Mediaweek visited Ashcroft at the company’s London base in the historic Somerset House in London earlier this year. Events since that meeting have thrown up some unexpected challenges for the business, something that Ashcroft addresses in a more recent discussion we also had with him.

Ashcroft started working in distribution of television programs in the late 90s working with Wendy Hallam and her team at ABC International. He soon moved to Southern Star and then after moving to London worked under Greg Phillips at what was then Fireworks (now Content Media Corp). He later found himself back in Australia, this time at Viacom managing Asia-Pacific program sales.

Ashcroft moved to Singapore, twice, Australia again, some of that time working with Mark and Carl Fennessy at Shine Australia as head of Asia Pacific international distribution. Ashcroft noted the main driver of revenues at the time was the MasterChef format which had been supercharged in Australia. When Shine invested in scripted with hit series like Broadchurch and Hunted the business went to another level.

When starting Parade Media as a UK-based distributor, Ashcroft admitted he didn’t have a lot of money at launch. He networked with the Australian foodies he knew and grew the business. “I focussed on programs associated with winners, runners-up and judges from MasterChef, specialising in food. I approached people to see if they had been planning any programs, telling them we could go out and raise the finance through our international network.

“The first show we got away through that model was Andy and Ben Eat the World for branded content company Projucer. That business has got bigger over the years and they also have Desert Vet on Nine.”

Andy and Ben co-host Andy Allen returns to MasterChef this week, not as a contestant or returning mentor, but as one of three new judges.

An investment in Parade from a UK-based Station12 and Welsh Broadcaster S4C helped grow the Parade catalogue quickly – “almost overnight we went from 200 hours of content to almost 800 hours of content”.

With so much content to sell, Parade set about growing its sales team. “Heike Renner, ex-BBC, was our first big hire and she has been with us ever since,” said Ashcroft. “We how have people in Miami and Singapore. Having people on the ground, intimately understanding those markets, certainly gives us an edge over companies that might run their business out of a single hub.” Other key signings were Mark Caulton (from Mediaworks NZ) as chief content officer, Cesar Diaz who runs Latin America and Jacqueline Tan (ex-Shine, ativeTV) who looks after Asia.

Selling Australian programs globally is the key to Parade’s success with Ashcroft estimating it currently accounts for as much as 80% of Parade’s catalogue. “I am super proud to be flying the flag globally,” said the exec from Sydney’s northern beaches. “We have now extended that to New Zealand where we represent more of its producers.

“We built the business on culinary travel chop and chat with big names. We are now moving into premium factual – wildlife, science, history.”

Recent successes include sales from programs hosted by Luke Nguyen, Curtis Stone and Ainsley Harriot.

While Parade was unable to get to MIP TV which was cancelled this month, Ashcroft said the two Cannes markets, MIPCOM later in the year is the other, remain crucial for the business.

The merger of bigger global players like Endemol and Shine, and more recently Banijay and Endemol Shine, open up opportunities for smaller players. “For the distribution business at large it has been a turbulent time for everybody with declining revenue in the traditional linear space. That can work for us where big productions find it hard to reduce their production budgets. We are able to work with our producers on creating high value content for maybe as little as a tenth of the cost to what else is out there.”

When Mark Caulton joined Parade he gave the business new insights into content demand. The company also works with producers who have existing series which can be recut to give them a new selling point. “Mark understands the touchpoints that TV buyers look for which can help keep a project on track.”

Recent successful projects include the previously mentioned Desert Vet (Outback Vet outside of Australia) and Jack Stein Inside the Box (Jack is son of Rick Stein) – both from Projucer. Long term relationships with Australian producers include H Squared (My Restaurant in India, Everyday Gourmet) and Abode which specialises in property programming.

“We have about 35 producers we represent. Our producers have around the clock access to buyer conversations. We also supply detailed information on why networks have passed on an opportunity, which gives them an insight into their next production.”

Although the way the audience consumes media is changing, Ashcroft said linear pay TV and FTA still accounts for over 90% of Parade revenues. “We are working with the AVODs more plus Amazon and Netflix. Traditionally pure lifestyle content was something Netflix didn’t do, but that is changing with premium lifestyle content also moving to streaming services. They will be a bigger part of our future.”

