Media & Marketing: RTÉ believes its relaunch of Network 2 next week could help to boost its turnover in the second half of the year as the station targets the lucrative 15- to 34-year-old market.
While the station has been accused of lacking imagination in rebranding the station "RTÉ 2", the staff behind the project believe something more fundamental is taking place. The changes will take effect from Saturday October 2nd.
"In strict ratings terms, while we probably cannot compete in the evenings with soaps like Emmerdale or Coronation Street, we can be more creative ourselves and make sure we reach a clear target audience," says Andrew Fitzpatrick, head of scheduling at RTÉ TV.
He says the rebranding firmly connects the station with the general RTÉ stable.
Currently, Network 2 lies in third position in Irish TV ratings. RTÉ 1 has 30.5 per cent share of the adult TV market; TV3 has 22.5 per cent; and Network 2 has 20.6 per cent.
One of the aims of the rebranding is to close the gap on TV3, although TV3's ownership of Coronation Street gives the station an advantage.
However, Mary Curtis, assistant director of programmes at RTÉ TV, says the newly rebranded RTÉ 2 will have a firm identity and independent producers must pitch their ideas very firmly for RTÉ 2 rather than just making general pitches to RTÉ. "We want their best and bravest work. They will have to think about the age demographic involved." she says.
The station also hopes to have first call on new episodes of hit shows like The Sopranos, The Apprentice and the Friends spin-off Joey.
The team behind the rebranding admits increasing viewing figures will be a challenge. Susan McAteer, head of commercial at RTÉ TV, points out that "young adults are watching less television over time as a plethora of traditional and non-traditional media compete for their attention".
She says 11.3 per cent of young adults used to tune in daily to TV in 2002, but now the figure is standing at 10.7 per cent.
Strong Ryder ratings
Dublin advertising agency AFA O'Meara this week notes the strong viewing figures recorded by the Ryder Cup shown on Sky Sports.
The adult viewing ratings peaked on Sunday evening between 21.15 and 22.15 with 96,000 viewers.
The agency comments: "This is a huge increase on last months viewership of the US PGA that peaked at 25,000. Sunday night's ad breaks on Sky Sports could easily claim viewership of 100,000 if the 4 per cent out-of-home audience is factored in," the agency says.
Irish golf fans are a very attractive audience to advertisers. O'Meara said, if you combined golf players and golf followers (tournament attendees, TV viewers and newspaper readers), Irish golf fans make up 18.4 per cent of the national population.
Hector in whiskey deal
Irish Distillers has signed up Hector Ó hEochagáin to front its new advertising campaign for Paddy Whiskey.
Brendan Buckley, marketing manager of Irish Distillers, said the broadcaster embodied everything that Paddy was about. "He is quintessentially Irish with a quirky, irreverent character. It also helped that Hector was already a fan of Paddy," he said.
The recent viewing figures for Hanging with Hector, particularly the episode featuring the Taoiseach, have aroused interest in the marketing world.
Slow press recovery
The much heralded recovery in press advertising may be a little slower coming than earlier predictions suggested.
In recent days, leading newspaper group the New York Times warned its profits would be weaker because advertising sales had not picked up as much as expected.
The New York Times Company, which owns the New York Times and the Boston Globe, reported an increase of almost 8 per cent in advertising revenue for August but warned that the trend had not continued.
