Saturday, August 24, 2013

Daytime TV Moves: Katie Couric and Kris Jenner

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According to AllThingsD, Katie Couric is in talks with Yahoo! to host her own internet interview show which would be posted on the homepage. The interviews would feature everyone from business leaders to celebrities and sports stars and I would imagine that it would be in the vein of the only successful show she hosted for CBS, "@KatieCouric", which was basically the same thing.



"@KatieCouric" did pretty well and drew extra views to CBSNews.com's websites and they seemed to catch on in the mediasphere. An opportunity like this benefits Yahoo! because if the show does well, they can grab a bigger market share in video ads which garner more money that regular banner ads. It also helps give them notoriety and become part of the national conversation if she's interviewing someone who is a newsmaker at the moment. It would even keep viewers on the homepage longer than usual.


It also helps Katie because she's now going to have a more intimate setting to do interviews. Based on watching her daytime talk show, she doesn't seem comfortable in an audience environment and isn't as spontaneous or out of the box as you have to be in order to be a successful daytime talk show host. In fact, to be frank, she's pretty boring. But that doesn't take away from the fact that she's an excellent interviewer, and if she's in a more intimate environment where she doesn't have to read the audience and the interviewee's interests all at once then she will be able to handle herself well with this Yahoo! show.


Believe it or not, this is a great move for ABC as well. Despite the fact that "Katie" was the highest rated new daytime talk show last season, the show is in major danger of getting cancelled after it's second season. Despite Katie's star power, it's ratings are nowhere near the other talk powerhouses such as "Ellen", "Dr. Phil", "Dr. Oz" etc. and with the show costing so much to produce, ABC isn't so sure if it's worth spending so much money for limited ratings.


With this deal, ABC can save money from continuing a failed project while keeping Ms. Couric busy before taking over Barbara Walters' role with the network (which is my prediction on Couric's next career path). Now according to the report, ABC wants Couric to balance her daytime show with an online show but it would be better served if the daytime show got cancelled so Couric could move on to the next phase of her career. By letting her host on Yahoo!, you give her something to do while she waits to take over Walters' spot on "The View" (which is most likely going to happen) and you keep her under the stable through a partner who is already in business with ABC (co-produce GMA's website).


Couric's next destination would most likely be CNN, where her good friend Jeff Zucker is right now, but with if she's able to have an innovative deal with ABC/Yahoo! doing a daily interview show online (which they could also put on Fusion), a spot on "The View", feature stories on all the big news shows on ABC and primetime specials; you keep Couric happy and busy and best of all you keep her and her bookers away from another network who could prowl her for her newsmaking interviews.

Kris Jenner Kanye West - P 2013

KRIS Jenner's first season of her new daytime talk show has come to a close and in my opinion, it has potential......but it's a different kind of potential than what Ms. Jenner or Fox might want.

First of all, I think the set is fabulous and is a great rendition of the house we're all used to seeing every Sunday night on E! But the show's format has to change!


One thing I would suggest is that this show goes live and unscripted. I'm not sure if it's possible due to Jenner's busy schedule but the show just seemed too planned and wasn't authentic of the unconvential Kris Jenner who we all know and love. It almost seemed like Jenner was fitting a role as a structured talk show host rather than just being herself.

The show also needs to do away with the co-hosts because most of the people they brought in to co-host with her had way more television experience than she did and they ended up overshadowing her and controlling the show. At some points watching throughout the season it seemed as though Kris was just watching what was going on without taking the show under her wing.


The show also needs to find a way to differentiate itself. It was a good premise to have Kris do something different such as giving lifestyle, food and fitness tips instead of delving too much into celebrity culture but to be honest, it doesn't work, and it ended up making the show boring.

What would I do if I was exec producer? Give Kris time to give her spiel about everything that's going on and watercooler stories similar to what Wendy Williams does with her show and during that specific segment if she wants to bring a co-host in then go right ahead, but I think Kris is opinionated enough to carry a show on her own without the necessity of a co-host. (I have to admit though, it was very smart of Fox to have Jenner deny rumors about her family throughout the season directly and respond to Obama when he made a comment about Kim but there should have been more connection to the E! show revealing inside tidbits about each episode on the Monday after they aired on Sunday)


Another thing is to use the access that you have. Be real and talk more about your experiences. People watched Regis everyday in his heyday to find out who he had dinner with last night, what he was doing and who he might have ran into that did something funny or weird. I'm sure Ms. Jenner has tons of those types of stories, so use that access wisely and go off the cuff.


Finally, I would suggest making the show online exclusive. The show hasn't done so well with the ratings and with increased competition coming in the daytime talk field with Queen Latifah and Meredith Vieira, it's not going to get any easier. Fox and YouTube or CelebBuzz (which houses all of the Kardashians websites) should team up to start an online hub where Jenner's show would livestream every afternoon for moms and young girls who are on the move throughout the day. It can also provide all the latest news going on with the Kardashians and set the truth straight on all the rumors that go around about them everyday.


SIDENOTE: As egotistical as it sounds, why not start your own entertainment site about you which competes with TMZ and does better than TMZ and all the others because it gives direct access to you. The blogs are great for personal tidbits but a journalistic outlet with reporters that actually reported on you and set the record straight on rumors while holding you accountable would be even better. And if a news site like that drew a lot of views and it served as the hub for a Jenner talk show, you could garner major sponsorships and best of all own your product and scoop the other entertainment sites who inevitably report the truth on what's going on with the family.

For example, a potential Kardashian News Network could've done an interview with Lamar about his drug issues which were reported by TMZ, it could be a softball interview but at least you own the story before someone else gets a hold of it. I understand as public as they are that there are some things you want to keep private but if you know there's a bad story bound to come out, own the dialogue and control how the media spins the story.


A Jenner show online would work better than the TV show because you're not limited to the restraints of TV. The show hasn't done well TV-wise but is still worthy of contuinging because of access and because of how well it has done online as described by the Hollywood Reporter:

Kris also generated a lot of buzz on social media and can be expected to continue to do so. According to Fox, Kris got 7.5 million views on YouTube, where it picked up about 1,300 new subscribers a day. On Facebook, Kris attracted 100,000 fans in its first four weeks and received 200,000 likes for its posts. On Twitter, Kris’s weekly impressions averaged between 75 million and 200 million per week.

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