Advertisers are not boycotting CBS after Les Moonves allegations

CBS
CEO Les Moonves at Business Insider Ignition
2015
Michael Seto/Business
Insider

• Don’t expect an ad boycott of CBS any time soon —
  despite recently-reported sexual misconduct allegations made by
  multiple women toward CBS CEO Les Moonves, including claims of
  forcible touching or kissing.
• Advertisers don’t seem inclined to react to this
  situation the same way they have reacted to reports of alleged
  sexual misconduct by on air talent, like former Fox News host
  Bill O’Reilly.
• Plus, there seems to be little outside pressure to pull
  ads from CBS (at least for now).

---

Verizon, Progressive Insurance, Pfizer, Lowe’s, Geico, Walmart
and McDonald’s are some of TV’s biggest advertisers.

So far, a source says, none of them are cutting back spending on
CBS.

That’s despite serious allegations of sexual misconduct against
CEO Les Moonves — including multiple accounts of Moonves forcibly
touching women at the network — and one account of him pinning
down an actress and kissing her. 

In fact, it’s “business as usual” at CBS and no advertisers have
asked to pull spending from the network, a person familiar with
the matter said. Two top advertising agencies also said none
of their clients have pulled money from CBS.

On Friday, the New
Yorker’s Ronan Farrow published a bombshell report of an
investigation into Moonves’ alleged behavior spanning multiple
decades. In it, six women accused the executive of
sexual misconduct, retaliation and unwanted advances. NBC News
then reported that a woman had gone to
Los Angeles police to claim three instances of misconduct.
The NBC News report states that it is unknown whether the woman
who went to the LA police is among those who spoke to The New
Yorker.

But Farrow has since tweeted that the report appears to stem from
allegations not included in The New Yorker story:

CBS’ board of directors reportedly spent the weekend figuring out
how to handle the Les Moonves report. For now, it has decided to
keep him on and open an investigation into the claims through
independent outside counsel.

The media skewered CBS for the decision, but advertisers don’t
seem inclined to punish CBS.

Business Insider reached out to several of the top TV
advertisers, including Verizon, Pfizer, Progressive Insurance,
Lowe’s, Geico, Walmart and McDonald’s.

Verizon declined to comment. A spokesman for Universal
Pictures said: “We are not planning to pull spending at
this time.”

The rest did not respond to inquiries about their CBS
spending.

Brands apparently don’t view the Moonves allegations in the same
way as ones that led to other recent ad kerfuffles

Advertisers have pulled their money in other #metoo situations.

Former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly, for example,

lost more than half of his show’s advertisers in the week
following a report on his alleged behavior.

But Moonves isn’t on TV. In fact, most Americans probably don’t
know who he is, even though he is one of the
highest-paid corporate executives in the world, pulling in
about $70 million in 2017.

And brands likely don’t see advertising their products during
popular CBS shows, like “The Big Bang Theory” or “NCIS,” as an
endorsement of Moonves.

Plus, it’s a lot easier for a brand to request that its ads get
moved out of a particular show to other shows on a network (which
happened during the O’Reilly incident, as well as the short term
advertiser
boycott of Fox News’ host Laura Ingraham) than to ditch an
entire network.

Especially the highest-rated broadcast network in the US. 

For an advertiser that might need to drive people to its stores,
going dark on CBS and temporarily taking away the reach of its
message could actually hurt its business.

CBS’
hit show, “The Big Bang Theory.”
CBS

Advertisers aren’t always inclined to take the moral high
ground  unless they feel pressured to

The harsh truth is that  advertisers aren’t always
inclined to make media buying decisions because they want to make
a statement or feel like they are ‘doing the right thing.”

Sometimes it takes being publicly shamed before they will
take action. Right now, that outside pressure is lacking.

For example, Sleeping Giants, a social media advocacy group
that has pressured brands to yank money before, has yet to weigh
in on Moonves.

For now, the
CBS board will proceed with its investigation into the Moonves
allegations. Future business might actually look pretty
bright.

The broadcast TV industry, CBS included, just closed a killer
upfront ad sales season, locking down roughly $10 billion in
sales for the upcoming season,
according to Variety. 

CBS even pushed for big prices increases, Variety reported.