From Its Charity Efforts, Aflac Learns What Works in Social Media

The Aflac holiday duck being sold at Macy's stores this year to raise money for pediatric cancer hospitals was designed by Monica Sandoval, a young cancer patient.

These are early days for marketers trying to figure out what role social media should play in their efforts to woo consumers. One major advertiser, the insurance company Aflac, is adjusting its strategies to generate a deeper emotional connection - and spur more donations - for its big annual holiday season charity fund-raiser.

“We're doing a lot of experimentation in social with our philanthropic efforts,” said Michael Zuna, chief marketing and sales officer at Aflac in Columbus, Ga. Using social media is worthwhile because it “helps us connect with people's personal passion points,” he added.

Each November, Aflac teams up with the Macy's division of Macy's Inc. to sell plush-toy versions of the Aflac duck brand mascot. The net proceeds from the sales of the toys - $10 for a six-inch duck and $15 for a 10-inch duck - are donated to pediatric cancer hospitals that are near Macy's stores.

The 2012 holiday duck went on sale this month. Promotional efforts include a Twitter party on Thursday at 9 p.m. Eastern time, during which Aflac is to donate $2 for each comment that uses the hashtag “#AflacKids.”

Clearly, Aflac is a big believer in social media, with presences in places that, in addition to Twitter, include Facebook, Foursquare, GetGlue, Pinterest and YouTube. Nevertheless, a charitable effort that Aflac spo nsored in September, called Swim With Friends, fell short of its goal of raising $500,000.

In analyzing those results, Aflac executives have decided to make several changes in using social media to encourage purchases of the holiday ducks.

One step involves having Monica Sandoval, a 17-year-old cancer patient from Winder, Ga., who designed the 2012 duck, serve as the centerpiece of the social media initiative. She is featured in photographs posted to the Facebook fan page and is scheduled to take part in the Twitter party on Thursday night.

Asking Ms. Sandoval to be the face of the promotion was possible because “for the first year ever, a patient designed the duck,” Mr. Zuna said. (The holiday ducks date to 2000.)

Another change is the inclusion of so-called mom bloggers in the efforts to generate attention for the fund-raiser. Aflac learned about the bloggers after they participated in the Swim With Kids initiative.

A third change seems mi nor, but it could make a major difference in the Twitter aspects of the promotion.

During the Swim With Kids initiative, Aflac executives determined that comments posted to the Twitter feed should be no longer than 120 characters, rather than the  140-character Twitter maximum. The reason for keeping the messages shorter, said Laura Kane, a spokeswoman at Aflac, was “so that people could re-Tweet without going over” the maximum.

Aflac has set a goal of $1.5 million for the 2012 holiday duck. Last year, the goal was $1 million, and the total raised was slightly more than that.

Stuart Elliott has been the advertising columnist at The New York Times since 1991. Follow @stuartenyt on Twitter and sign up for In Advertising, his weekly e-mail newsletter.

CBS Plans 13-Part Series Based on Stephen King Novel \'Under the Dome\'

CBS will invest in a major drama series next summer, a 13-part adaptation of the Stephen King novel “Under the Dome” to be produced by Steven Spielberg's production company.

The series represents a significant shift for CBS, which in past years has limited its investment in summer programming, relying largely on repeats and the long-running reality series, “Big Brother.”

But with summer ratings showing steady declines, and cable networks proving that dramas in summer can attract big audiences, CBS seems to be forging a new summer strategy.

“Under the Dome,” which was published in 2009 by Simon & Schuster (also owned by CBS), is the story of a small New England town that is suddenly threatened w ith extinction when an enormous, transparent, but indestructible, dome descends and seals the town off from the rest of civilization. The townspeople have to find ways to survive even as they seek answers to why this fate has befallen them.

The novel will be re-released in paperback to coincide with the series.

The connection to the cable strategy of summertime drama is underscored by the background of this show. The series, to be produced by Mr. Spielberg's Amblin Entertainment, was originally developed for CBS's sister network, Showtime.

Bill Carter writes about the television industry. Follow @wjcarter on Twitter.

Chinese Theaters to Get Rebates for Showing Chinese Movies

LOS ANGELES - While most executives in the American film business were busy handicapping the prospects of late Oscar entries like “Zero Dark Thirty” and “Les Misérables,” those who run China's movie business - the officials in the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television - have been occupied with a different problem. Namely, how to sustain ticket sales for the country's own films, like the historical epic “Back to 1942,” even as Hollywood films like “Life of Pi” fill China's theaters.

Their solution is one that may not cheer Hollywood studios looking to export more films to China. In a recent circular to the Chinese film industry, state officials declared that they will give a financial incentive to any theater chain that gets at least 50 percent of its annual box-office revenue from Chinese films.