Parade is always looking to diversify both the types of content and its revenue streams. With a view to the latter, it took a 10% stake in the Outdoor Channel last year. Outdoor Channel in Australia has a deal with Seven where it sits as a linear channel on 7plus. Parade runs a programming block called My Life on the channel. “The channel is in 35m homes across 19 countries. The biggest markets are Malaysia, Philippines and Indonesia.” Ashcoft is an Outdoor Channel board member.

Recent challenges the business has had to deal with since the spread of COVID-19 are impacting the TV sector globally.

“Ad rev and production delays are the most severe challenges we are facing but there is an opportunity to focus on corona-proofing content,” said Ashcroft last week.

“Punching through this period is the primary aim and then we look to rebuild on the other side. The most important thing for distributors now is to be empathetic to the needs of our broadcast partners, being nimble and flexible as we navigate these uncharted waters together and get through to the other side.

“We have focussed on a rich archive and contributor led originals more recently with three such shows in pre-production here in the UK. These shows will deliver at the end of the year when broadcasters will need new, premium factual content to backfill slots due to delays in drama production and sport.”

Ashcroft spoke frankly about the last month: “Whilst the ass has fallen out of the ad market globally and content spend has been hit across the board, we are still creating opportunities with our partners and providing premium high-end cost-effective originals and finished tape. Dubbing is an issue in the key European markets which is causing delays so there is an increased focus on existing content that we have dubs readily available. There has never been a better time to pivot.”

The channel has summarised the highlights from the past five weeks of ratings data:

Sky News has been the #1 channel on Foxtel for more than five weeks (1 March – 7 April), with total audience increasing +63% year-on-year, reaching 2.4 million viewers.

This includes an increase throughout the day (6am-6pm) of +82% across programs including First Edition, AM Agenda, NewsDay, Afternoon Agenda and The Kenny Report.

Viewing to primetime (6pm-11pm) is up +41% driven by programs including Paul Murray Live, Credlin, The Bolt Report, Jones & Credlin and the Sunday night coronavirus investigations hosted by Peter Stefanovic.

Since launching on 23 March, the dedicated 24/7 Sky News COVID-19 channel on Foxtel has reached 1.4 million viewers (23 March – 7 April).

Additionally, there have been 1.1 million streams to the Sky News COVID-19 channel online.

Sky News Australia has shattered its previous digital traffic records with visitors to skynews.com.au surging +404% since the start of March bringing unique users to 3.5 million. Those people streamed Sky News Australia videos more than 5 million times over this period.

Significant traffic increases continued across Sky News Australia’s portfolio of digital platforms with syndicated video views across the News Corp network, Microsoft, YouTube and Facebook exceeding 80 million since March, representing a year-on-year increase of +536%.

The trend of consecutive record-breaking weeks continued last week with the network scoring 19.9 million video views across all digital platforms, the biggest week in the company’s history.

Audio figures have been bolstered by the launch of Sky News on iHeartRadio on 23 March which has already been streamed more than 18,000 hours.

Paul Whittaker, Sky News Australia chief executive said: “At this time of unprecedented health and economic uncertainty, more people than ever before are turning to us for accurate and timely breaking news, in-depth analysis and expert commentary.

“Our team is working around-the-clock to deliver our trusted news content to Australians at this crucial time across our broadcast, digital and audio platforms.”

Over the past five weeks (1 March – 7 April) individual programs across Sky News on Foxtel have delivered large audience increases as viewers turn to the team for the latest news and exclusive insights:

