Weather Channel’s Challenge: Predictable Programming for Advertisers

Eyebrows usually rise when the Weather Channel makes upfront presentations, sharing with marketers and agencies its programming plans for the coming television season. As one reader of this blog commented on a post on Tuesday that mentioned in passing the Weather Channel’s 2013-14 upfront, “I can’t wait to see which hurricanes they’ll be covering this summer. : )”

Kidding aside, the Weather Channel, part of the Weather Company, has been adding original scripted series to its schedule for several years for one primary reason: Although weather is mercurial, marketers and agencies crave regularity.

So for next season, the Weather Channel will add six series to its schedule, along with three online-only series that will be streamed on the channel’s Web site, weather.com. The new shows, along with additional changes that will include a new look for the channel’s regular programs, were outlined by senior executives at the 2013-14 upfront presentation on Wednesday morning.

At the center of the plans is a renewed commitment to the channel’s core audience, the dedicated viewers who were described by David Kenny, chairman and chief executive of the Weather Company, as “weather enthusiasts.”

Mr. Kenny took pains to reassure the marketers and agency executives who attended the presentation that those viewers are not couch potatoes who watch weather forecasts because they have nothing better to do, thus making them poor targets for commercial pitches.

Rather, Mr. Kenny said, weather enthusiasts are “over-indexing on weather because they do stuff,” which makes them “an audience worth investing in.”

So worthwhile is that audience, Mr. Kenny said â€" whether they consume Weather Channel content on cable, online or on mobile devices â€" that the company is urging marketers and agencies to “Own the weather.”

David Clark, president of the Weather Channel, described plans to further localize the content of the channel.

For instance, there will be a revamping of the forecasts known as “Local on the 8s,” Mr. Clark said, and a customization of coverage so that while viewers in markets affected by severe local weather are watching coverage of that news, viewers in other, unaffected markets will be able to continue watching regular programming.

As for the programming lineup for 2013-14, he added, there will be, all told, 20 “new original series” on the channel, “up from eight in 2012.”

The six newcomers are: “Coast Guard Cape Disappointment,” “Freaks of Nature,” “Secrets of the Earth,” “Storm Warriors,” “Strangest Weather on Earth” and “Weather That Changed the World.” They will join new original series that were previously announced, among them “Breaking Ice,” “Lava Chasers” and “Reel Rivals.”

The three original series to be available on weather.com, scheduled to start in the summer, are “Brink,” “The Bucket List” and “The Explorers.”

Curt Hecht, chief global revenue officer of the Weather Company, discussed how he wants to “make our analytics and our data more available to” marketers and agencies so they may, for example, better use location targeting to reach the right consumers in the right place at the right time.

There was also an announcement of a deal between Twitter and the Weather Company - owned by Bain Capital, the Blackstone Group and the NBCUniversal unit of Comcast - to create customized content around weather-related activity on twitter.com. The content, which can be sponsored by marketers, will include video clips of local forecasts

At the end of the presentation, the hosts of the event, Jim Cantore and Maria LaRosa - two of the on-camera meteorologists-cum-personalities on the Weather Channel - offered the weekend forecast for the New York area. (Temperatures, they predicted, will be near-average, in the 50s.)

Ms. LaRosa jokingly reassured the audience that despite the presence of Mr. Cantore, who has become known for his coverage of extreme weather like hurricanes, “there is no major storm” in the forecast.

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.