Can a lawyer from Jersey named Vinnie win over viewers as a local TV anchor on the morning news in Atlanta? WXIA thinks so. “We focus-group tested him,” said Ellen Crooke, news director at the Gannett-owned NBC affiliate, “and people loved him.” Vinnie Politan leads the charge as the new news anchor on WXIA’s newly […]
Can a lawyer from Jersey named Vinnie win over viewers as a local TV anchor on the morning news in Atlanta?
WXIA thinks so.
“We focus-group tested him,” said Ellen Crooke, news director at the Gannett-owned NBC affiliate, “and people loved him.”
Vinnie Politan leads the charge as the new news anchor on WXIA’s newly christened morning newscast, Atlanta Alive, as of Monday, Aug. 4.
Politan, a former prosecutor and attorney, spent the past five years at HLN hosting a variety of justice-related shows out of Atlanta. Politan’s also been a local reporter in New Jersey and Orlando, Fla.
But he’s not exactly a household name in Atlanta.
“Some people know him, some don’t,” said Crooke. He has covered some high-profile court cases while at HLN and Crooke says a few viewers have called excited about his arrival.
Politan has some 305,000 Twitter followers, and with the importance of social media, Crooke admits that was a factor in the decision to hire him.
And if he’s to succeed, WXIA will need all the followers, and viewers, it can get.
According to Rodney Ho, TV critic for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, WXIA’s morning news has been “perpetually in third place.”
To introduce Politan and Atlanta Alive, WXIA launched a “massive marketing blitz,” according to Larry Watzman, WXIA’s creative services director.
In addition to WXIA’s on-air, the marketing campaign included “80% digital ads placed where people were going on-line by ZIP code,” according to Watzman. Using real-time tracking, Watzman estimates the campaign generated more than 137,000 impressions a day.
If Watzman’s job is to get them into the tent to sample the new newscast, early evidence indicates he’s succeeded.
According to Crooke, in its first week, WXIA’s 5 a.m. news was up 300% and up 40% at 6 a.m.
But adding a new face to the morning news isn’t the only change Crooke is making to WXIA’s news.
A few years ago, Crooke was the subject of a story by Rodney Ho in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution where she was quoted as saying that “TV news stinks,” and that local TV news tends to be “boring, repetitive, irrelevant and too depressing.”
Her mission is to make WXIA’s news more exciting, smarter and, through innovation and change, compelling and higher quality.
In that article, readers were asked to vote on WXIA’s effort to be different. With 338 votes in so far, 55% said “It works. I’m liking it.”
In the most recent article about Vinnie Politan and the launch of Atlanta Alive, when asked how they like the new Vinnie Politan-led show so far, 100 readers voted and 28% said either they will give it a chance or say it’s promising and they’ll keep on watching.
I guess you could say the the jury’s still out on Vinnie Politian.
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