• First Edition (Weekdays from 5am) with Laura Jayes and Peter Stefanovic has seen a +37% average audience increase during this period, reaching 559,000 cumulative viewers.
• AM Agenda (Weekdays from 9am) with Tom Connell and Annelise Nielsen up +91%, reaching 723,000 viewers.
• NewsDay (Weekdays from 12pm) with Ashleigh Gillon up +144%, with a reach of 805,000.
• Afternoon Agenda (Monday – Thursday at 2pm) with Kieran Gilbert has seen average audiences increase +93%, reaching 876,00 viewers.
• The Kenny Report (Weekdays at 5pm) with Chris Kenny has delivered a +62% increase in average audience, reaching more than 560,000 viewers.
• Credlin (Weeknights at 6pm) anchored by Peta Credlin increased its average audience by +58%, reaching 649,000 viewers.
• The Bolt Report (Weeknights at 7pm) hosted by Andrew Bolt is up +38% year-on-year, with a reach of 710,000 viewers.
• Kenny on Media (Mondays at 8pm) hosted by Chris Kenny is up +52% compared to the same timeslot last year, reaching 295,000.
• Jones & Credlin (Tuesdays at 8pm) with Alan Jones and Peta Credlin recorded a +12% audience growth, reaching 372,000 viewers.
• Richo & Jones (Wednesdays at 8pm) anchored by Graham Richardson and Alan Jones increased viewing by +66% compared to the same time last year, with a cumulative reach of  264,000.
• Chris Smith Tonight (Thursdays at 8pm) hosted by Chris Smith is up +147% compared to the same timeslot last year, reaching 323,000 viewers.
• Paul Murray Live (Sunday – Thursday at 9pm) grew by +39%, reaching 888,000 viewers.
• Sharri (Sundays at 6pm) increased average audiences by +101%, reaching 314,000.
• Coronavirus: Special Investigations (Sundays at 7.30pm) hosted by Peter Stefanovic have seen a +105% increase compared to the usual timeslot average audience, reaching 295,000.
• The Front Page (Monday – Thursday at 11pm) anchored by Peter Gleeson is up +42%, with a cumulative reach of 399,000 viewers.
• Outsiders (Sundays at 9am) with Rowan Dean, Rita Panahi and James Morrow saw an average audience increase of +53% while Outsiders’ Guide (Fridays at 8pm) is up +314% compared to the same timeslot last year.
• In My View (Sundays at 8pm) is up +67% on average audience compared to the same timeslot last year, reaching 363,000 viewers.

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Top Photo: Annelise Nielsen and Kieran Gilbert on Sky News

Source: OzTAM National STV Panel, Total People, 01.03.20 – 07.04.20 vs STLY/ 16 days prior, Sky News Live, Sky News Extra/ COVID-19, Overnight and Average Audience & 1 Min Cume Reach. Programs that didn’t air in 2019 are compared to the program in the same timeslot and day range. Encore programming is excluded.

The ABC has topped the news rankings as it passes the 15m unique users mark.

Guardian Australia is the fastest growing news site, reaching 11.6 million Australians in March. Both publishers improved their ranking – the ABC rose from #3 to #1 month-on-month, while Guardian Australia lifted from #7 to #4.

All publishers experienced substantial growth with The Australian doubling its audience, smh.com.au jumping by 66% and The Age, nine.com.au and Daily Mail Australia all close to doubling their February audience numbers.

Nine.com.au dropped down the rankings from #2 in February to #6 in March.

Guardian Australia has shot ahead to become the country’s fastest growing news site, up 104% as 11.6 million readers turned to the masthead for reporting of the coronavirus crisis during March 2020.

Lenore Taylor, editor of Guardian Australia, said that audience growth demonstrates high levels of trust.

“I’m proud and delighted that 11.6 million Australians have put their trust in Guardian Australia’s journalism at this time,” said Taylor.

“Our Australian editorial team, and Guardian journalists around the world, are delivering distinctive, fact-based news and sharp commentary and analysis to inform and explain the events we are all living through.”

“I’d also like to thank our Guardian Australia readers, who have provided so much support and encouragement in the seven years since we launched here, and who have now made us the fourth most read news site in the nation.”

Dan Stinton

Dan Stinton, managing director of Guardian Australia, said that the masthead was an effective platform for advertisers looking to reach a highly engaged audience.

“Almost half of the country read Guardian Australia last month, and it’s a readership that is deeply engaged with our journalism,” said Stinton.

“Our reach is now bigger than almost any other advertising platform – including most free to air television shows – and we believe our readers trust us a lot more than someone watching Married at First Sight or a rerun of an old footy final.

“Obviously the coronavirus crisis has impacted on many marketing budgets, but those advertisers who need to get a message out in these times will be hard pressed to find a more effective advertising vehicle than us.”

However HT&E is only putting its toe back in the outdoor space, with the shareholding in oOh!media counting for 4.2% of the issued shares. It has not been revealed the price that HT&E acquired the shares for, but HT&E said this morning its new investment was worth close to $15m.

HT&E is no stranger to outdoor, formerly being the owner of Adshel. When it used to trade as APN News & Media, the company increased its Adshel shareholding to 100% after buying out Clear Channel. It later sold Adshel to oOh!media for $570m in a bidding war with APN Outdoor, which itself later merged with JCDecaux.

In a short statement to the ASX this morning, HT&E said: “HT&E looks forward to supporting oOh!media as a constructive significant shareholder.”