Writing for The International Herald Tribune on Friday, Didi Kirsten Tatlow mentioned the incentive while reporting that Tian Jin, the dep uty director of the Chinese film agency, had noted at a recent news conference that the market share of Chinese films in China had dropped to 41.4 percent.

The new incentive, described in more detail a recent post by the China film consultant Rob Cain, is aimed at getting that share back to 50 percent by creating a rebate to theater owners of the fees - 5 percent of all ticket sales - paid by exhibitors to the National Film Development Funds Management Committee.

If half of a theater owner's revenue comes from domestic films, the entire fee is refunded. If at least 45 percent of sales come from Chinese films, 80 percent of the fee is returned. If the percentage falls below 45 percent but exceeds the domestic market share in the previous year, 50 percent of the fee comes back.

The new system gives China's theater owners a strong incentive to keep a lid on films from the United States and elsewhere even as a revised quota system admits as many as 34 foreign f ilms each year. And some privately argue that the incentives give the Chinese exhibitors an added reason to attribute revenue from Hollywood movies to local films - an illicit practice that is suspected by some to have kept the actual receipts collected by Hollywood studios artificially low.

Either way, the new policy points toward new complications in a trans-Pacific business relationship that is supposed by many to be Hollywood's future.

Michael Cieply covers the film industry from the Los Angeles bureau.

CNN Makes It Official: Zucker to Be New President

CNN made official Thursday morning its decision to install Jeff Zucker, the former chief executive of NBC, as the new president of CNN Worldwide.

The announcement culminated a months-long search to find a replacement for Jim Walton, who had led CNN to record profits even as ratings for its American network, CNN/U.S., hit record lows. The network announced in July that Mr. Walton would step down at the end of the year.

Mr. Zucker will be expected to revive the American network to competitive standing against its rivals, Fox News and MSNBC, even as it maintains its position as a non-partisan news network opposing those speaking from the right (Fox) and left (MSNBC.)

He will arrive at CNN carrying the baggage of the collapse of NBC's own broadcast network, which descended from dominance in prime time to last-place status under Mr. Zucker, even as the company's cable networks, including MSNBC, thrived under him.

But Mr. Zucker also brings a reputation f or leadership in news, which he forged in two tenures leading NBC's “Today” show to dominance in morning ratings and profits.

The Time Warner chief executive, Jeffrey L. Bewkes, and his deputy, Phil Kent, the head of Turner Broadcasting, were known to have sought candidates with the right combination of management skills, programming expertise and journalistic credibility to oversee CNN's many channels and Web sites. There was a short list, and Mr. Zucker was on it from the beginning.

Walter Isaacson, who ran CNN from 2001 to 2003, preceding Mr. Walton, said Mr. Zucker was a smart choice because “CNN has great journalists, but what it has needed is an imaginative programmer who knows how to build good shows.”

The Breakfast Meeting: Reining In the British Press, and Accessible Indie Films

The release of a long-anticipated report on Thursday about abuses in the British press, particularly the phone-hacking scandal, is prompting furious debate about what comes next, John F. Burns and Alan Cowell report. The question is whether the British government should regulate newspapers, or whether some stronger form of self-regulation is sufficient. The report from the Leveson inquiry will no doubt have suggestions as well.

• The idea of the government becoming involved in the operation of newspapers is chilling to many in Parliament - 86 members on Wednesday signed a letter in defense of a free speech - as well as to the publishers themselves. But others note that self-regulation proved itself inadequate to deal with the phone hacking scandal, and that all the attention gives the country a rare chance to rein in the excesses of the British press.

With the appointment of a new mediator there is hope that, perhaps, the online advertising industry an d privacy advocates can come to an agreement on how to give consumers more control over the collection of personal information, Natasha Singer reports. It has been tough going for the creation of an international standard for a browser setting “Do Not Track.” The new mediator is Peter Swire, a professor of law at Ohio State University and a former White House privacy official during the Clinton administration. He said in an interview: “The overarching theme is how to give users choice about their Internet experience while also funding a useful Internet.”

There is an accessibility among many of the films selected for the Sundance Film Festival in January, with many familiar movie and TV stars appearing, Brooks Barnes writes. Of course, accessible is a relative term, and the selections - with actors like Jessica Biel, Daniel Radcliffe and Kristen Bell - are still destined to be art-house films, not multiplex fare. But the 56 feature and documentary films selecte d on Wednesday - culled from 4,044 submissions - reflect the stronger infrastructure around independent films, including video-on-demand distribution.

The editorial director of Le Monde, Érik Izraelewicz, died on Tuesday at the office apparently of a heart attack at age 58, Eric Pfanner writes. He had been brought in to the left-leaning newspaper two years ago by new owners, who had acquired it from the employees, after a career in business journalism. Mr. Izraelewicz had many friends in the Socialist Party, however, and the president of France, François Hollande, spoke with affection about him.

Noam Cohen edits and writes for the Media Decoder blog. Follow @noamcohen on Twitter.