Six moves NBC can make to come out on top – Quibbling Siblings

Debbie:

I’m in the mood to save the world, but since that’s a fairly daunting task, I thought I’d try to help out NBC a bit. Forget about the homeless and hungry — my heart is breaking for the struggling network that used to be America’s sweetheart. Clearly they can’t get anyone to watch the shows they air, even the critically acclaimed ones, so I’m not sure that their retooled fall 2012 schedule is going to make a difference. I’m thinking they have to dip into the bag of tricks that other businesses use to get people to buy into their companies.

1. Give away money to charity: No one is enamored with the fact that high ratings mean you’re lining the pockets of the network bigwigs. All the cool companies are doing it — giving away a percentage of their earnings to charities. NBC could try a telethon with their biggest stars manning the phone lines; that’s always good for a bunch of donations without a bunch of overhead … and fabulous publicity.

2. Crossovers: Even Target is finding small businesses that they love and carrying their products in their stores for a limited time. Now there’s great exposure and a huge boost for small business owners. I’m thinking NBC can make this work two ways. First, get some eyes on some of their critically-acclaimed shows by having some of their favorite stars do crossover appearances. Kind of like Abed on Cougar Town, except they need to pick a show that people watch (sorry, CT, I still love you). Then, on the flipside, they can choose some talent from webseries with cult followings (like The Guild) and have their stars appear on shows that would have a similar viewership.

Your turn: What big business ideas can NBC dip into to try to get people to watch their shows?

Bob:

Oh, poor little NBC. It does need some help, doesn’t it? Maybe I’m not feeling as creative as you, but I’m looking at some simpler, more traditional approaches.

3. Change management: Alright, NBC already did this and there’s a new boss in town since last year. There hasn’t been a huge change in the situation since Robert Greenblatt has been the chairman of the network, however. I think a little more time needs to be given to the man.

4. Improve the product: Maybe the most obvious choice here might be the hardest to achieve — make better shows! At the very least make shows that people want to watch. The network doesn’t do too bad when it comes to reality shows, so it’s not like they are completely dead in the water. They just need to appeal to their audience … maybe a scripted show about people trying to lose weight while singing?

5. Rebranding: Yeah, yeah, there’s a lot of history behind that stupid little peacock, but sometimes you just have to give things a fresh start. Change the logo. Heck, change the name of the network. Get something fresh and new!

 Debbie:

Oh, not the peacock — anything but that!

6. Instead of rebranding, how about retro-branding? Remind people of NBC’s heyday, and toss in clips of old Cheers episodes, favorite Friends moments and show how they relate to today’s NBC shows. A clip of the Huxtable kids doing something relevant to the upcoming Parenthood episode. Some clips of Matthew Perry from Friends as a lead-in to his new show, Go On. I think they could really make this work!

Bob:

Now you’re just ripping off 30 Rock. Don’t you remember when Jack had a big plan to take all the archive footage of Jerry Seinfeld and insert him digitally into every NBC show? Right now it looks less like a joke and more like a plan. …

Debbie:

Well, I was thinking they would just do it in the promos, but you may be onto something. …

Clacked by Debbie McDuffee
on May 17, 2012 @ 10:00 EST5EDT