TNS Media Intelligence said Monday that a 30-second commercial during next months Super Bowl on CBS are selling for between $2.5 million and $2.8 million, based on reports from advertisers and media buyers. Thats a drop from last year, when ads averaged $3 million on NBC - a record, according to TNS. Prices remained strong last year because the majority of ads are typically bought in the spring, before the deepening of the recession, analysts said.

Final figures for this year will come in after the Super Bowl airs Feb. 7. CBS wont comment specifically about its prices, but company officials said they believe prices will be higher than last year.

“We dont calculate average price because its not how we manage the business, but were confident that if we did it would be higher than last year,” said CBS spokesman Dana McClintock. “In certain cases, were getting over $3 million” per spot.

McClintock said it was difficult to peg a lower end of the range of prices because clients who bought ads throughout the football season may get a lower rate.

Vacation rental Web site HomeAway was lured in for the first time by the prospect of lower prices. Its ad in the third-quarter of the game is its first television commercial. The company would not say what it paid for the ad.

“We certainly had a hunch that it wasnt going to be massively overpriced versus last year. We had a hunch thered be some wiggle room,” said CEO Brian Sharples, whose company is launching a yearlong campaign tied to the Griswold family of “National Lampoons Vacation” fame.

CBS officials said the pace of sales had been better than it was for NBC a year ago. As of Friday, only four of the 62 commercial slots remained to be sold.

CBS is keeping a few slots open so it can sell them at higher prices to last-minute buyers, said Bob Horowitz, president of Juma Entertainment and executive producer of television show “Super Bowls Greatest Commercials.”

He said putting a single number on Super Bowl ads is tricky because they are often bought in packages that can include other events like the Olympics.

The only other year that prices declined was from 2006 to 2007, when 30-second slots dropped from $2.5 million to just under $2.4 million, said Jon Swallen, senior vice president of research for TNS. Overall advertising spending fell slightly in the first half of 2007, even before the recession began.

Super Bowl prices crossed the million-dollar threshold in 1995, and topped $2 million five years later.

Ad prices spiked as viewership soared, going from 68.3 million viewers in 1981 to 87.2 million in 1986, according to Nielsen. Last years Super Bowl had a record 98.7 million viewers.

From 1990 through last year, the Super Bowl generated $2.17 billion of network sales, including 1,400 commercials from 210 advertisers, TNS said.

CBS wont say what it paid for the rights to the Super Bowl. The three networks that now alternate carrying the game, CBS, NBC and Fox, get it in a package along with the other football games they broadcast through the season.

NBC Universal has said it expects to lose money televising the Winter Olympics next month, mainly from the $820 million the company paid for the rights to the games. The company has said advertising sales were soft for much of past year, but they have increased as the Olympics draw near.

The 2009 Super Bowl brought in $213 million in advertising revenue - just for ads airing during the game. That was a 14 percent increase from the previous years $186.3 million, when the average 30-second slot cost $2.7 million.

Source

Accenture ended its association with Woods on Sunday, marking the first major sponsor to cut ties altogether with the golfer since his alleged infidelities surfaced and he announced an indefinite leave from the sport to work on his marriage.

In its first statement since the Woods scandal erupted, Accenture said the golfer is “no longer the right representative” after the “circumstances of the last two weeks.” The move ends a relationship during which the firm credited its “Go on, be a Tiger” campaign with boosting its image significantly.

“After careful consideration and analysis, the company has determined that he is no longer the right representative for its advertising,” Accenture said, adding that “it wishes only the best for Tiger Woods and his family.”

The firm plans to immediately transition to a new advertising campaign, with a major effort scheduled to launch later in 2010. An Accenture spokeswoman declined to comment further. Advertising firm Young & Rubicam, which has handled the companys Woods ads, also would not comment on the move.

One of the risks of advertising tied to a celebrity is that “your image gets carried by someone you cant control,” said Jonathan Bernstein, president of Bernstein Crisis Management.

“They definitely understand theres damage,” Bernstein said of Accenture.

Accentures advertising campaign was almost entirely built around Woods and his success, portraying his ability to sink a key putt or hit out of the rough. If Woods had acknowledged mistakes and said he would be back in a month, Accenture might be able to ride it out, said Rick Burton, a professor of sports management at Syracuse University, in an interview.

But Accenture cant afford to wait for what could be a long time before Woods returns.

“They had tied everything in their campaign to Tiger Woods it appeared,” he said. “If hes not golfing, those ads dont make sense.”

Burton said Accentures billboards and airport advertising need to be replaced quickly. Without a backup plan, the company might fall back on something simple and conservative that could highlight its logo.

