‘I am proud to work for Seven’: CMO Mel Hopkins defends network
Seven West Media’s chief marketing and audience officer, Mel Hopkins, has taken to LinkedIn to share her pride in working for the Seven Network, in response to a post over the weekend from former Huge boss, Mat Baxter.
Baxter’s post described the Seven Network as being “in danger of becoming a liability for clients” due to “the major turmoil” in recent weeks – speculation of CEO James Warburton departing this week, an expenses scandal investigation by the Sydney Morning Herald, a former Spotlight producer claiming the network paid for drugs, sex workers and more to secure an interview with Bruce Lehrmann, to name a few – adding that this has unavoidable consequences for media buyers and clients.
“Put simply, brands never want to be tarnished by controversy or negativity, and this can easily happen by association,” Baxter wrote.
“And so, this is where the danger exists for Seven right now. Sadly, the network doesn’t currently exemplify the qualities (or safety) marketers are looking for. Would you really want your company associated with them in the current circumstances? My guess is most people would say ‘no’.”
On Monday night, Hopkins took to LinkedIn to defend the network, saying she felt compelled to write the post “off the back of a challenge around perhaps ‘not currently exemplifying qualities that marketers are looking for'”.
Hopkins
She wrote: “As a seasoned senior leader who has worked globally and navigated many businesses through complex challenges, reputational challenges and crises, I believe that I am well equipped to provide this narrative.
“I am proud to work for Seven Network and Seven West Media and be a key member of the executive team.
“I am proud of my choice to join this business.
“I am proud to lead my direct team and department and contribute to the leadership of our wider teams and organisation.
“I am proud of the thousands of amazing employees that go over and beyond every single day to deliver content in front of paywall, much of it live, to more than 17 million Australians a month.
“I am proud of the ambition we have as a business, and the hunger to evolve and drive strong profitable outcomes for our advertisers.
“I am proud to be a leader who steps up in adversity and hard times.
“I am proud that our employees, advertisers and viewers are discussed internally every day, all day and we always want to deliver the very best for them – and most days we do.
“I am proud that we ask ourselves how can we be better at what we do every single day,” she listed.
Hopkins acknowledged that some might critique her post and make assumptions, but said she believes that “the strongest leaders know how to lead through challenges and imperfections and never shirk from their responsibilities or the heavy criticism”.
On the latest episode of the Mumbrellacast, Mumbrella’s editor Neil Griffiths and publisher Adam Lang discussed the controversy coming out of the TV giant in recent weeks.
“It’s not really a consumer issue, as in, the millions of people that watch and read and consume their content, that’s probably not of major concern to them. But as trading partners for the business of media and advertising who trade with Seven: ‘Who am I going to be dealing with and who’s running the show?’ That is a change,” Lang said.
“This is more about the employment brand. And so, you can see that the change from James Walburton to Jeff Howard is coming, [that] may be brought forward. And then you look at, well, why would that happen?
“These are big changes and a lot of speculation that maybe through all of that, perhaps it makes sense to change to a new leader earlier than was planned.”
Listen to the full episode here.
Mumbrella has contacted Seven for further comment.
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Lauren McNamara is a journalist at Mumbrella, covering the creative and PR beat. She joined in November 2022 as editorial assistant, after completing a Bachelor of Communications (Journalism) at UTS.
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As a former 7 employee, I’m glad to have left before this storm hit. But glad the toxic culture of the place is finally becoming public knowledge.
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Seven faces clear contempt of court charges – for not handing over docs under a subpoena and also potentially soliciting Lehrmann to give them the court docs (in full knowledge he wasn’t allowed to – something which is also contempt).
At a minimum they also paid his rent (we’ll forget the potential drugs and prostitutes shall we?) knowing he was still facing a second rape charge.
I get what Mel was trying to do here (rally the troops etc) but maybe read the room… there’s not a lot to be proud of in this “omnishambles”.
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Thanks, but no one asked.
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In fairness, she seems to be sticking around longer than she did at Optus.
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To HJT,
Audiences will continue to watch whatever they like and I’d think the majority of them don’t care about what goes on in 7. Those that do wil switch channels. Those that remain will be the audience that it is your job to deliver to your clients, it won’t affect their opinion of the advertiser. Repairing the culture of ” do anything to get a story and ratings} is another matter, one that every TV network has been guilty of over the years.
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Hard to defend CH7 at this stage; I would argue that it is better to keep your head down and get on with it till it all blows over.
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Dear Mel
To state the bleeding obvious, you’re answering a question no one asked!
No one has any concerns with the thousands of amazing employees at Seven. Cameramen, production assistants, drivers, receptionists, whatever. There’s no need to defend those or say you are proud of them.
You have totally missed the questions everyone wants answers to, and as CMO you should be very aware of what every advertiser is clearly thinking right now.
In the pursuit of a scoop/story, your network was prepared to do many things a supposed family-friendly network would not have done: pay the rent for a year for an alleged rapist, reimburse his expenses for cocaine, ply him with prostitutes. Firstly, how is this even a valid thorught in the mind of a producer? In my business no one would even dream of such things. Please start by explaining that.
Next, when confronted with this information, Seven management didn’t sack the producer, rather they accepted it as it was all in the pursuit of a scoop. Then they paid more for a Tasmanian holiday to validate even further the ongoing sordid effort to get an interview. Please explain why network management didn’t just shut down the story and sack the producer on the spot once he admitted to using company cards for such expenses.
Then when finally it came out in court, Seven still maintains it didn’t pay for these things, even though invoices have now been produced and tendered in court. It seems like Seven has a hard time admitting the truth or owning up to its own failings. Please explain why we should put our media advertising budgets into such an organisation.
These are the serious questions you have not addressed. Please answer them. Please step up and do your job of communicating to your customers.
HJT
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Employee says she’s happy to work for a discredited network.
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Unfortunately it is well known in the industry and between production companies etc that Seven are notoriously difficult to work with, and very, very hostile. The rot starts at the very top and things will not change until he (and others) is removed.
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Maybe it’s just me but I wouldn’t be proud to have paid Lehrmann’s rent for a year??
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This is the same *leader* who made the optus hack all about them after they’d left Optus (even doing conference talks on it and how resilient they are/were). And SXSW. Same story again here re 7 with this posturing. Doesn’t seem like the opportunity for self promotion.
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She was at Optus for over 6 yrs
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Yaaaasss Queeenn!
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