And cable's biggest advertiser? AOL-TW.

'It has really increased its spending from last year by almost three times as much. Others, like General Motors, are very similar to last year, just a couple of percentage points different.'

And cable's biggest
advertiser? AOL-TW.

Bigger bucks to promote shows on its networks

By Elizabeth White

    The aftershocks of the weakening ad economy and soft upfront are being felt in cable TV, most notably in terms of who is advertising.
    While lower upfront rates presumably have brought in first-time cable advertisers, while increasing the presence of major brands like GM, the leading advertiser is something of a house brand, AOL Time Warner.
    AOL Time Warner owns TBS, TNT, CNN, the Cartoon Network, among other cable networks, and it also owns one of the nation's largest cable systems.
    This year, AOL Time Warner has dramatically kicked up its cable ad spending, and much of it goes to promote shows on its own networks.
    Much of that in turn appears to be a case of AOL-TW soaking up inventory that otherwise would be going unsold.
    "AOL Time Warner was the major cable advertiser for the first six months of 2001," says Bill Marchetti, an analyst at Paul Kagan Associates.
    "It has really increased its spending from last year by almost three times as much. Others, like General Motors, are very similar to last year, just a couple of percentage points different."
    According to data from Competitive Media Reporting, AOL Time Warner spent $144 million in the first six months of 2001, up from the combined $59.8 million that AOL and Time Warner spent in the first six months of 2000.
    Numbers on ad spending by program type, released this week by the Cabletelevision Advertising Bureau, further suggest that a significant portion of that $144 million was spent on the media conglomerate’s own properties.
    AOL Time Warner is a top-10 advertiser in nine of 10 program categories, absent only from the general variety program type.
    In four of those program types, feature films, comedy/variety, adventure and evening animation, AOL Time Warner was the leading spender. In two more, general drama and news, AOL Time Warner was the second-biggest spender.
     "A lot of AOL Time Warner is on their own networks, but not all of it," says Marchetti. "Some of it is their own inventory. One point to make is that everyone had to accept CPM decreases this upfront. But while broadcast held its prices to 5 to 10 percent declines, cable networks got hit with double-digit declines of 15 to 20 percent from 2000. Perhaps now they are using their own avails more and paying the money to themselves. They get more bang for the buck on promotional spots that way."
    Other big cable spenders are Philip Morris and General Motors, top-10 advertisers in seven program types, and Johnson & Johnson and Procter & Gamble, top-10 advertisers in six program types.
    Among media companies with cable interests, Walt Disney was a top-10 advertiser in four program categories, comedy/variety, daytime drama, evening animation and general variety.
    News Corp. was a top-10 advertiser in one program category, evening animation.
    The most lucrative program type on cable is feature films, which accounted for almost $325 million through the first eight months of 2001.
     AOL Time Warner, which spends heavily in the movie and music categories, spent $50 million. Procter & Gamble was second, with $46 million.
     "Feature films tend to be a significant part of our overall inventory," says Joe Ostrow, president and CEO of the CAB. "Cable is the primary supplier of made-for-TV movies, so it’s not surprising that advertisers looking for that come to cable."
    The second-richest program type was general documentary, with $214 million spent through August 2001, followed by general drama, with $148 million. News programs were fourth, with $128 million, and situation comedies were fifth, with $116 million.

