The Secret Sauce That Made HBO A Success

Before streaming brought movies into every room of our homes, there was HBO.

It was the channel that brought uninterrupted movies to viewers for an additional fee, and it changed the way cable television was packaged and consumed. At the helm was Jeff Bewkes, a Stanford and Yale graduate who started with the company selling HBO packages to hotels in 1979.

Bewkes recently discussed his start in the media industry with iHeartMedia Chairman and CEO Bob Pittman for an episode of his podcast, Math & Magic: Stories from the Frontiers of Marketing with Bob Pittman.

“Just to put this into context for the people listening (or reading), at the time, there was no home video yet, there was no pay per view,” said Pittman. “So, you had no way to get a movie unless the broadcast networks ran it on their movie of the week or something with commercials on it or seeing it at the theater.”

HBO was the first channel to bring movies to the average household, 24 hours a day seven days a week. As more subscriptions rolled in, it was time to expand, and the company began experimenting with original programming. Once again, they had a unique advantage over their competitors.

“We didn’t make shows for the advertisers, we made shows for the audience,” said Bewkes. “That’s what we were saying with our campaign, ‘It’s not TV its HBO,’ ”

HBO was different, and it was more than just commercial free movies and shows. The network didn’t have to censor anything, and it became a massive selling point.

“So, people were not signing up to HBO so they could tune into a specific show,” Bewkes said. “They wanted the range of shows they were hearing everyone raving about. It led to what we modestly called the Golden Age of Television.”

Listen to “Jeff Bewkes: ‘We didn’t care about the ratings.’ ” to hear the full interview about HBO’s continued rise through the decades. Check back every week for new episodes of Math & Magic: Stories from the Frontiers of Marketing with Bob Pittman. Find it on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you listen to podcasts.

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