You can call them “the Original Celebrity Family.”

As it prepares to officially welcome the channel’s first original scripted drama, The Royals, to its airwaves Sunday night, E! is relying on its long history chronicling the highs and lows of the real life Windsors as it makes its pitch to viewers.

“We know our viewers are obsessed with the real royal family,” said Jen Neal, executive VP of marketing at E! and Esquire within the NBCUniversal cable family. “We have traditionally covered all things royal family, and any opportunities we have to marry relevant contextual content with The Royals in this capacity, we are going to take advantage of.”

One glance at the series’ page at eonline.com shows just how on-brand The Royals is for E! as it wades into the increasingly crowded original scripted pool.

Alongside the standard videos and photos that accompany the show are a plethora of ripped-from-E!-News headlines including “Wildest Royal Fashions,” and “Queen Elizabeth’s Celeb BFFs,” that offer The Royals viewers a chance to go down a rabbit hole of regal content while remaining within the E! universe.

It’s all part of E!’s larger strategy of catering to celebrity obsessives and so-called “scoop seekers” that has made it the go-to network for Red Carpet coverage and pop culture news.

E! went on-air with its first trailer for the series in August, during the Emmys, providing a long-lead calendar to introduce viewers to the fictional royal family led by Queen Helena (Elizabeth Hurley) and her husband, the reigning King Simon (Vincent Regan). A playboy heir to the throne and his wild-child sister provide the sex, drugs, and rock n’ roll in the plot.

The series’ tagline: “Anarchy in the Monarchy.”

“We asked ourselves ‘how do we start early? How do we fuel this addiction to the anarchy in the monarchy?’” Neal said.

Digital and social content played a major part in the plan, with more than 52 unique pieces of content rolled out as the campaign ramped up.

Among them, a four-part “Behind the Palace Gates” miniseries produced by a documentarian on set capturing footage during the production. The digital series allowed the producers and cast to break the fourth wall a bit while setting up the premise of the show.

“We really wanted to align with pop culture events in clever ways to get out there,” Neal told Brief.

One such occasion was the real tradition of The Queen’s Speech, which sees the monarch deliver a televised address to the nation on Christmas Day.

E! dreamed up its own version, with Queen Helena delivering her take on her train wreck of a family.

Within 48 hours the video had tallied almost two million online views.

Valentine’s Day saw the aforementioned playboy heir—Prince Liam, played by William Moseley—looking for love on dating app Tinder. Users who swiped right to match with the Prince were sent follow-up content promoting the show.

The Super Bowl provided the show’s biggest platform to date, with NBC offering up a 30-second spot to introduce the series to the year’s biggest TV audience.

“NBCUniversal has a strong culture of supporting projects throughout the company, and we know there is a lot of confidence in this show,” Neal said, adding that The Royals was designated a “Gold Symphony” project within NBCU’s internal marketing initiative that seeks to develop deeper ties between NBCU’s programming and content and Comcast’s cable platforms. “We knew that we were a priority and it was fantastic to learn we would have a 30-second spot.”

“Making Headlines” features Queen Helena explaining that Royals make history just by being themselves, even if they have only a few moments. It was the series’ first spot that leaned heavily on creative, rather than episodic footage.

“We wanted to signal the importance of the effort,” Neal said.

The final weeks have seen a serious ramp up in the out-of-home presence in New York and L.A., with station domination at Grand Central and 30 Rockefeller Plaza, combined with a lot of energy devoted to a TV tune in message. The :60s, :90s, :30s, and :15s have been flying fast and furious across the Internet and on air.

The final promos have paired the series with E!’s own royal family of sorts, the Kardashians. The season premiere of Keeping Up With The Kardashians serves as the lead in for The Royals.

“Get ready for back-to-back premieres featuring two of the world’s most notorious families,” declares the promo.

It seems entirely fitting for a show the network says is “part fairy tale, part cautionary tale,” and well in line with popular high-stakes dramas.

The Royals premieres Sunday, March 15 at 10p.m. ET.

Tags:


  Save as PDF