When Rino Scanzoni decided to pull the trigger on the $800 million upfront deal in June on behalf of his GroupM clients with the NBC Universal TV networks, kicking off the marketplace, his motive was to get what he believed was the best deal for his own clients rather than the more lofty goal of establishing an entirely new negotiating currency and setting the market's rates.

But set the market he did. Along the way, Scanzoni, GroupM's chief investment officer and chairman of Mediaedge:cia, paved the way for making commercial ratings plus three-day DVR viewing ("C3" was a catchphrase that was hurled around the industry like a boomerang in a matter of weeks) the industry's new negotiation benchmark.

And while several of his media agency competitors criticized him at the time for overpaying, Scanzoni appears to be enjoying the last laugh, with fourth-quarter scatter inventory now selling for between 30 percent to 50 percent above upfront rates.

"I wanted to look smart for my clients, not my competitors," Scanzoni explains, "and I think I made the right decision and am very comfortable with the recommendations I made. I don't get paid to follow other agencies' strategies. I develop my own strategy and follow it."

No small words from an executive who oversees a massive $12.5 billion in broadcast and cable television media budgets (according to RECMA Research Co.) for the three GroupM media agencies, Mediaedge:cia, MindShare and MediaCom. For this aggressive and innovative media stewardship, Scanzoni tops Mediaweek's first annual list of the 50 most indispensable executives in media.

Asked if he feels vindicated, Scanzoni, whose GroupM clients account for about 30 percent of the overall prime-time ad dollars, plays it a bit coy, noting that "no one had to use my deals as a basis for their deals."

But clearly, it was Scanzoni and his GroupM team that irrevocably altered the longstanding upfront system of buying media. Heading into the upfront, Scanzoni was very vocal about wanting the negotiating currency to be based on the C3 standard, with the ratings portion being determined by an average of all commercial ratings during a particular program, rather than being based on minute-to-minute ratings within each show.

And after doing the first deal with NBC Universal based on that currency, the other broadcast and cable networks and agencies quickly followed suit. What was predicted to be a chaotic upfront proceeded in orderly fashion in the slipstream of the GroupM/NBCU deal.

Setting the terms in this upfront was important to Scanzoni because he felt they would be the basis for any negotiations in coming years—and he, along with his fellow media agency execs, would have to live with the consequences. That's why most of the groundwork began long before the start of the upfront in late May. "The process of
coming up with our negotiating strategy is all about marketplace intelligence," Scanzoni says. "It is about understanding the audience at a very granular level. Research is where one agency can really differentiate itself from its competition."

Scanzoni believes some of his competitors were slow to pull the trigger on their own deals because they were uncomfortable about different aspects of shifting the currency from program to commercial ratings. "Some agencies didn’t do enough homework, and when it
came time to do the deals, they were hesitant."

Scanzoni said he began getting input from the GroupM agencies after the December holiday season, with each offering perspective and discussing client strategies and goals.

"We were determined to establish what type of pricing we should pay going in, and not wait to have the marketplace determine the pricing," he explains. "Agencies need to do their own analytics and not wait to pay what everyone else is willing to pay."

The initial NBC deal was cut because, Scanzoni notes, the timing was right, and because both sides had a similar understanding of the present value ad inventory had in the marketplace just as the upfront was starting to stir this past spring. But why do the first deal with the fourth-rated network in prime time (prime-time ratings were down double digits) and pay CPM increases to boot? "NBC is much more than prime time. The network is rated first in early morning, evening news and late night," says Scanzoni. "And its cable networks are strong ."

Scanzoni credits many on the GroupM team for the agency's upfront success. "It was not just me. There are a whole lot of people who worked on this process in different roles, contributing different things. Shari Cohen (president and co-executive director of national broadcast for MindShare) was the orchestrator of the NBC Universal deal, and each agency's executives played a role in the negotiations for their individual clients with all of the networks," he says.

"I am basically the choreographer for the three agencies," Scanzoni says. "We have about 150 clients across the three agencies, and each one has its own needs. I set the parameters for the deals, and each agency does its deals within those parameters. I make sure we are true to the overall strategy." This year his choreography worked out well, and any client who loaded up based on Scanzoni's marketplace parameters has to be pleased. They would have taken a royal drubbing if they had held that money back for the scatter market.

But Scanzoni says he has no time to rest on his laurels. While the current new TV season against which he made his breakout negotiations is still a week away, Scanzoni says, "We are already starting to plan for next year's upfront."

For Scanzoni, it seems, homework never ends. — John Consoli