Recorded October 5, 2017
Transcript edited for length and clarity.
Brian Kenny: In February of 2017, Billboard magazine released a list of the 100 greatest award show performances of all time. The list is a veritable who's who of legendary performers like Ray Charles, Paul McCartney, and Bruce Springsteen. Right in the middle at number 54 sits Latin heartthrob Ricky Martin for his electrifying performance of "La Copa de la Vida," which he sang both in English and in Spanish, busting out salsa moves as he gyrated across the stage.
The performance propelled Martin from boy band also-ran to superstar, as sales of his new album exceeded 20 million in the days that followed. It was a performance to remember not just for its entertainment value, but also because many in the media industry saw it as an inflection point. Newsweek magazine wrote that Martin's performance changed the way the country looks, feels, thinks, eats, dances, and votes. Today we'll hear from Senior Lecturer Henry McGee about his case entitled, “NBCUniversal Telemundo: Transforming Latino Television.” [Editor’s note: The case is expected to published in the late fall.] I'm your host, Brian Kenny, and you're listening to Cold Call.
Henry McGee teaches MBA students and executives at Harvard Business School and he's also a member of the School's Digital Initiative. Prior to joining the faculty, he served as president of HBO Home Entertainment. Henry, thanks for joining me today.
Henry McGee: Brian, terrific to be here.
Kenny: I don't often get to talk about people like Ricky Martin in the intro, so that's kind of fun. Can you tell us who's the protagonist and what's on his mind?
McGee: The case opens just a few months ago in August of this year when Cesar Conde, who's the chairman of NBCUniversal International Group and also NBCUniversal Telemundo is surveying the construction site of the Spanish language network's vast new headquarters in Miami. It's like 500,000 square feet. That's approximately about the size of eight US football fields, so it's absolutely enormous.
It's also a wonderful metaphor for the growth of the network under Conde, who took the reins in 2015. In August he's just received news that he's beaten the traditional giant in the space, Univision, in the prime time ratings race and he's closing in on the traditional big four broadcasters: ABC, NBC, CBS, and FOX. It's a real David and Goliath story.
That said, there's a lot that Conde has to be concerned about. While Telemundo is the fastest-growing television network in the US, the traditional broadcast market as a whole is shrinking and he's got to figure out a way to capture the generation that is increasingly cutting the cord or never plugging into cable or satellite TV. Traditionally most Americans, as you know Brian, have gotten their television through cable or satellite, but in the last quarter alone the industry lost nearly a million subscribers.
"How does he attract an audience that's leaving the traditional broadcast universe all together?"
Conde also faces another big challenge, and that is despite the enormous growth of the Spanish-language market many advertisers treat it as a niche play and the size of the dollars don't match the size of the audience. Given the increasingly bilingual nature of the Hispanic market, many advertisers think that they can reach the market through English language media only.
This is an extreme example, but it makes the point. Last year on FOX, they got as much as 5 million dollars for a 30-second spot on the Super Bowl, while a spot on the Spanish language network [broadcast] went for about a quarter of a million dollars. So Conde really faces three challenges that the case examines. One is how does he come up with compelling program that's going to continue to win the ratings race both against the traditional rival, Univision, but also against the big four. He actually wants to redefine Hispanic television so that it's not the big four, but it's really the big six. The second challenge he faces is how does he attract an audience that's leaving the traditional broadcast universe all together, and third, how does he monetize all of that via advertising.
Kenny: So he's got the challenge that many in this industry are facing with the added wrinkle of the fact that it's a Spanish-speaking format and dealing with the questions about bilingual audience?
McGee: Exactly. That's why I wanted to do the case. It's going to be taught for the first time in a course I teach called, “Hollywood, Distribution and Marketing Challenges in a Digital World.” The course takes as its premise that the two things that are shaping the media industry right now are digitalization and globalization. I'm using this case because, one is the challenges that any broadcast network head would face, but also it raises issues of globalization, given the enormous size and importance of the Hispanic market here in the US.
Kenny: It sounds like a really great course, too. Let's talk about the Hispanic market. I was surprised at just how large it is and how rapidly it's grown.
