In response to the continuing demand for targeted advertising, DirecTV (DTV) has come up with what I think will be a tremendous winner. On their new Hotpass service, DirecTV is offering advertisers to buy an entire Nascar channel.
Starting next month, the service will lauch five Nascar channels for the 2007 season. Each channel will be centered around a specific driver, which offers team sponsors tremendous opportunities to market themselves. While it offers driver-
specific channels, those drivers presented will be changed every week. The sponsor of the team will have exclusive logo space throughout the race.
Another benefit of the service will be that when local station breaks come, the channel's team will be offered 60 seconds to promote the advertising of their choice; whether it's related to their sponsor or the team.
"Some teams may choose to talk about merchandise, some may choose to talk about their driver's winery," said Eric Shanks, exec VP, DirecTV Entertainment. Either way, "no corporate sponsor has ever had the opportunity to have their own channel for three-and-a-half hours."
Even the announcers will be trained specifically to build their commentary around the sponsored driver of the day. This gives tremendous opportunity for embedding advertising in the mix. It should give viewers a much more natural flow to what's going on then the usual disruptive-only ad offerings.
In another smart move, Hotpass will also include the opportunity for fans to vote on which driver will get to be featured on their own channel, giving them ownership in the decision, which should increase loyalty and viewership.
This sounds like it should be a great success. It's putting together a whole package that seems to fit into what everyone on all sides of the equatio are looking for. From the drivers, advertisers, Nascar, viewers and station, it offers something that all of them want.
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