Meredith Corp. announced a live video series with Rachael Ray that will launch in 2018.
At a Brandfront presentation in New York Monday, Meredith unveiled a number of video and advertising initiatives including a new travel and fitness TV show with Rebecca Kennedy.
The company also released results from its Sales Guarantee program for the pharmaceutical industry. Using first party data and insights, advertisers were able to target key audiences, resulting in a 22% increase in prescription sales, according to Alysia Borsa, Meredith’s chief data and insights officer.
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The Rachael Ray project is called Food + Music Revolution. The June issue of Rachael Ray Every Day will kick off a cross-platform initiative. It will cover the best eats at summer music festivals, how chefs choose what plays at their restaurants, musicians who are foodies, chefs that are in bands and more.
Shape magazine’s FitCity, gives viewers an inside look at some of the best under-the-radar fitness, food, and travel locations from across the U.S. In each 30-minute episode, trainer Rebecca Kennedy and her posse of fitness friends explore different cities to discover the country’s best gyms, workouts, trainers and healthy food hotspots. FitCity will also appear on SHAPE.com with an expert look at the latest in fitness, athleisure styles, healthy apps and trends.
“Consumers and meaningful results are at the heart of everything we do at Meredith,” said Jon Werther, Meredith National Media Group President. “The ‘Year of Doing,’ and the various cross-platform initiatives that comprise it, speaks to a major evolution in consumer mindset calling for a return to the fundamentals of happiness, a wish to regain control, and a desire to make things happen. We are harnessing the power of our brands to reshape the conversation around our audiences’ passions, helping them achieve daily and dream big, while tapping into our powerful technology platforms and first-party data and insights to drive meaningful and measurable results for our clients.”
Other new Meredith projects include:
- IRL (In Real Life) – Parents reflects the demand for authenticity, humor and forgiveness in the community of moms with this new, wholesome editorial franchise for 2018. The program will look at the emotional journey of parenthood with a designated landing page on Parents.com featuring articles, slideshows and videos under the Parents IRL banner. The campaign’s social component will include curated videos, articles and slideshows, using the hashtag #ParentsIRL, across social media platforms. To kick things off, Parents Content Chief Liz Vaccariello sat down on-stage with celebrity mom Hilaria Baldwin to discuss some real-life mom moments.
- #SHAPESquad – SHAPE’s #SHAPESquad is a new 360° initiative dedicated to “the life, the look, the leaders” of today’s active lifestyles, appearing across the brand’s print, digital, social, and experiential platforms. The new print section, premiering in SHAPE’s October issue, focuses on trending workouts; athleisure; profiles of real, inspiring women and much more. To launch the campaign, SHAPE is hosting its first-annual ‘#SHAPESquad NYC Takeover,’ an event series featuring workshops with top fitness, wellness and beauty influencers at cutting-edge locations throughout New York City. Jen Widerstrom of The Biggest Loser, along with SHAPE Editor-in-Chief Elizabeth Goodman Artis revealed plans for this lifestyle-focused initiative.
- #MomBod – Parents, Parents Latina and SHAPE partner on #MomBod, a cross-brand, cross-platform initiative about embracing body confidence and rejecting body shaming. The #MomBod initiative is a content series that lives in-book in both Shape and Parents magazines and online at both Shape.com and Parents.com.
- Plant Your Plate – EatingWell and Better Homes & Gardens join forces on Plant Your Plate, a cross-brand editorial initiative inspiring people to get more involved with their food, learn where their food comes from and get a better understanding of what eating healthy is all about. The new campaign will pair gardening advice along with cooking inspiration in the brands’ digital and print platforms. Plant Your Plate will be integrated into every issue as well as have programming on both BHG.com and EatingWell.com.
- Celebrity Allstars – In commemoration of its 20th anniversary, Allrecipes is launching Celebrity Allstars, a new editorial platform showcasing delicious dishes served up by celebrities that will cross digital and print with Facebook Lives, celebrity profile pages and a branded TV segment in partnership with Celebrity Page. Real Housewives of New York’s Dorinda Medley and actress Hilarie Burton helped promote this cross-platform program in a live breakfast cook-off during the 2018 BrandFront event.
- Change Maker – This new Martha Stewart Living column, appearing in both print and digital, showcases people who are making an impact on their communities or the environment and inspires readers to follow suit. Each column includes an action plan, which gives readers the opportunity to learn and do—and brings the pages of Martha Stewart Living to vibrant life. Founder and Chief Creative Officer Martha Stewart and Editor in Chief Elizabeth Graves presented key highlights of this editorial franchise at the 2018 BrandFront event.
