way for Bravo to attain reach and frequency by playing the advertisements on back to back nights. This idea of repeating the ad will gain frequency with repitition, and stick in the mind of the consumer. I feel this market of 18-40 something year old working women, making at least 75,000 dollars a year will also be a brand loyal type of demographic. If advertised to in the correct way these individuals can become extremely brand loyal both to Bravo's broadcasting, but also the product being advertised.
Niche marketing is the trend of the future. Now the niches are so small that they are down to the day -- upscale on Thursday, mass market on Wednesday. This will make selection of media even more important for media planners -- every slot will matter. And that is a costly proposition, as buying particular time slots in specific programs is much more expensive than a run-of-station buy.
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