CAN DIGITAL SAVE THE SOAP OPERA???

Way back when I was knee high to a grasshopper, my Mom was a devotee of The Guiding Light, a soap owned and produced by P&G. I can’t say that I shared the fascination, but I was impressed how a TV show could capture the attention of arguably the busiest woman in America. She worked, she went to grad school, cooked, cleaned, made Little Green Sprout Halloween costumes, but if she had a bit of free time and happened to be home at 2:30 PM, she was right there reveling in the dramas of GL.

And soaps had (and have) a lot going for them for liberated women. They nearly always revolve around a strong Matriarch that kicks butt as well or better than any of the shirtless lads that surround her. Soap women are like ballerinas – the stars, the protagonists, the antagonists -- and the men, while not incidental, are really more swan lifters than the foci of attention.

But soaps have hit on hard times. There is probably no more loyal audience than hard core soap fans. Soap fans are huge contributors to uniques and page views for the Network sites, as they post and comment on the antics of Jessica and Lorenzo (I am told there is ALWAYS a smoldering Lorenzo) and speculate on the longevity of the latest fifth time around marriage. Actually that’s unfair. Soaps are over the top, but they aren’t THAT over the top. Except for Passions, a campy NBC soap with witches and aliens. But the Big Mommas of the genre, on ABC, are 100% ALIEN FREE. Not that I know…of course. So while soap fans are loyal, they are, unfortunately for the genre, more likely to have liver spots than Chocolate cell phones. It seems as if work and social media and all of the other sundry ways women pass their daytime hours have hurt the biz.

But now, it appears that SOAPnet, the Cable channel that was founded on the concept of “Today’s Soaps Tonight” is trying to change all that.



SOAPnet’s demos were always more desirable than the networks’, for reasons of daypart presumably. But now, the Internet group at SOAPnet seems to be taking a more proactive approach to repopularizing the soap genre.

The idea for the new SOAPnet.com seems to be based upon the concept that the essence of soaps – relationships and drama – is what powers much of TV drama, and celeb life. Brangelina is a soap. Ditto the Team Aniston t-shirts that were popular for about 11 seconds after Brad left Jen for Ange. ER is a soap, just at a different time of day. And anyone that remembers Dynasty knows that Daytime has no monopoly on catfights and strong women running the show.

The new SOAPnet.com takes the idea of soap in all aspects of entertainment and brings it to life online. Yes, there are synopses of soap plots, and the requisite unbelievably busy AMC and OLTL posting boards. But there is a ton more. Articles about the soapiness of celeb lifestyles. Soapy fashion. Soapy beauty (looking like a soap star is NEVER a bad idea.) There are also billions of photos – some clearly pro, some clearly paparazzoid, and while I couldn’t find a cellulite circle drawn on anyone’s thigh, I am hopeful that the good people at SOAPnet will see the light and provide them post haste.

The soap site category is bizarre in that there are decent independent and network sites, but some of the most trafficked are run by crazy (I mean that in a loving way) soap fans from their kitchen tables. The sort of people who know the blood relationships of every character back to 1957. These sites do well because of the passion of their owners – and because generally the other sites…well…if you can’t say sumthin nice...

That’s changed. The new SOAPnet.com design is unmistakably youthful, but not offputting for the more mature set. That’s an achievement. Too often (remember as I climb on my soapbox that you are reading a blog called “Oldest Living Digital Marketer”) sites trying to go young end up pissing off their loyal fans. I cannot imagine that happening in this case. No funky nav, no crazy jarring graphics. Just a smooth, integrated, consistent experience. An experience, I might add, that is befitting a celeb/Hollywood/entertainment/TV editorial remit.

I love sites that do those little article summaries in rollovers, and this one does it in spades. And the organization is delightfully, deliberately entangling. Click on a link about soapy beauty and you’ll be confronted with fabu looking soap stars and not soap stars. “Oh, who’s that? CLICK”
There’s video everywhere. And it’s good. Lots of original bits which is nice.

It’s also not quite as jarring and stark as my old favorite celeb site, Yahoo’s OMG. Sorry Yahoo, yer #2 now. This has a bit more dignity. I can see publicists wanting to have their people all over this.

Advertisers as well. In the old iteration of SOAPnet, I can’t help but speculate that most of the ads were…firesaled. Lots of mortgages and 1,000,000th visitor. Mark my words, people, this site’s traffic is about to explode. And with it the advertising base.

I’d write more, but there’s this interesting piece on Katie Holmes that’s pulling me away.

Anyway, check out SOAPnet.com! You’ll be glad you did. And sign my petition demanding more cellulite circles so we can correct that glaring omission on an otherwise delightful site.