In One's new vision, ads get with the program

WHILE the Seven and Nine networks tap dance around when next year their new digital channels will be launched, Ten chief executive Grant Blackley has been back in his old sales garb flogging Ten's new dedicated sports channel, One, like there's no tomorrow.

Some media buyers and network rivals have been critical of One, doubting it will pull enough eyeballs and revenue without ripping into the audience of the network's primary channel.

But this week Blackley confirmed conjecture that Ten was to sign up three "principal sponsors" for One at up to $2.5 million a pop. And he went further: before Christmas, One will have six paying premium backers signed up. There will also be a handful of backers committed to specific sporting events. All of the mooted premium sponsor deals are current Ten advertisers.

Blackley has the advantage that Nine and Seven won't yet show their hand on digital, giving Ten an open gate for an advertising muster. That may well change quickly - Seven's chief, David Leckie, told the Herald this week his network would announce plans before Christmas - but for now Blackley & Co appear to be beating off their detractors.

Blackley won't confirm or deny indications Ten is banking on $15 million to $20 million in revenue next year for One, nor will he talk audience numbers. But if ABC2 is regularly topping or in the top 10 of pay TV nightly audience rankings, which unofficially it is, the commercial broadcasters believe they will do much better with their channels - and they should.

But back to One. The $15 million to $20 million revenue figure greatly surprises Ten's rivals, who argue that even if it is achieved much of it will not be incremental revenue, that is, it will be money diverted from Ten's existing money pot.

Blackley begs to differ, but won't elaborate.

Some buyers who are in discussion with Ten say the network is offering its primary channel and One as a "blended package" on an audience cost per thousand basis and that Blackley has told them it will help lift Ten's overall revenue market share.

The term "blending" is an interesting one because Ten is pushing blending of advertising content and sport to advertisers on One. Call it a commercials and content mash-up, but essentially the level of traditional advertising each hour via 30-second spots will be slashed in favour of commercial messages being "integrated" into programming. Advertisers love that stuff and it is one of the advantages of sports programming - it's much easier to add advertising to sport than, say, drama.

Nine, too, has been in the market talking about more advertising content moving into programming, so watch next year for all sorts of logos, name dropping and products wafting about TV screens. Tough times apparently call for blended solutions.