McGee: It's enormous and it's growing. Hispanics are by far the largest ethnic or racial minority in the United States. Currently there are about 54 million Hispanics in the US, which represent about 18 percent of the population--about one of every five people in the US is of Hispanic origin. Importantly, their buying power is tremendous, about $2.3 trillion. That's roughly a GDP somewhere between India and France.
Kenny: Amazing. Talk about the demographic of the Hispanic population.
McGee: Before I do that, let me also say, because we have been using interchangeably the words "Hispanic" and "Latino," it's important for the listeners to know that "Hispanic" is the broader term that refers to anyone who speaks the Spanish language, where "Latino" specifically is a term used to describe those people in the United States who have family origins in Latin America. About two-thirds of the US Hispanic population is from Mexico. The second largest group is from Puerto Rico. That audience demographic is increasingly US born and increasingly young.
Kenny: Which gets a little bit to the way they consume media. The preponderance of consumption happens on digital devices. In the case you talk about what Cesar has to think about as he's building his strategy.
McGee: Broadly, they really fall into two areas, and that is, what is the content he's going to come up with to attract an increasingly younger audience? He's doing that not in a static universe, but he's also doing it with competition from Univision and the other networks, so it's very much what is he going to program. Then of course, how is he going to do it? Hispanic millennials get about 50 percent of their media via streaming devices.
Kenny: Before we get into more of the way that he approached that problem, can you describe the economics... The numbers for the TV industry are just staggering. As I write my check out to Verizon every month I feel my own little pinch of that. Can you describe how the advertising plays out?
McGee: Yes. Almost all television networks with the exception of advertising-free networks like HBO--television broadcasters and cable networks--are dependent on two different revenue streams. Importantly they get money from advertisers who are increasingly interested in a youthful audience because of their high spending power. Then their also extremely important revenue source comes from subscription fees that you pay each month. Networks have to look at both revenue streams.
Kenny: Spanish speaking TV has been around a lot longer than I realized. The case talks a little bit about the origins.
McGee: The first Spanish language TV broadcaster in the US was in fact Telemundo, which was started in 1954 by an entrepreneur named Angel Ramos. It went through a number of owners and eventually was acquired by Comcast. It has over time grown enormously. It not only has 17 owned and operated stations, there's a cable-only network, NBCUniverso, and a number of other properties, including a new film division.
Univision, which is the giant, started a couple of years later in 1956 in San Antonio and they got a big infusion of both money and programming from Mexico's television giant, Televisa. Although again the ownership has changed for a number of reasons and they are privately owned, the early lead that they established and the programming that they could bring from Mexico gave them a real leg up.
The challenge that Univision faces and the one that Telemundo has taken advantage of is that Univision by many young Hispanics is seen as their parents' network and it's highly reliant on the traditional telenovela Spanish language soap opera. The challenge for them and for Telemundo is how do you create programming that's going to appeal to this younger group?
Kenny: I'd like to hear a little bit more about Cesar. He grows up obviously watching whatever Spanish programming is available, but he identifies himself as a “200 percenter.” What's that all about?
McGee: He's great. He grew up in Miami. He is the son of immigrant parents, but growing up in Miami, in the US, he identifies, as he says, 100 percent with being American and 100 percent being Latino, so he's a “200 percenter.” That's how the younger generation is thinking of themselves. Cesar grew up in Miami. He's a great scholar and athlete. He came to Harvard College and competed on the varsity tennis team and was very involved in organizing a Cuban-American students’ organization on campus.
So he's always had this deep tie to his Hispanic roots, but he's also very much operated in a larger context of the broader US. As you can imagine, as a varsity tennis player he's quite competitive, but at the same time as I have observed him he's very much focused on team and team performance. When you talk with the people who work for him, one of the hallmarks of his management style that they cite always is his willingness to listen to multiple points of view. While he's been very much the leader and the driving force, he would be the first to tell you that it's not a one-man show.
Kenny: The case has an interesting tension in it, which is that Cesar, after largely being at the center of the success of Univision, now goes over to Telemundo and has to compete against the giant that he helped to create.
McGee: That's an interesting story. I actually wanted to do a case on Cesar back in 2013, because that was the year that, as president of Univision, which was going to be his rival, he scored a coup that caught the entire television industry by surprise. That was in the July sweeps period, which is when all the networks are rated one against the other.
