Lucia Moses

The TV industry is changing dramatically, with people watching shows on all kinds of devices.

David Levy, president of media giant Turner, said he’s confident he knows what the company’s founder and his longtime boss Ted Turner would say about the current state of the business.

“Ted was a visionary,” Levy said Tuesday at Business Insider’s IGNITION Conference in New York in a conversation with Geoff Ramsey, chairman and cofounder of eMarketer. “He launched Cartoon Network. Everyone advised him not to launch a 24-hour news channel. He understood content was king."

"He would be very bullish on the TV industry," he added. "He would say, television is everything. We don’t think about it as this thing on the wall. We think about it as generating fans, where fans are.”

Part of the industry’s response to the rise of Google and Facebook has been to get bigger. Levy discussed the benefits of AT&amp;T’s acquisition of Time Warner, now WarnerMedia, which Turner belongs to. Levy said he’s confident the merger will work because it serves both sides.

“Turner needed data,” he said. “We needed to understand the consumer much better than we did. Having that understanding of first-party data would allow us to have better advertising products, understand consumers better. Being able to download B/R Live or having the CNN logo on your phone is extremely valuable. AT&amp;T needed quality premium programming. There was a need for both, so I think it’s a good marriage.”

To adapt, Turner is developing more of a consumer-oriented mindset. The concept of “TV Everywhere” in its early form “was a little clunky. That catapulted Netflix into where it is today,” Levy said.

Turner has focused on making content available wherever people want to see it. One recent experiment showed the effort is still a work in progress, when there were technical snafus that made it hard for people to watch Bleacher Report’’s Tiger vs. Phil match.

“We had a little technical difficulty there,” Levy acknowledged.

“You made it free, right?” said Ramsey.

“Thank you for reminding me,” winced Levy.

The rise of Amazon, Netflix and other digital streaming companies funding original content means a plethora of premium content choices for viewers. Despite that, Levy said the competition is good, but Turner has plenty of its own premium programming.

“We have great brand with our own IP,” he said. “Every SVOD product would love to have ‘Rick and Morty.’ We just had 33 Emmy nominations for our content.”

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Turner CEO David Levy says content is still king, but television needs to evolve

At a time when people are tuning out advertising and agencies are facing competition from all sides, agencies have to adapt to stay relevant. To Wendy Clark, the first female global CEO of Omnicom Group’s DDB, the agency of the future has to be more like flexible bamboo than unbending oak to survive.

The traditional TV ad that’s pushed out to people whether they want to see them or not may be dead, but advertising itself is changing to reflect the broad canvas that it shows up on, Clark said in a conversation with Business Insider senior reporter Tanya Dua at Business Insider's Ignition conference in New York on Monday.

“The 30-second spots that were in a traditional TV pod — that idea that we can push a brands’ message in the world and it will be so — that is dead,” she said. “Everything communicates. That’s what we have to think about.”

Clark discussed the agency’s answer to this change, creating bespoke models like DDB Flex, the agency's new operating model that creates integrated, cross-agency teams based on clients’ needs and that helped the agency win McDonald’s.

“Siloed companies weren’t working,” she said. “We have to be as dynamic and fluid and agile and flexible as the marketplace that represents itself today.”

Is the model working? Well, DDB has signed on other clients like Volkswagen and Johnson &amp; Johnson, she said.

“The big, leading brands are all looking at these models now,” she said.

Traditional agencies also are seeing consulting firms encroaching on the advertising business. Clark said she actually sees the entrance of those companies in the industry as a sign of the industry’s health rather than a danger to agencies’ livelihood. “I don’t regard them as a threat, I regard them as a worthy competitor.”

Clark also addressed the news last month that DDB <a id="16e90324-ebcd-3d80-a450-c15a42b7c812" href="https://www.campaignlive.com/article/ddbs-wendy-clark-exits-times-advertising-amid-conflict/1496600"> used former Droga5 CCO Ted Royer on a pitch </a> . Royer and Droga parted ways earlier this year amid an HR investigation. Last month, Clark admitted DDB’s using Royer was a “mistake.”

“I don’t lead a perfect organization,” she said on stage, without naming Royer. “I don’t want anyone to think failure is something to be hidden. It’s generally the case that if you knew then what you know now, you’d do things differently. But we have to have a learning culture … and that’s something I’ve faced the agency and talked about.”

Ignition is Business Insider's flagship conference featuring the biggest names in business, tech, and media. Check out the agenda <a id="898d30a7-c195-3915-a55c-862b3300518b" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/ignition-agenda?utm_source=intl&amp;utm_medium=ingest"> right here </a> .

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'Siloed companies weren't working': DDB's Wendy Clark says the ad agency of the future needs to be more flexible

Remember you can <a href="http://newsletter.businessinsider.com/join/4np/insider-advertising"> sign up to get this newsletter daily here </a> .

