Originally published by Adweek
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EVP, GM, or CMO—why pick one when you can be all three?
In this episode of Marketing Vanguard, Keisha Taylor Starr, EVP, CMO, and general manager of Scripps Networks at The E.W. Scripps Company, proves that intersectionality and a diverse skillset can take your marketing game to the next level.
Tune in for their discussion on how strategic repositioning can drive record-breaking audience engagement, why marketers must balance creative risk with financial rigor and the leadership moves required to shape an industry built for diverse voices.
How to transition from CMO to General Manager by gaining P&L ownership
Why sports franchises are essential programming investments
The strategy behind rebranding a legacy network for new audiences
How to balance creative ambition with financial rigor as a CMO
The importance of diverse representation in leadership and decision-making
How to expand sports definition and create inclusive programming
With a career spanning agency work at BBDO, leadership roles at CNN, Turner Broadcasting, and Warner Bros. Discovery, as well as experience in collegiate sports marketing, Keisha has consistently driven innovative transformations across news, entertainment, and sports properties.
Her leadership in ION’s rebrand into a general entertainment network with pioneering women’s sports programming has resulted in record-breaking audience engagement and Google TV’s most-watched free live channel designation in 2024, demonstrating how CMOs can balance creative vision with financial accountability.
[05:53] Connection Is Your Competitive Advantage in a Fragmented Media Landscape— Keisha emphasizes that the modern media environment demands a fundamental shift from competing on content volume to competing on audience connection, explaining that in an era where viewing is asynchronous and audiences scatter across infinite platforms, connection becomes the differentiator that traditional networks can no longer guarantee. Her strategic response is to anchor programming around universal connectors, whether that’s local news, live sports or experiential events, that create genuine reasons for audiences to gather.
[08:08] Make Early Strategic Bets on Underserved Audiences Before Competitors Do— Keisha demonstrates how successful brand repositioning requires identifying audience gaps and committing resources before market saturation occurs. While many networks were still discussing women’s sports as a trend, Scripps made the calculated decision to build franchise-level programming, i.e., their dedicated WNBA broadcasts on Friday nights and NWSL games on Saturday nights, creating structural scarcity in premium programming time. This early mover advantage addressed a real consumer friction point: Sports fans struggle to find their teams across fragmented broadcast rights and platforms. The result was record-breaking engagement, including seven WNBA broadcasts averaging over 1 million viewers—metrics that were previously unattainable outside traditional sports.
[12:04] Link Every Marketing Investment to Business Value, Not Just Creativity— Keisha explains that the fundamental tension between creative marketing ambition and financial accountability emerges when CMOs gain P&L responsibility. As a traditional CMO, the instinct was to pursue bold, attention-grabbing campaigns that differentiated the brand in the marketplace—a goal that often conflicted with cost discipline. Once responsible for margins, her evaluation framework shifted dramatically: Creative excellence only justifies investment if it generates tangible business value through audience growth, advertiser satisfaction, or revenue lift. CMOs facing similar pressure should reframe financial rigor not as a limitation but as a clarifying tool that helps identify which marketing activities truly drive business growth versus those that primarily satisfy internal creative ambitions.
[22:23] Expand Your Definition of Sport for Higher Audience Engagement— Keisha’s portfolio strategy at ION deliberately broadens the definition of “sport” to include cheerleading competitions, women’s college basketball and emerging athletic categories rather than treating them as peripheral content. This inclusive positioning serves dual strategic purposes: It captures substantial but previously underserved audiences (each niche represents millions of passionate fans), and it signals organizational values alignment with increasingly diverse consumer bases. CMOs managing entertainment or media properties should apply this framework by mapping audience passion clusters beyond traditional category definitions, identifying which niches are substantial enough to justify dedicated programming or product development and deliberately positioning organizational alignment with underrepresented communities as a competitive and values-driven advantage.
Jenny RooneyJenny Rooney is Chief Brand and Community Officer, leading strategy for the overall ADWEEK brand as well as the ways in which we serve and support our audiences with high-value content, products, partnerships and experiences, notably through our community programs such as Marketing Vanguard.@jenny_rooney|[email protected]
Jenny Rooney is Chief Brand and Community Officer, leading strategy for the overall ADWEEK brand as well as the ways in which we serve and support our audiences with high-value content, products, partnerships and experiences, notably through our community programs such as Marketing Vanguard.
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