Top TV Ad Spenders: ‘Run All Night’ Ran Ads All Week
In this week’s edition of the Variety Movie Commercial Tracker, powered by iSpot.tv, “Run All Night” jumps to the top of the TV ad spending heap with $11 million of the $13.7mm total spend coming between the 16th and 22nd. The Warner Brothers thriller starring Liam Neeson spread its ad dollars across 42 networks, with MTV and VH1 as the top benefactors ahead of the March 13 premiere.
Will Smith’s “Focus” spent another week in the top five, slipping from first to second, despite an increase in spending week over week from $6.4 million to $9.6mm. The Kevin Costner vehicle “McFarland, USA” stays at third over last week with the same $5.9 million spend as the week prior, bringing Walt Disney’s total TV ad investment to $20.3mm. Its 954 airings were spread across 34 networks, with Lifetime and ABC Family seeing the most action. Meanwhile, “Unfinished Business” spent a second week at fourth, with $5.2 million contributed to a total outlay of $12.2mm.
While “Fifty Shades of Grey” remained hot at the box office, it was whipped off the TV ad spend list by the familiar faces of “Hot Tub Time Machine 2.” The Paramount Pictures sequel registered 1,180 national airings across 30 networks this week, led by MTV and BET.
Overall, the entire category spent just over $74 million on 13,062 airings for the week spread across 26 different brands. Warner Bros. led spending with 29% of the category spend or $21.4mm on 6 spots that aired more than 2,300 times. Walt Disney Studios ran six spots to the tune of $9.8mm, 20th Century Fox ran 7 spots for $6.9mm. Paramount spent $5.7mm, but ran 11 different ads, among them a set of co-branded segments with ESPN, MTV and Comedy Central for “Hot Tub Time Machine 2.”
Top Movie Commercials by Weekly TV Spend
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$11M – Run All Night
Online Activity: 0.38% within the movie category*
National Airings: 1,207
Networks: 42
Most Aired On: MTV, VH1
Creative Versions: 8
Est. Lifetime TV Spend: $13.7M
Studio: Warner Bros.
Started Airing: 02/13/15
$9.7M – Focus
Online Activity: 1.69% within the movie category*
National Airings: 1,036
Networks: 48
Most Aired On: Comedy Central, FX
Creative Versions: 26
Est. Lifetime TV Spend: $31.7M
Studio: Warner Bros.
Started Airing: 01/18/15
$5.9M – McFarland, USA
Online Activity: 1.85% within the movie category*
National Airings: 954
Networks: 34
Most Aired On: Lifetime, ABC Family
Creative Versions: 29
Est. Lifetime TV Spend: $20.3M
Studio: Walt Disney Pictures
Started Airing: 01/12/15
$5.2M – Unfinished Business
Online Activity: 0.39% within the movie category*
National Airings: 805
Networks: 33
Most Aired On: MTV, Comedy Central
Creative Versions: 11
Est. Lifetime TV Spend: $12.2M
Studio: Twentieth Century Fox
Started Airing: 02/01/15
$4.7M – Hot Tub Time Machine 2
Online Activity: 0.47% within the movie category*
National Airings: 1,180
Networks: 30
Most Aired On: MTV, BET
Creative Versions: 26
Est. Lifetime TV Spend: $18.4M
Studio: Paramount Pictures
Started Airing: 01/17/15
1 Movie titles with a minimum spend of $100,000 for airings detected between 02/16/2015 and 02/22/2015.
* Percent of digital activity captured across online video, social media, and search activity that was stimulated by these movie trailers and measured in comparison to all online activity in the movie category.
Variety has partnered with iSpot.tv, a company that catalogs, tags and measures activity around TV commercials in real time, to bring you this weekly look at what studios are spending to market their movies on TV. Learn more about the iSpot.tv platform and methodology.
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