Opie takes over Scott's marketing role at Five

by Colin Grimshaw, Media Week 16-Oct-07

Five is not replacing marketing director Jane Scott, who resigned earlier this month. Instead, responsibilities for on and off-air campaigns will be assumed by Five's managing director of content, Lisa Opie.

A Five spokesman denied that the move signalled a downsizing of Five's
marketing operation, insisting the budget would be maintained at between
£8m and £10m a year, which includes about £2m for the

digital channels, Five Life and Five US.

Opie has prior marketing experience from her previous employer Flextech,
where she also combined the content and marketing roles.

Scott's responsibilities are being broken up, with the Research and
Insight team that focused on qualitative research into audiences now
moving into Five's sales operation and now reporting to director of
knowledge David Harrison. He is also responsible for quantitative
advertising research.

Scott also headed development of website extensions for the TV channels,
but this responsibility has already been moved into a new digital
division overseen by head of digital media Jon Lewis.

Scott was appointed marketing director of Five in March 2005, joining
from the BBC, where she was controller of TV marketing, strategy and
channel development, and oversaw the marketing launch of Five's digital
channels. She left Five without a job to go to. The remaining most
senior marketing executive is head of marketing Simon Downing, who now
reports to Opie.

Opie said she would deliver a refresh of Five's on and off-air marketing
in 2008. She added: "Never has it been so important to align brand with
content as the market becomes increasingly crowded."

Five's advertising agency roster is VCCP for creative, Vizeum for media
and Digit for interactive design. During the past year, it spent £11.6m on media, including the launch of the digital channels, according
to Nielsen Media Research.