"just as I was about to sit down and work on the case of Cesar Conde being this genius who had completely disrupted the television industry, he moved to NBCUniversal"
Univision came in number one ahead of ABC, NBC, CBS and FOX, so you can imagine how everyone stood up and took notice, including Steve Burke, who is head of NBCUniversal, who lured Conde over toward ... Not initially on Telemundo, but he placed him in charge of all their international operations, which are huge for them, and their digital operations. So, just as I was about to sit down and work on the case of Cesar Conde being this genius who had completely disrupted the television industry, he moved to NBCUniversal.
He was there for a couple of years running and growing NBCUniversal's international and digital operations, and then two years ago he was asked to take over the Telemundo operations. I noticed his success and contacted him again and said, "Well, it seems like now you've done it two for two. Why don't we sit down and do a case?"
Kenny: You wind up getting a more layered case as a result, so that's good. He approaches this in an interesting way. He calls it the three pillars approach.
McGee: He has decided that there are three ways that he can approach this audience. The first is by really re-inventing the telenovela. At Telemundo they invented something called super series, which use … very high production values. They are produced mainly here in the US and in Mexico, but they've brought, if you will, all of the expertise and learnings from NBCUniversal to this new form. The plot lines are focused not on life in Mexico, but on the issues that the Latino audience faces in the US. So it's a combination of both production values and storylines.
Kenny: You mentioned in the case that they're shorter than the novelas, which had hundreds of episodes.
McGee: That's right.
Kenny: Who wants to hang on for that?
McGee: Right. So it's much more American in the case, right? In keeping with the US tradition they're shorter, but can go on for a number of seasons.
The second pillar is sports. With the backing of the very wealthy parent, NBCUniversal, they're going to have the World Cup Soccer rights, which will be tremendous. That's coming up in the future, but sports programming, which does quite well in the Hispanic audience, has been a huge area of investment.
The third pillar is music programming, and you mentioned Ricky Martin earlier. They put a lot of money into both live events, but also they've developed a whole set of musical biographies that have had a great appeal. Those are the three programming pillars that he's built up.
Kenny: You mentioned Steve Burke earlier, so I'm just curious, for Cesar, who had been at Univision and been sort of his own captain, what's it like all of a sudden being part of an organization where you've got to answer to others and you're part of a family of programming?
McGee: I think that being part of NBCUniversal, Cesar Conde really embraces ... Burke has given him a lot of room to grow the network. Certainly resources have not been a problem, whether it's the brand new headquarters in Miami, the tremendous investment in sports, the investment in the new original programming, so they've really benefited from that.
They've gained two other benefits from being part of NBCUniversal. What NBCUniversal has done quite cleverly is to have the NBCUniversal advertising team, which is handling all advertising not only for the NBC network, but also for the SciFi channel, the USA network and Bravo ... they now also handle the ad sales for Telemundo. So they can have a different sort of dialogue with advertisers than if it was a standalone network.
Similarly, when it comes to negotiations with cable and satellite providers, that is all being done as a group as well. One of the things that both Burke and Conde talk about is that while there's been a gap in revenue, they also see that as a monetization opportunity.
"A tremendous amount of their resources are focused on the digital market"
Kenny: And some interesting partnerships that Cesar has pursued. You mentioned Vice in the case?
McGee: Yes. They have reached out to Snap, Vice, and others as they go look for the younger audience. I'd like to talk about that. A tremendous amount of their resources are focused on the digital market and it's really one of the things they do. Their head of digital is brought into all of their discussions and it's very much not an afterthought. As you walk around the headquarters of Telemundo, the one sense you get is that they are keenly aware of the importance of the millennial and younger audience and that coming up with digital programming or adapting the current programming for consumption on digital platforms is extremely important to them.
Kenny: This is all still playing out? You haven't taught the case yet, but you're getting ready to, and is Cesar going to join you?
McGee: Cesar is coming. He's flying up from Miami for the day. The students are very excited about it and I think they're going to be very impressed by him. I think the way that he approaches problems, he thinks about problems, the career choices that he's had to make and the strategic choices that he's made both at Univision and Telemundo, and being able to tell the story from both sides, there will be a lot there to talk about in class.
Kenny: Henry, thank you so much for joining us today.
McGee: My great pleasure, Brian.
Kenny: I'm your host, Brian Kenny, and you've been listening to Cold Call, the official podcast of Harvard Business School.