Top 10 Advertisers by Program Type (Jan. 1 to Aug. 31)
Program Type	#	Advertiser	$(000)	% of top 10 total
Feature Film	1	AOL Time Warner	50,621.52	16
	2	Procter & Gamble	46,356.47	14
	3	Philip Morris Cos.	45,871.41	14
	4	General Motors	36,340.06	11
	5	Pfizer Inc.	34,234.04	11
	6	Johnson & Johnson	27,754.47	9
	7	GlaxoSmithKline PLC	22,700.06	7
	8	AT&T	22,183.53	7
	9	Unilever	20,214.73	6
	10	Diageo PLC	18,694.56	6
	Total		324,970.85
Documentary, General	1	General Motors	36,339.34	17
	2	Ford Motor Co.	27,004.91	13
	3	AOL Time Warner	26,728.62	12
	4	Procter & Gamble	20,664.23	10
	5	AT&T	19,025.75	9
	6	Daimler Chrysler AG	18,097.65	8
	7	Johnson & Johnson	17,760.57	8
	8	Honda Motor Co.	16,993.32	8
	9	Toyota	15,964.84	7
	10	Direct Focus Inc.	15,662.87	7
	Total		214,242.10
General Drama	1	Procter & Gamble	29,101.03	20
	2	AOL Time Warner	16,943.99	11
	3	Philip Morris Cos.	15,640.11	11
	4	Pfizer Inc.	15,472.82	10
	5	General Motors	15,426.32	10
	6	GlaxoSmithKline PLC	12,713.16	9
	7	Johnson & Johnson	11,168.43	8
	8	American Home Products	11,106.89	7
	9	AT&T	11,104.82	7
	10	Progressive Corp.	9,986.01	7
	Total		148,663.58
News	1	General Motors	30,706.34	24
	2	AOL Time Warner	21,823.69	17
	3	Sprint Corp.	13,244.48	10
	4	Philip Morris Cos.	10,546.44	8
	5	WorldCom Inc.	9,752.73	8
	6	AT&T	9,292.85	7
	7	FMR Corp.	8,703.84	7
	8	Dow Jones & Corp.	8,601.13	7
	9	Pfizer Inc.	8,465.88	7
	10	Ameritrade Holding Corp.	7,825.13	6
	Total		128,962.51
Situation Comedy	1	Philip Morris Cos.	20,179.55	17
	2	Procter & Gamble	18,000.75	15
	3	Unilever	12,639.80	11
	4	AOL Time Warner	11,484.33	10
	5	Johnson & Johnson	11,167.96	10
	6	Pfizer Inc.	11,053.53	9
	7	GlaxoSmithKline PLC	9,531.11	8
	8	Wal-Mart Stores	8,025.51	7
	9	Castalian Music LLC	7,661.26	7
	10	Diageo PLC	7,026.62	6
	Total		116,770.43
Comedy/ Variety	1	AOL Time Warner	7,153.68	18
	2	Philip Morris Cos.	5,317.28	13
	3	General Motors	5,140.48	13
	4	Telephone Amusement	3,882.22	10
	5	National Amusements Inc.	3,821.82	10
	6	Sony Corp.	3,556.38	9
	7	U.S. Government	3,201.55	8
	8	Walt Disney Co.	3,007.80	8
	9	Mantra Films	2,545.99	6
	10	Toyota	2,322.44	6
	Total		39,949.64
Adventure	1	AOL Time Warner	3,207.52	17
	2	Diageo	2,311.37	12
	3	Unilever	2,016.38	11
	4	General Motors	1,825.30	10
	5	Philip Morris Cos.	1,804.94	10
	6	GlaxoSmithKline PLC	1,652.87	9
	7	Johnson & Johnson	1,596.55	9
	8	AT&T	1,418.24	8
	9	Procter & Gamble	1,387.59	7
	10	American Home Products	1,311.77	7
	Total		18,532.53
General Variety	1	General Motors	887.03	15
	2	Dell Computer Corp.	660.74	11
	3	Unilever	634.94	11
	4	Philip Morris Cos.	582.77	10
	5	Johnson & Johnson	580.23	10
	6	Walt Disney Co.	573.03	10
	7	Pfizer Inc.	573.01	10
	8	Clorox Co.	537.94	9
	9	GlaxoSmithKline PLC	519.31	9
	10	Novartis AG	477.70	8
	Total		6,026.70
Daytime Drama	1	Procter & Gamble	876.89	21
	2	National Amusements Inc.	563.12	14
	3	Sony Corp.	442.53	11
	4	PepsiCo. Inc.	412.13	10
	5	Cadbury Schweppes PLC	364.09	9
	6	Walt Disney Co.	360.65	9
	7	AOL Time Warner	360.22	9
	8	Castalian Music LLC	302.98	7
	9	Tracinda Corp.	246.90	6
	10	Mars Inc.	237.82	6
	Total		4,167.33
Evening Animation	1	AOL Time Warner Inc.	815.48	26
	2	Mantra Films	381.42	12
	3	Cadbury Schweppes PLC	376.64	12
	4	Sony Corp.	313.34	10
	5	Walt Disney Co.	289.28	9
	6	News Corp LTD	235.50	8
	7	Hyundai Group	225.87	7
	8	Nike Inc.	192.59	6
	9	US Government	159.47	5
	10	National Amusements Inc.	136.58	4
	Total		3,126.17
Source: Cabletelevision Advertising Bureau analysis of Nielsen Monitor + Ad Views data, 1/1/01-8/31/01

-Elizabeth White is a staff writer for Media Life.

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