ViacomCBS’ Jo Ann Ross on Keeping Her Upfront Event Short

The upfronts week presentations have ended, and now it’s time for the real work: the negotiations. Adweek is sitting down with each of the ad sales chiefs who presented this week to talk about their respective events and their strategies for navigating this year’s marketplace. Following NBCUniversal’s Mark Marshall, Fox’s Marianne Gambelli , Discovery’s Jon Steinlauf, Disney’s Rita Ferro and JP Colaco’s WarnerMedia, next up is Jo Ann Ross, president and chief advertising revenue officer, ViacomCBS domestic advertising sales. ViacomCBS closed out upfronts week last Wednesday with a relatively brief presentation that highlighted the company’s combined content slate (via a spoof Survivor Celebrity Casting Special) instead of its individual brands. The company also inserted faux ads to tout its EyeQ Video platform (which includes ad-supported streamers like Paramount+ and Pluto TV) and new InView reporting platform (which helps advertisers evaluate their multichannel investments across the portfolio). Ross talked with Adweek about keeping things brief for upfronts week viewers, not donning a costume for this year’s presentation and her top priorities in this year’s negotiations. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. Adweek: This was your first time doing a fully combined upfront presentation as ViacomCBS after holding two presentations last year. How did you decide to structure it the way you did this year?Ross: What we learned last year, was that while it did serve its purposes to do it over two days—and it was also a tip of the hat to legacy Viacom and legacy CBS in the early days of the merger—one unified approach would resonate more with our audiences, a year into Covid. We all know that being on Zooms is somewhat taxing to the spectators, so we went into this process very intentionally: let's do one combined presentation, but make sure that it's not just talking heads. Let's make it entertaining, and let’s show the depth and breadth of our assets, best expressed by the talent that we have across the board. And that is really what you saw. And how about the fake ads? Our challenge was, how do we also weave into an entertaining, efficient [presentation] our corporate messaging coming from ad sales? Well, I think the best way to show that we were innovative, was to innovate, and do our hard sell, through advertiser commercial messages. We were the advertiser. It was tongue in cheek, it was seamless and we got our message across. They were really well-received. How much more are you going to absorb on a Zoom? I think that we got our messaging across, and we did not need to go any longer.—Jo Ann Ross, president and chief advertising revenue officer, ViacomCBS There were multiple presentations that went past an hour, so I think people were surprised that yours ended up being so brief, especially in comparison. Why did you keep things to just 40 minutes?It goes back to the lessons that we learned. When you look at it in totality, how much more are you going to absorb on a Zoom? I think that we got our messaging across, and we did not need to go any longer. And then we also did the websites [with more information about shows and offerings] that if they want to do a deeper dive, they can do a deeper dive. We learned some lessons from that last year: don't expect them to do it, but many people want to do it, so we leave it there for them to do it at their convenience. I think, given what we needed to communicate, which are those messages about where we stand in the ecosystem, in terms of our footprint how deep we go, how you can add the incremental reach, how we're working with our clients with InView and EyeQ and what we're providing, we got it done—and [it didn’t feature] anybody in a suit. How did you get out of dressing up in costume for the upfront presentation this year?It’s funny that you say, “How did I get out of it?” I don't like to get out of it; I like to be part of it. I love doing that, and if I could have, I would have had a [Survivor] buff around my head, or had an immunity idol. But I was kind of the voice of God [in the Survivor segment]—so if I'm the biggest piece of gravitas in the presentation, that's pretty good! ViacomCBS’ Upfront Highlights Combined Content Slate Instead of Individual Brands What’s your biggest priority in this year’s upfront?Lots of priorities. I think for anyone in the marketplace this year on the sell side, the biggest priority is really working as closely as we can with our clients, which we have been doing very, very proactively since January. The conversations revolved around what is the marketplace—we all know the marketplace dynamic this year is that linear ratings on cable and broadcast are somewhat challenged. This is the year that our marketers and advertisers are leaning into digital for incremental reach, they're impressed by what they've seen with our rebranding of Paramount+, they now understand our ecosystem, including Pluto. We're showing them how the digital footprint that we have, 60 million MAUs [monthly active users], will add incremental reach, and we can help them through EyeQ. We put together video content bundles, which makes it simpler for them to buy the digital if they're buying prime on linear, and they need to move impressions away from there. We've also come up with a product that has been in beta for five months, InView. That's a transactional dashboard that helps the clients get the transparency that they're looking for. So a lot of priorities. There's a lot of digital opportunities out there. We're not the only ones on the block, but I believe if we marry our digital properties with our linear cable and broadcast, it's a win-win. And we've shown that to our clients, so we're ready to go. I think it's gonna be quick. What’s the biggest way this year’s upfront marketplace will be different from last year’s?You go through something like what we went through last year, I think we've all learned a lot, on both sides of the desk. That was the theme of our upfront, the power that we bring to the table, but also the power of our partnership with our clients. So it's not like, “knock knock, it's the day before the upfront, we think we should do this,” we've been having that conversation with them for close to four months, and we understand that what we're asking in many instances is going to be very challenging for them. And that's why we wanted to have the conversations early on, so we can work with them to help each other in the partnership. And so far, the conversations have been really good and productive. But we're not running away from linear; linear still provides huge reach across CBS and all the Viacom assets. I believe if we marry our digital properties with our linear cable and broadcast, it's a win-win.—Jo Ann Ross, president and chief advertising revenue officer, ViacomCBS Given the success of the Nickelodeon NFL playoff game and other award show simulcasts, will you be leaning into other simulcasting capabilities into this year’s upfront?Some of what we are able to do in simulcasting is controlled by the rights holder, but those are conversations that we’re having all the time, and they are ongoing. You’re also emphasizing your DEI initiatives this year.The multicultural audience has become so important. We’re making sure that as our clients are looking at their media plans and making it more of a priority than they have in the past, that we're able to be very responsive to that. Because we are industry leaders, we've been in this space for a long time, and we have a lot of experts in that space having BET in our roster, as well as all the diverse audiences that we have served for years through our cable and broadcast programming. What else are you seeing out there this year?The importance of premium content. Live sports is still really important in the mix. We're thrilled that we renewed our deal with the NFL for years to come. Last year, flexibility was a big word. I believe clients will still be looking for flexibility, whether that's through options or fluidity. And as they're leaning more into digital, they want to make sure that they have frequency controls and transparency, they want to know what they're buying. And EyeQ answers a lot of that, as does InView.

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ViacomCBS’ Jo Ann Ross on Top Upfront Priorities and Keeping Her Event Short

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