“It is probably prudent to take a low-key, conservative approach until they determine what their next message is that they want to send,” he said. Accenture will have to determine whether it wants to stick with sports or whether its been too burned by what happened and will go another route, Burton added.

The PGA Tour said it would have no comment.

Accenture has been title sponsor since 2001 of the Match Play Championship, a lucrative World Golf Championship event that draws the top 64 players from the world ranking. Accenture earlier this year renewed its sponsorship of the tournament through 2014. The contract is separate from its business endorsement with Woods.

The management consulting, technology services and outsourcing company has clients in more than 120 countries and about 177,000 employees across 52 countries. Starting as the consulting arm of now-defunct accounting firm Arthur Andersen, it split off in 1989 under the name Andersen Consulting, eventually ending all ties with Andersen and changing its name to Accenture.

The company went public in 2001 and now has a market cap of $26 billion. Earlier this year Accenture shifted its place of incorporation from Bermuda to Ireland, where it has done business for about 40 years.

Woods array of endorsements helped him become the first sports star to earn $1 billion, according to Forbes. But while not terminating its relationship completely, another major Woods sponsor pulled away this weekend.

Source

“There is an active search going on,” said Rich Halberg, a spokesman for Northbrook, Illinois-based Allstate. “We dont have anything to say about the search.”

LaNeve steps into an insurer advertising war that pits Allstate pitchman Dennis Haysbert against Geico Corp.s gecko mascot and Progressive Corp.s spunky saleswoman, Flo. Geico, owned by Warren BuffettsBerkshire Hathaway Inc., was the only publicly traded insurer to spend more on advertising last year, paying $624.6 million, according to data compiled by TNS Media Intelligence.Progressive spent $294 million.

Allstate is spending more of its advertising budget this year on commercials that feature Haysbert, who played the U.S. president on News Corp. television show “24,” TNS said. Allstates television ads increased to 80 percent of its overall advertising expenses in the first six months of 2009, compared with 68 percent in all of 2008, according to TNS data.

Lizards, Loyalty

“Dennis Haysbert represents middle age, stability, father- figure type things,” said George Ruebenson, the president of Allstates home and auto unit, in an interview in August. “Lizards do something different. They attract different people. Flo right now with Progressive, its funny,” and attracts a younger, less-loyal customer, he said.

LaNeve would be at least the fourth senior appointment by Chief Executive Officer Thomas Wilson in the past 14 months. He hired Don Civgin, a former OfficeMax Inc. executive, as chief financial officer in August 2008, the same month Judith Greffin was promoted to chief investment officer. American International Group Inc. Vice Chairman Matthew Winter was named head of the life insurance and retirement unit this week.

Progressive, the fourth-largest U.S. auto insurer, also brought in an outsider to oversee advertising. The Mayfield Village, Ohio-based company hired Larry Bloomenkranz, a former vice president of brand management at United Parcel Service Inc., as chief marketing officer in March 2008.

GMs Chief Executive Officer Fritz Henderson named LaNeve to the nine-member executive committee created as the automaker left bankruptcy on July 10. Business Week reported LaNeves move earlier today.

“We are not at liberty to disclose” where LaNeve has taken a job, said Tom Wilkinson, a spokesman for Detroit-based GM.

Source

As a result, you wont necessarily see more traditional, 30-second commercials. Instead, many of the new TV ads will resemble online ads - interactive and often shaped for individual members of the audience. Theyll also be harder to ignore. Typically, you cant opt out of seeing them.

The companies behind the latest kind of ads hope theyll especially appeal to advertisers that are increasingly careful with their marketing budgets. In turn the advertisers are betting viewers wont be turned off - as long as the ads pitch products and services tailored to consumers particular interests.

In a trial that ended last year in Huntsville, Ala., Comcast Corp. found that viewers shown targeted ads watched them 38 percent longer than folks who got less-relevant commercials.

“People like to shop. People like to research products,” said Charlie Thurston, president of the advertising sales division at Comcast, the nations largest cable TV provider. “Where advertising is intrusive is when theres a complete mismatch between product and viewer.”

The increased advertising on pay TV services is striking, given that the industry started with scant ads as one way to appeal to subscribers.

Revenue from advertising on cable TV was just $100 million in 1981. By 2000, though, it hit $10.5 billion and then doubled this decade to $21 billion, according to research firm SNL Kagan.

To put this increase another way: There were 15 minutes and 30 seconds of advertising in the average hour of prime-time cable TV last year, up 14 percent from 1999, according to TNS Media Intelligence.

But that statistic doesnt account for advertising appearing in new formats on your TV.

