Incoming Ten boss McLennan signals move towards 40+ audience
New Ten boss Hamish McLennan has signalled that he plans to ditch Ten’s focus almost exclusively on a youth audience to pursue a wider 40+ viewership.
In a series of media interviews given over the weekend, he telegraphed the new approach, saying Ten had “skewed too young”.
McLennan was quoted by News Limited’s Sunday tabloids as saying: “We’ve had a laser focus in a youth demographic sense. But I think we can be youthful and appeal to a slightly wider audience without losing what we are good at.”
McLennan was named as the new boss of Ten on Friday night. He joins on March 18, on a salary of $1.975m a year, plus a bonus scheme which could double the number.
Ten’s audience strategy is a key one for the network, which used to be profitably run on a low cost model dedicated to only targeting advertising-friendly younger demographics. Recent years saw it try to widen its appeal, driven in part by the success of the MasterChef franchise. However, as ratings began to fall, Ten returned to the key targets of 16-39 and 18-49.
The decision is critical for the network. While its younger heartland is the audience which is moving fastest away from traditional TV, moving towards an older audience will see Ten’s sales team pitted more directly against Nine and Seven.
McLennan has little experience in television. He was CEO of Y&R Brands in Australia where he led the merger of Y&R Australia with George Patterson Bates before moving to a US-based global role for Young & Rubicam. A few months ago he moved to News Corp, working closely with Rupert Murdoch with the title of executive VP – office of the chairman.
Today, saw further signals from McLennan of a shift in the network’s target audience. He told the Australian Financial Review: “I think we’ve skewed a bit too young. When we go to the younger audience, that’s the end of the spectrum that’s fragmenting most.”
He also told the AFR that there were “a lot of advertising dollars” to be taken from the 40+ market.
And in a further interview with The Australian, McLennan said: “I think the core is still good for us, but if we’re in a position where we will bid for the cricket or another sporting event by nature of the programs they will appeal to a larger audience.”
He added: “And there’s a lot of money tied uop with over-35s and over-40s. We just need to be open to that and a little bit more flexible in terms of how we create our content and programming.”
On Sunday, a source within Ten played down the comments, suggesting that McLennan was still referring to targeting the under-50 market.
McLennan’s appointment to the new role was announced by Lachlan Murdoch, who is chairman of Ten and owns about nine per cent of the company. At close of business on Friday, Ten’s market capitalisation was $763m.
McLennan could not be reached by Mumbrella for comment at the time of posting.
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
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Some free advice for Ten:
1) have faith in your programming… give things a chance (including management)
2) look at what made you great and look at what you DON’T have now… could they be the missing links?
3) STOP moving shows around! If you change the schedule audiences don’t know where to find it and STOP LOOKING for it!
4) you can’t be all things to everybody so there is nothing wrong with focusing on the under 50 demo
If you would like further advice it’ll come a lot cheaper than $1.975 million!
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Hamish’s view on targeting a broader audience is spot on, and sadly was where James did not see the opportunity. James was committed to chasing an audience that had not only left the channel, but they had no intention of coming back. There is no point in a FTA especially Ten to chase their once core demo of AP16-39. The yonger demos are now very tech savy and are consuming their media else where compared to 10-15 years ago. It’s time for the FTA’s to realise their core audiences are now skewed AP25+ or even older. Stick to your guns Hamster on targetting a broader audience, and if you can repair the damage of the past 12 months and once again provide the market a competive number 3 channel then your job will be done. Good luck!
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Ten has lost more momentum, ratings, revenue, expertise and goodwill than any company in the market for some time.
Murdoch and Warburton were joined at the hip and through their handy work sacked over 200 people, lost 80% of the value of the company or $1.2 billion in shareholder value and gave Seven and Nine a free kick.
Warburton gone and McLennan in !
That means more influence from News Limited full stop ! That will keep Fox Sports exclusively in the Sports business without competition from Ten.
That said, McLennan and Howcorft have no background in Television and Broadcast Media. This sounds like groundhog day with appointments like Eddie McGuire and the like.
Let’s wait and see but this “old bugger” suggests we will see more failure !
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Maybe McLennan has not realised that the AFL, NRL, V8′Ss, FFA have all been dealt with in the last year with multi-year contracts.
To even suggest that Cricket Australia might consider the Youthful/Older Network Ten as a partner when they have incumbent Nine and a well proven aggressive Seven is naive to the extreme !
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Anyone see a problem with moving away from the younger demos and chasing the older ones… As in the older ones will eventually die off?