It may be a good time to buy oOh!media shares, with the company commenting: “oOh!media is the leader in the out of home sector in Australia/New Zealand and the acquisition of oOh!media shares by another participant in the Australian media sector highlights the strategic value of oOh!media’s assets and in the board’s view the company remains significantly undervalued based on current trading prices.”

The oOh!media share price jumped from 60 cents at the open today to 80 cents at lunchtime. The 52-week high for the stock is $3.87. Early this month the business had a capital raising where shares were offered at 53 cents.

SMI AU/NZ managing director Jane Ractliffe said SMI, which collects the actual advertising payments made by media agencies on behalf of their advertiser clients, organised special advertising data collections in both the AU and NZ markets Tuesday night to provide the first insight into how the Coronavirus has impacted ad demand in the past two weeks.

And while the market has been awash with talk of campaign cancellations, the net impact for Australian agency advertising in the past two weeks has been an inflow of $17 million in agency bookings. But in NZ, which has been more bullish all year with a higher level of future confirmed bookings, SMI is reporting a $7.1 million decline in April bookings.

But both markets are now showing similar levels of forward demand in April with the confirmed value of Australian bookings already 46% of that reported in April 2019, and in NZ that figure is 45%. And that’s with more than two weeks of trading still to occur in the month.

“SMI’s actual data shows the market is not experiencing the wipeout some people have suggested,” Ractliffe said. “The market is back, but suggestions of 50- 60% declines will just not happen. Some media are tracking well from an agency perspective and many large product categories have continued to grow their media investment in April,” she said.

“Even if another ad was not bought in the whole of April, the worst case scenario for the AU market is a decline of 55% and 54% for NZ. But of course there’s a mass of paid ads that we’ll see in the next two weeks on our TVs, in our newspapers, on the radio, in magazines, outdoor and on our phones and tablets. Given the amount of ad revenue we’d usually see come through in the next two weeks, the likely decline at worst will be 25% to 30%.

“If media are seeing declines of more than 50%, that will be more due to the devastating impact of evaporating advertising from the small business sector given much of that part of our economy has closed. Media agency demand is not falling anywhere near the same level.”

Ractliffe said TV and newspapers appear to be the early beneficiaries of the recent changes in media plans by agencies on behalf of corporate advertisers.

Australia’s national newspapers are already reporting a 30% increase in agency bookings for March and in the last two weeks agency spend on newspapers has grown 14% for the month of April (the highest percentage increase in Agency spend of any media for the month).

In both countries television is reporting the highest level of future confirmed bookings of any media, with the value of confirmed TV bookings for April already 57% of that achieved last April.

As for the product categories, in the past two weeks SMI is reporting a strong increase in April investment from retailers in both countries (mostly supermarkets), while insurers, domestic bank and utilities have also grown ad spend in both markets since the ‘stay at home’ message came into effect.

SMI is today also releasing the first look at early March data for both markets. In NZ, the market came into the COVID-19 crisis in a strong position with agency demand up 4% in March (ex digital) which also brings its March quarter growth to 4% (ex digital). In Australia, the very early March data shows the market back 11% ex digital.

Ractliffe said SMI would again update the market on ad demand next week with the release of the usual interim March results for Australia and New Zealand and was committed to keeping the market informed during this unprecedented time.

“It’s never been more important to have the facts about how advertising demand is tracking and we want to ensure all our media and advertiser stakeholders continue to have an accurate view of the market on which to make important decisions in this unprecedented time,” Ractliffe said.

In the final week of March, when no live sports events were played, there were more views of sports-related video content on social platforms than a week prior when the AFL Premiership and the NRL where both being played.

According to Nielsen’s Social Content Ratings, engagement of sports-related videos across social media exceeded 12 million views in the first week without live sporting content (March 26-April 1), which is over 1.2 million more than the prior week (March 19-March 25).

While the total amount of owned video content published by leagues, teams and athletes was down (-18%), views per video increased by 35%.

Singles

After climbing to #1 a week ago, Saint Jhn remains there for a second week with Roses.

The only change to the top 10, and just one of three top 50 chart debuts this week, was Drake with Toosie Slide new at #3. It is the 13th top 10 single for the multi-talented Canadian.

