Matt James.
Nine Entertainment's upfront event in Sydney was a window into the Australian media company’s strategy changes.
The upfront flagged what it called the Nine advantage, a redefinition of the way the company does business.
“We've been redefining our own model, and that's really important in terms of how we're setting ourselves up for the future from a strategic standpoint,” said Matt James, who has been chief sales officer since December last year.
Nine has reorganised into three divisions around streaming and broadcast, publishing and marketplaces.
The updated operating model underpins Nine’s plan to reduce its cost base by a further $50 million in the current financial year and enhance profitability through greater use of premium assets.
“We've also pulled together new centres of excellence in data, technology, AI and business intelligence,” James told an upfront briefing.
“For us strategically that's going to be critical in terms of the way we think about the content, the integrated opportunities,
“Culturally, that's quite a significant shift in terms of what we were … siloed.
“We can start to bring real cross functional collaboration into our business.”
Nine would continue to drive that integration as part of the advantage of being a local Australian media company, he said.
Amanda Laing, Nine's managing director of streaming and broadcast, described it as an unfair advantage.
“Bringing together Australian broadcast is a new division from what was really a siloed channel .. speaks to the ambition of what can we do, given we've got all these extraordinary products, platforms and all the content,” she told the briefing.
“I talk to my team about us having this unfair advantage, which is we can do things that nobody else in Australia can do, because we have free to air, we have free streaming, we have subscription streaming, we have audio, we have publishing.
“So we actually do have this unfair advantage. And now it's our obligation to make sure that every dollar that we spend on content, we're really optimizing the value of that in a truly integrated media ecosystem.
“We're not a global platform that's trying to fit into Australia, or someone who's taking a cue from someone in the US, in the UK or elsewhere.
“The content we make here is made by Australians, for Australians.
“We understand the local markets better than anyone.”
She said Nine was growing across news, sport, prime time and reality.
“Each month, we reach over 17.9 million Australians. And of course, Stan remains, still the biggest commissioner of Australian drama in the whole country.
Nick Young, commercial director digital at Nine, said feedback from Nine’s audience is that they crave this curated, professionally produced content.
“They are looking for real stories about real people and about Australians,” he said.
Nine has launched a brand safe vertical video proposition, 9Now Stories.
Using curated content from Nine's portfolio of brands, 9Now Stories delivers short form, premium vertical video across entertainment, sport, news and current affairs in an owned and operated environment with emphasises trust and reliability.
“I'm not allowed to go into numbers but it's already progressing very, very well in that space,” Young said.
“We've already got advertisers looking to get involved in this around sponsorship opportunities. We will be offering unique six second video capabilities with it.”
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