Yahoo Finance TV Ad Sales Leaders: Meet the Key Upfront Execs
The turmoil in TV and advertising has been reflected in a high level of turnover among top TV ad sales executives, so media buyers will be doing business with a number of new faces in this year’s upfront advertising sales market.
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Madison Avenue’s growing reliance on streaming video has given rise to a new array of top sales honchos. Jeff Collins is leading Fox Corp.’s efforts this year following the retirement of sales stalwart Marianne Gambelli. NBCUniversal’s Mark Marshall and Nexstar’s Michael Strober will preside over sales processes after just a year at the helm of their respective companies. And advertisers are bound to focus more on offerings from Netflix, Amazon and YouTube as viewers opt for streaming over linear TV.
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Here’s a list of the influential sales executives likely to have a hand in 2024’s proceedings.
Brian Albert
YouTube, managing director
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He certainly has the sheer tonnage of ad inventory, and YouTube has an in with younger consumers, but buyers still yearn for better-defined offerings amid a sea of user-generated content.
DID YOU KNOW?
He spent more than 15 years as a labor and employment attorney and as a sports marketer representing professional athletes.
Jeff Collins
Fox Corp., president, advertising sales
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Collins is likely to rely heavily on Fox’s broadcast of Super Bowl LIX while calling attention to the company’s lineups in live news and sports, along with primetime entertainment.
DID YOU KNOW?
Collins played a sizable role in expanding Fox News’ content slate to lifestyle programming.
Rita Ferro
Walt Disney Co., president, advertising sales
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Ferro will use Disney’s giant media portfolio to woo ad dollars that might go to others. Look for the Mouse to play up sports and streaming as well as a stack of proprietary ad tech.
DID YOU KNOW?
She once presided over sales for Disney’s kids-focused cable networks.
John Halley
Paramount Global, president, advertising
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Halley is armed with popular TV like NFL football and the “Yellowstone” universe — and a keen understanding of the cut -ting-edge advertising technology that drives the business. He’s operating in a chaotic environment these days, thanks to Paramount’s abrupt CEO turnover and long-simmering acquisition talks with suitors.
DID YOU KNOW?
Halley has been a vocal advocate of pressing for better audience measurement across TV and streaming.
Kim Kelleher and Evan Adlman
AMC Networks, chief commercial officer and AMC Networks, executive VP, commercial sales and revenue operations
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Can the “Walking Dead” franchise and broader digital distribution offset the company’s boutique programming operation, which is much smaller than those of its larger rivals?
DID YOU KNOW?
This team has struck deals that help support projects from actors such as Colman Domingo and Rhea Seehorn.
Mark Marshall
NBCUniversal, chairman, global advertising and partnerships
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Marshall enters the upfront world with the Paris Olympics and the 50th season of “Saturday Night Live.” He’s also steering NBCU into the future with a focus on new kinds of data-informed buying patterns.
DID YOU KNOW?
Marshall brought stability to NBCU’s ad sales effort after last year’s abrupt departure of his boss, Linda Yaccarino, who decamped just before the upfronts for what was then Twitter.
Alan Moss
Amazon Ads, VP, global advertising sales
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Moss has a large chunk of inventory to sell now that Amazon has launched an ad-supported tier of Prime Video and made it the default for subscribers. Media buyers, meanwhile, say they are guarding against new increases in pricing rates, particularly when it comes to streaming video.
DID YOU KNOW?
He previously had stints at Google and PayPal.
Peter Olsen
A+E Networks, executive VP, ad sales
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The company’s innovation with measurement, packaging and distribution is alluring, but it remains heavily dependent on cable and placing its content on third-party streamers.
DID YOU KNOW?
Olsen has been an “early backer of “attribution,” or measurements that show whether ads spurred consumers to make a purchase or take other meaningful action.
Amy Reinhard and Peter Naylor
Netflix, president, advertising, and Netflix, VP, global advertising sales
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The subscriber base for Netflix’s ad-supported tier continues to grow, but buyers contend the numbers are too small for a significant ad investment and suggest the streamer may focus more intently on bespoke sponsorships and product placement.
DID YOU KNOW?
Reinhard is a veteran Netflix operator, while Naylor has hard-won sales expertise from senior roles at NBCU, Hulu and Snap.
Donna Speciale
TelevisaUnivision, president, U.S. advertising sales and marketing
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Speciale is likely to go to market armed with new information about the power of Spanish-language audiences and how they have been growing, not shrinking, in recent years.
DID YOU KNOW?
Before moving to the sales side, Speciale was a top media buyer who represented Procter & Gamble and Coca-Cola, among others.
Jon Steinlauf
Warner Bros. Discovery, chief U.S. advertising sales officer
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A new primetime sports schedule on TruTV, ad-supported streaming on Max and the robust following of HGTV and Food Network could help dispel concerns over the state of viewership at some of the company’s secondary cable properties. But there is intensifying scrutiny on whether WBD will keep its current NBA package, a big source of its audience.
DID YOU KNOW?
Steinlauf made WBD carve out a package of top-rated programming from across the company’s media portfolio to sell to advertisers. This was in a bid to compete on price with the broadcast networks that even today enjoy a premium for their mass audiences.
Michael Strober
Nexstar Media Group, chief revenue officer
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This isn’t your aging millennial’s CW. Nexstar is loading up the network with sports like NASCAR, LIV Golf and WWE and hopes to package that with its NewsNation cable network as well as its dozens of local stations.
DID YOU KNOW?
The former Warner Bros. veteran believes Nexstar’s local TV stations give the company an edge, and is offering packages that can drive reach in specific regions.
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