<ul><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/how-andy-jassy-could-grow-amazons-ad-business-2021-2021-2">Amazon advertising under Jassy</a></li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/ogilvys-new-global-ceo-andy-main-is-leading-a-big-turnaround">Andy Main's Ogilvy plans</a></li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/movie-studios-and-netflix-battle-for-cross-platform-franchises-2021-2">Entertainment companies' franchise fever</a></li></ul>

Andy Jassy, who leads Amazon Web Services, will replace Jeff Bezos as Amazon CEO and leaves an opening for a cloud new leader.

<h3>What Amazon's incoming CEO can do for advertising</h3>

News that Amazon's incoming CEO is Andy Jassy is raising advertisers' hopes that he'll help solve some of their longstanding gripes about the company,Lauren Johnson reported.

Advertisers have long wanted more data to see if their ads grow awareness and lead to sales, and they're speculating that he'll bring together disparate parts of the company and bring more measurement to ads.

They point to his leadership of another growth business, AWS, and its cloud products that could help improve the accuracy of ads.

<h3>Read more: Andy Jassy will be Amazon's next CEO. Here's how advertisers think his AWS experience could boost its ad business.</h3>

People are changing viewing habits while avoiding ads more than ever. Advertisers are seeking fewer big, multi-year contracts, while getting their message out is becoming more complicated than ever. Many are abandoning agencies altogether, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/consultancies-and-firms-helping-brands-in-house-their-advertising-2020-11"> figuring they can do the work better internally </a> .

One way agencies have been responding is mimicking the consulting and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/edelman-bulks-up-its-350-person-data-analytics-offering-2021-2"> companies that are encroaching </a> on their business.

Last week, Lindsay Rittenhouse checked in on how Ogilvy's new CEO is taking <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/ogilvys-new-global-ceo-andy-main-is-leading-a-big-turnaround"> a page from consulting </a> to revive the WPP-owned agency.

Main also wants to triple the PR business, by partnering with<a href="https://www.dreamstarsafrica.com/"> leading pan-African PR agency, Dream Stars Africa</a> to help them define and achieve their strategic PR goals.

Main seems like he has as good a shot as anyone at turning around an agency, having built Deloitte Digital into a big business. But with big contracts being a thing of the past, its comeback could be more a plodding one than a roaring one.

As one exec put it: "I fully think Andy has the will and ambition. The main thing we're struggling with right now is the work; it's project by project."

<h3>Go deeper: Ogilvy's new chief Andy Main is leading a massive turnaround at the storied ad agency, but some insiders are wary of the new direction</h3>

The coronavirus pandemic has not only accelerated legacy media's push into streaming but influenced the kind of entertainment Disney, WarnerMedia, Netflix, and others are leaning into, namely, big franchises, Travis Clark reports.

<ul><li>The most notable example is Disney Plus' "Star Wars" series, "The Mandalorian."</li><li>Netflix and Amazon are building up their franchise content, too. Netflix has new teams dedicated to event/spectacle and franchise TV shows and also has its sights on video-game IP.</li><li>Disney has plans for 10 "Star Wars" and 10 Marvel TV shows exclusive to Disney Plus, and WarnerMedia is planning DC movie spinoffs.</li></ul>

That's good news for franchise fans, but those craving the next feature film may have to be patient.

<h3>Read more: The cross-platform future of Hollywood franchises is starting to take shape, as movie studios jump into streaming and Netflix builds content based on comics, games, and more</h3>

Other stories we're reading:

<ul><li><a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/pop-culture/pop-culture-news/months-after-tiktok-apologized-black-creators-many-say-little-has-n1256726">Months after TikTok apologized to Black creators, many say little has changed</a> (NBC News)</li><li><a href="https://digiday.com/future-of-tv/smart-tvs-have-become-the-new-front-in-the-connected-tv-platform-battle/?utm_content=buffer1ee14&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_campaign=digidaydisn=digidaydis">Smart TVs have become the new front in the connected TV platform battle</a> (Digiday)</li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/netflix-hbo-max-lean-into-tiktok-influencer-campaigns-2021-2">Netflix, HBO Max, and other streaming services are flooding TikTok with splashy ads, comedy skits, and viral dances, as they battle to sign up new users</a> (Business Insider)</li><li><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/why-mondelezs-colab-is-betting-on-tiny-snack-brands-2021-2">Why Mondelez is going after early-stage startups with a new financing and mentorship program</a> (Business Insider)</li><li><a href="https://www.axios.com/bloomberg-media-consumer-subscription-revenue-34489fa9-cb19-4b17-a1fe-1ebee8d6d846.html">Bloomberg Media expects 9-figure consumer subscription biz</a> (Axios)</li></ul>

Thanks for reading, and see you next week.

Hi and welcome to this weekly edition of Insider Advertising, where we track the big stories in media and advertising. I'm Lucia Moses, deputy editor here.

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Lucia Moses

Articles written by the author

Turner CEO David Levy says content is still king, but television needs to evolve

'Siloed companies weren't working': DDB's Wendy Clark says the ad agency of the future needs to be more flexible

How Amazon's next CEO could change advertising