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Maybe APN can hire Warburton!
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If this shift is based on changing audience behaviour, particularly in regards to new technology and viewing preferences and platforms then I think this is a smart move by McLennan. Older viewers are more inclined to tune in to scheduled programming after all. The danger is forgetting about the younger demographic altogether. Ten need to majorly readdress their online efforts, on-demand via the Ten website is terrible! Optimisation people, optimisation.
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@ CLP the older ones will eventually die off?
You may be immortal but the younger ones will eventually die too.
And given the dynamic environment anybody who makes long term fixed plans will most likely join the dinosaurs. Or Channel 10.
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I’m in Channel 10’s ‘target audience’ and it bothers me that there is always talk about younger people moving away from TV. No one I know in the same age bracket has moved anywhere. Sure, we’re using more internet, phone, etc, but that doesn’t necessarily mean we’ve given TV the arse. If anything, we’re being less active, playing less sport, etc.
My friends are watching My Kitchen Rules, Packed To The Rafters and The Block. None of these shows are on 10. Put some decent shows on, rather than treat us like idiots (aka The Shire). It’s not rocket surgery 😉
I don’t think the last bloke got enough time to prove himself. Having said that, I can’t wait to see what the new breed have up their sleeves. Russell Howcroft, in particular, seems like an ideas man and hopefully he can bring in some better shows, and thus higher ratings for 10.
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At the moment TEN are doing OK with the 40+ audience.
I am not referring to age but the number of shows that have more than 40 viewers.
I think only Masterchef and Ten News currently have more than 40 viewers but I could be wrong.
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So two things strike me about this:
1) $1.975m BASE salary – isn’t it time that Ten joined the real world? Everyone gets that it’s a bit of a hot seat, and it’s a risk for Hamish to take the job, but surely shareholders will be up in arms about this. there’s no monetary risk for him, and only upside, so where’s the incentive to really change things?
2) Surely the future of every TV network is tied to the digital space, so why do Ten keep going to the agency world for their CEOs?
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@ Groucho
Right on the button! This notion taught by business collages and a mass of other so called educational courses, that the old will be gone tomorrow, is only one of many jokes which have found their way into the learning system.
They scorn the imagined group who lives in the past, whilst they live in the moment, and attempt plan for the future. They deny the past, and so constantly reinvent the wheel.
“I represent the young people” says Jane. “For how long?” asks Sarah.
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@Groucho and @Richard Moss, calm your tits. No need to get so Mumbrella-angry.
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Why is everybody getting so concerned about Ten? They’ve got Lachlan Murdoch looking after everything, so they have nothing to worry about. As unlikely as it may seem, even if he did falter they still have Gina Reinhart at the ready.
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Agree with Corky. a subtle shift to engage with older viewers (whilst not alienating existing) makes sense. Attracting them to begin with is the challenge, but once lured, they’ll be more sticky than fickle young.
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hey CLP… the over 40s are the largest sector of the community and getting bigger. the growth market is in servicing an ageing market… AND on top of that… the younger markets move much quicker with technology so trying to get the 16-39 to attach themselves to an old medium is not worth the effort. there is SO much money in the over 40 marketplace…
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Just so long as Ten doesn’t drop F1…
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Ten was in the toilet the moment Neighbours moved from the main channel.
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oh dear ..
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@CLP Richard may agree, we’re not Mumbrella angry, you mistake anger for scorn.
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Recapping the saga so far…
2-3 years ago Blackley/Mott and co realise Ten needs to target a broader audience in the new multi channel environment.
Enter Murdoch who doesn’t agree with the broader strategy and wants Ten to go back to the low cost 16-39 Channel it once was.
Current Ten Management start to leave one by one.
Budgets are slashed resulting in being outbid on The Voice and Big Brother.
Enter James Warburton who agrees with the 16-39 strategy and so shows like The Shire and Bingle (which were meant for Eleven) are moved to Ten and cheaper reality shows EDN and IWS are commissioned.
Warburton makes some very bad appointments like Mike Morrison, David Castran and the Development Unit…all of which are gone within months.
None of the new younger skewing shows work.
Mott leaves.
Ten continues to decline until Warburton is sacked.
Enter a new CEO who’s first declaration is that Ten needs to start targeting older viewers.
It seems that Murdoch could have saved himself a lot of trouble and executive payouts if he had just listened to the Ten Management when he first arrived…back when Ten shares were around $1.30 and Ten were winning 18-49 still had the AFL and were very profitable. I do wonder what those guys are thinking now reading the headlines about this new CEO’s strategy!
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