Social Responsibility (Public Value)

ProSiebenSat.1 Group reaches around 45 million TV households every day with its stations in its TV markets in the DACH region; ProSiebenSat.1’s marketer SevenOne Media reached at the end of 2017 38 million unique users with their supervised websites. The distributed content contributes to the diversity of information and helps to shape the opinions of viewers and users. We are aware of our level of social responsibility. Therefore, ProSiebenSat.1 makes targeted use of the wide reach of its media offerings to focus on important ecological, societal and sociopolitical matters and thus makes a valuable contribution to society as a company. In doing so, we observe the principles of editorial freedom and journalistic independence.

Our public value activities also serve to increase the public relevance of our TV stations and media offerings, thus setting us apart from our competitors. Due to the large number of available free TV and pay TV stations, public value measures in the ProSiebenSat.1 station family also represent a tool for brand management and loyalty. Another important reason for dealing with social matters is to secure revenues and reduce risks, as our initiatives help us achieve greater acceptance of our offers and business models among important stakeholders such as viewers and Internet users, politicians and regulatory authorities, and advertising customers and media agencies. They therefore represent an important non-financial aspect for ProSiebenSat.1. (Fig. 056)

When it comes to selecting measures, we pursue four strategic goals: We want to build knowledge, offer opportunities, communicate values, and promote culture. In doing so, we base our actions on regulations such as the ProSiebenSat.1 Code of Conduct, the International Federation of Journalists’ Principles on the Conduct of Journalists, and internal guidelines on data protection, protection of young people, and the separation of advertising and programming. In addition to the stations, departments such as Governmental Relations & Regulatory Affairs also have budgets for public value projects. We measure the success of our actions quantitatively in some cases, for example based on audience shares, employee involvement in projects such as the Social Day, or funds raised in the RED NOSE DAY campaign.

In 2011, the Group placed its public value activities in a larger social context and underscored their relevance for the Group by establishing an Advisory Board. The interdisciplinary body chaired by Bavaria’s former minister president Dr. Edmund Stoiber advises ProSiebenSat.1 Group on relevant social, ethical and media-political issues and provides impetus on important topics such as education and culture. In 2017, the Advisory Board met three times. Members of the Executive Board as well as other decision-makers in the Group participated in these events. In view of ProSiebenSat.1’s young target group, the Advisory Board prioritized the issue of digital education. The Board intends to use corresponding measures to strengthen the media skills of young people in particular and give them guidance in the digital world, as these skills are increasingly becoming a prerequisite for participation in society and for entering the labor market.

One example of this is the SchoolsON project, which was carried out for the third time in 2017. This competition for school students arose from an initiative of the ProSiebenSat.1 Advisory Board with the support of the German Children and Youth Foundation (Deutsche Kinder- und Jugendstiftung). Within this contest, young people can design and produce a TV report for the formats “Galileo”, “taff”, or “Newstime”. Extensive tutorials are available at www.schools-on.de to help them, not only providing technical and editorial instructions but also dealing with the topics of personal rights, copyright, and rights to the use of third-party work. As such, SchoolsON not only gives young people scope for creative development, but also fosters their media competence.

Due to the German parliamentary elections in 2017, another topic of our public value portfolio with regard to opinion forming was a campaign to convey political issues and promote political participation among young viewer groups in particular. ProSiebenSat.1 Group’s stations reported extensively on the parliamentary elections in various election formats and other programs focusing on specific topics, as well as on their websites. As in 2009 and 2013, ProSiebenSat.1 also called on viewers to take part in the elections with a large-scale campaign based on the motto “Help shape your future. Vote!” on the German TV stations on the Group’s online and social media platforms.

When choosing our measures, we focus on topical, socially relevant issues that affect young target groups in particular. In addition to the Advisory Board as the governance committee, such projects are generally selected and implemented on the basis of a bottom-up process. For example, relevant sustainability topics are identified by the editorial teams of the TV stations as part of their journalistic work and corresponding formats and program environments are developed for them.

One example is the sustainability brand “Green Seven”: The annual “Green Seven” documentary broadcasting on a specific environmental topic (2017: “Save the Ice”) on ProSieben is supported by the same thematic focus in magazines and other programs. This broadcasting is accompanied by cooperations with external partners and employee campaigns. In addition, ideas for supporting social projects or implementing internal initiatives at the Company also come directly from ProSiebenSat.1’s staff. The refugee aid project “WE HELP” is one example of this.

It is not just with our programs and campaigns that we fulfill our responsibility, but also by making our offers accessible to everyone. ProSiebenSat.1 Group is therefore continuously expanding its range of subtitled programming for deaf and hearing-impaired people and the number of stations on which subtitles are available in order to improve its dissemination of information. Subtitles are available on five of the Group’s German stations, also including sixx since the reporting period. Compared to the survey of media institutions in 2016, ProSiebenSat.1 increased the number of broadcasts by more than 20% overall, while the airtime with subtitles rose by more than 30%. Almost 25% of ProSieben’s programming is now subtitled.