FranceTV Publicité’s strategy to make ads more accessible

09/10/2024

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In this interview, Marianne Siproudhis, Chief Executive Office at FranceTV Publicité discusses the company’s committment to greater accessibility in advertising in the context of the Paralympic Games.

egta: Why has FranceTV Publicité decided to embrace accessibility? What has changed in the last couple of years in our industry? Are more brands jumping on board, for example?

Marianne Siproudhis (MS): The media and advertising landscape has undergone significant change in recent years, with a growing recognition of the importance of accessibility. This has been driven by increased awareness of the needs of people with disabilities, legal requirements and a societal drive for diversity and inclusion.

As a French public ad sales house, FranceTV Publicité has a societal role to play in embracing accessibility to ensure that its content is inclusive and accessible to all audiences.

The Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games reached a record audience of 24 million French viewers. This record audience demonstrates the growing public interest in inclusive events and the importance of making content accessible to all.

Early results are already confirming this success, with the Paris 2024 Paralympic Opening Ceremony being watched by over 10 million people, 10 times more than in Tokyo.

Marianne Siproudhis
Chief Executive Office
FranceTV Publicité

egta: And what does your commitment to accessibility look like?

MS: As an advertising sales house, the best commitment we can make is to raise awareness and support advertisers on societal issues. That is why we have always included the Paralympics Games in the Paris 2024 communication plans that we offer to brands, and we have convinced 7 partners to sponsor the entire Paralympics on France Télévisions.

Above all, in recent months we’ve been working to make all our content accessible. It started with World TV Day, when FranceTV Publicité joined the Egta initiative and became the first advertising company in France to broadcast advertising translated into sign language. We then stepped up our commitment during the Olympic and Paralympic Games by offering subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing to advertisers. We are proud to be able to offer such an inclusive experience, with 100% of commercials subtitled and 91% subtitled by our broadcast team with the support of France.tv Access, the France Télévisions subsidiary dedicated to accessibility.

It’a also important to mention the France Télévisions incredible achievements through this wonderful Olympic journey! The most intense, huge and inclusive TV production never offered.

  • 74 hours of live closed captioning for hard of hearing audience every DAY!
  • 7 hours of audio description commentaries for visual impaired audience every DAY!
  • Sign Language translation of each Olympic ceremony together with our 4 daily news programmes already accessible to French signing telespectators.
  • Full closed captioning of historical Olympic events available on https://france.tv.

egta: What challenges do you still face in making all advertisements fully accessible?

MS: We believe we are on the right track, but we still need to enforce cooperation with all our partners to achieve the goals of accessibility and inclusion in the media industry. Despite progress in the adoption of accessibility, some challenges remain in making all advertising fully accessible, such as creative resistance, awareness and training. Indeed, while awareness of accessibility is growing, not everyone involved in the advertising process fully understands its importance or how to implement it effectively. Ongoing education and training is needed to ensure that all stakeholders are on board with accessibility initiatives.