This week’s other top 50 debuts:
#35 Jack Harlow with Whats Poppin
#47 DaBaby with Find My Way

Albums

Two new Australian albums have debuted in the top three this week – Violent Soho and Kerser. That gives Australian artists a second successive week topping the chart after 5SOS were #1 last week. Those two artists join Dune Rats and Tame Impala as other home-grown musicians who have reached the top this year

Taking over from 5SOS this week is Violent Soho with their fifth album Everything Is A-OK. This is the band’s second successive chart topper after their fourth album Waco became their first #1 in March 2016.

Helping celebrate more local chart success was ARIA CEO Dan Rosen when he said: “Congratulations to James, Luke, Luke, Michael and the entire Violent Soho team on their return to #1 on the ARIA Charts. Everything Is A-OK is the album title we all need to believe in right now. It’s an incredible achievement to reach #1, especially by a band who is known for their hard work on the road, and direct connection to their fans. I also want to congratulate Kerser on his sixth top five album in just seven years. It goes to show that despite the crisis, great Australian music finds a way to connect with music fans around the country.”

Kerser’s Roll the Dice continues a stunning run of success for the prolific Campbelltown rapper. Seven of those nine albums have made the top 10 with his previous album Lifestyle peaking at #2 just 12 months ago.

Four other albums debuted top 50 this week:

#12 All Time Low with Wake Up, Sunshine. Sixth top 10 spot for the Baltimore rock band who have just released their eighth album.
#30 Testament with Titans of Creation. Thrash metal from Northern California in the form of the band’s 13th album.
#41 Sam Hunt with Southside. Second album from the country music songwriter who launched his performance career with his debut album in 2014.
#50 Thundercat with It Is What It Is. Hard to musically pin down the former member of Suicidal Tendencies who works across many genres as a singer-songwriter-producer.

Monday news highlights
Seven News 1,299,000/1,268,000
Nine News 1,177,000/1,101,000
ABC News 954,000
A Current Affair 830,000/583,000
7.30 770,000
The Project 427,000/662,000
Australian Story 622,000
10 News 539,000/369,000
Q+A 428,000
The Latest 307,000
Nine News COVID-19 296,000
Sunrise 283,000
The Drum 258,000
The Morning Show 242,000
Today 208,000
SBS World News 203,000
ABC News Breakfast 203,000

Nine: The channel has chosen to wait until survey starts again next Sunday before launching Lego Masters. We will have to wait a week to see if that delay helps MasterChef build a following for Back to Win. Nine’s Tuesday best was RBT on 422,000 at 8pm after an hour of A Current Affair.

Seven: Primetime was back to a traditional format last night with Home and Away returning at 7pm with 676,000. House Rules followed with its second-smallest audience since launch – 548,000. Four of the five episodes screened last week made it over 600,000. Thursday dipped to 478,000 and the format started this week with 630,000 on Sunday. The Latest then screened after the renovators.

10: The launch of MasterChef Australia: Back to Win couldn’t have gone any better for the network with the biggest series launch or return of 2020. ViacomCBS Australia and New Zealand chief content officer and executive vice president, Beverley McGarvey, said this morning: “We are so pleased and excited with how Australians have responded to the return of MasterChef Australia. Twelve seasons in and MasterChef Australia is still loved by so many people. Food is a universal theme, particularly in times like these, and our show has always been about the food.

“A big thanks to the massive team, on and off screen who put this show together, thanks to our new judges, Jock Zonfrillo, Melissa Leong and Andy Allen, our brilliant returning contestants and to our wonderful guest judge Gordon Ramsay.

“The cooking, passion and energy in MasterChef Australia this year is amazing and it is going to be a really thrilling season.”

There were so many factors at play last night it will take a few nights and then next week to understand how the audience might respond across the remaining months. The new judges worked well together with the returning contestants and they will grow in confidence when not standing alongside Gordon Ramsay. 10 will be looking to bolt on as many returning viewers as possible before Nine cranks up again with Lego Master next week. Meanwhile it will celebrate its biggest night of the year and the best MasterChef launch numbers since 2015, telling advertisers to get on board with the network that could cause some heartache in the weeks ahead.

Elsewhere on the channel MasterChef only got a quick plug in a couple of minutes at the end of The Project with the show over 650,000. Hughesy, We Have a Problem followed the cooks with 382,000, up from 298,000 last week. Hughesy also had an encore audience of 314,000 last week.

ABC: Australian Story went out after 7.30 on an altered Easter Monday schedule. The early Q+A did 428,000, similar to the 442,000 watching an hour later a week ago.