Cable Ad Sales Whiz Fischer Lands at NBCU

A familiar face in media buying and selling circles was spotted at the Syfy’s upfront at Spider-Man Turn Off the Dark last week and Wednesday’s Bravo event.

Barry Fischer, whose Media at the Millennium Studies for Turner Broadcasting helped make media buyers and advertisers comfortable shifting billions of dollars in ad spending from broadcast to cable, is working for Dave Cassaro, the new president for ad sales at NBC Cable.

Cassaro says Fischer is working  with NBC Universal in a strategic role for the cable entertainment ad sales group.

Unlike Turner, NBC Universal also owns a broadcast network, which is making some NBC sales execs a bit nervous.

Fischer, an agency media director before jumping to the sales side, used new analytics to show how expensive buying incremental reach was on broadcast and how similar reach was available at much lower prices as cable networks increased their distribution and ratings.

These days broadcast is still more expensive than cable overall, but the gap has narrowed when it comes to original programming. And NBC has one of the largest portfolio of cable networks, including USA, Bravo, E!, Style and Oxygen, which will have an upfront event next week.