For instance, Time Warner Cable Inc. is layering another ad on top of a TV commercial in order to keep the viewer engaged past the 30-second spot. In several markets, Time Warner Cable subscribers watching a Big O Tires commercial might see a banner from the company pop up at the bottom of the screen, telling them to push a button on the remote control for more information. Then pushing another button would let them request a coupon in the mail.

TiVo, the creator of the digital video recorder that panicked the TV business by making it simple to skip ads, now flashes banners on TV screens when users pause, fast-forward or delete shows.

Viewers who paused “The Biggest Loser” TV show saw an ad saying “Jenny Craig says youve got more to lose!” If you used TiVo to pause “Iron Chef America” on the Food Network, this popped up: “Sub-Zero: Every cook deserves the best!”

Dave Zatz, a 37-year-old network engineer in Herndon, Va., isnt happy about it because he bought a TiVo digital video recorder and pays a subscription to skip ads.

“Its obnoxious,” he said of the ads that appear when a TV program is paused. He said other ads have been on the periphery or appear on the menu page. This is the first time hes noticed TiVo layering an ad on top of an actual program.

He said hes been wondering, “Who are TiVos customers?” People like him, or advertisers? “Theyre getting paid on both ends.”

One ad buyer was told by TiVo that a “pause” ad costs $20,000 a week with exposure on 15 programs. That would be a bargain by some measures: A 30-second commercial airing once on prime time TV costs about $150,000, on average. TiVo would not confirm its rate, saying that what an advertiser ultimately pays can vary widely, depending on whats negotiated.

Video on demand services - where you can watch movies and TV shows usually with fewer commercial interruptions than broadcast TV - are also expanding as a venue for ads.

Source

“Were in the first phase of a fundamental shift thats happening in media, and AOL has a global brand,” Armstrong said in an interview. “Its clear that there are strategic areas that AOL can go into and be successful.”

AOL should focus on its advertising, content and people- networks businesses, said Armstrong, whose plan is to first spend time with employees. Time Warner CEO Jeffrey Bewkes split AOLs Internet-access and online divisions last year.

Google has held a 5 percent stake in AOL since investing $1 billion in 2005. Bewkes said in the statement Armstrong can “move AOL into the next phase of its evolution” and assist in helping the company determine the “optimal structure” for AOL.

“Its pretty clear that this is going to mean a new direction for AOL, which has sort of been in limbo for at least a year,” Andrew Frank, an analyst at industry researcher Gartner Inc. in New York, said in an interview. “The days of AOL as a beleaguered subsidiary of Time Warner are certainly numbered.”

Shrinking Sales

AOLs ad sales slid 18 percent in the fourth quarter, after a 6 percent decline in the third quarter and a gain of 2 percent in the second. The unit told employees in January that 10 percent of the workforce will be cut as advertisers curb spending.

Time Warner is still coping with the failed $124 billion combination with America Online Inc. in 2001. At an investor conference earlier this month, Bewkes said the company remains open to strategic combinations for AOL.

In December, Bewkes said Time Warner was having discussions with Yahoo! Inc., Google and Microsoft Corp. about a deal involving AOL, without elaborating. On a Feb. 4 earnings call, he said one option is spinning off all or part of AOL to shareholders. AOL started as a dial-up Internet pioneer in 1985.

“We believe the only reason that Armstrong would agree to run AOL is the ability to manage a public company of his own in the near future,” Pali Capital analyst Rich Greenfield in New York said in a report.

Time Warner, based in New York, rose 41 cents, or 5.2 percent, to $8.32 yesterday in New York Stock Exchange composite trading before the announcement.

Falco, a 31-year TV veteran at NBC, joined AOL in November 2006 and helped lead the transition to a business focused on online ads from a subscription service. He succeeded Jonathan Miller two months after AOL started offering its e-mail and software for free to broadband users.

At an event in New York in October 2007, Falco said his team was reinventing AOL and that it was “a brand worth fighting for.”

Grant joined AOL in 1997, and Falco promoted him to president and chief operating officer in 2006.

AOL last month appointed former Yahoo executive Greg Coleman as president of its Platform-A advertising business, replacing Lynda Clarizio after less than a year as sales shrank.

Armstrong is among the more senior executives to leave Google. Sheryl Sandberg, vice president of global online sales and operations, left Google last year to become chief operating officer of Facebook Inc., the social-networking company.

Link to Advertisers

“Tim Armstrong was kind of, to my mind, their connection to the world of advertising and Madison Avenue,” Frank said. “I cant help wondering if this means a faster transition for Google from a company that is centered on advertising to a company that is focused on its roots as a technology company.”

Source