CBS Launches ‘You’re Laughing at CBS’ Comedy Campaign

For decades, CBS was known as the “Tiffany Network.” Now, CBS president/chief marketing officer Mike Benson is ready to “break some Tiffany glass.”

The exec, who has been giving CBS a modern image overhaul since taking over in 2019, has now turned his attention to its comedy brand. Timed to the fall launch of the Eye network’s four comedies, Benson has introduced the campaign “You’re Laughing at CBS.”

“People will say that CBS is old and stodgy, but actually, if you look at our programming, it’s really not,” Benson said. “I think we’ve got a lot of work to do, from a brand perspective, to show that we can have a lot of fun. That we are willing to poke fun at ourselves as much as we want people to come in and laugh at the shows that we’ve got.”

The “You’re Laughing at CBS” tagline will focus on returning hits “Ghosts” and “The Neighborhood,” as well as new “Young Sheldon” spinoff “Georgie & Mandy’s First Marriage” and freshman Damon Wayans/Damon Wayans Jr. laffer “Poppa’s House.”

“We thought this could be a really good time to add another dimension to the brand with what we’ve got in comedy, and bring some more attention to it,” Benson said. “We had this idea that it really started with, ‘You’re laughing with CBS,’ but then I really wanted to be provocative and have fun with it.”

As part of the new laffer brand, CBS is also introducing a smiling version of its Eye logo — which it has nicknamed “Chuckle.” (And yes, that’s a sly nod to the “Chuckles the Clown” character from CBS’ “Mary Tyler Moore” show.)

“We’ve got this ‘Chuckles’ version of the logo that we want to stamp on all of our comedies, just to show that they are certified as funny,” Benson said. “And we really want the audience to start to see that laughing CBS eye mark.”

Adding to that, Benson said CBS will start referring to the term “sitcom” as “sit-down” comedy, to differentiate it from the explosion of “stand-up” comedy on other outlets.

“There’s a lot of stand-up comedy out there,” he said. “But we are looking at this not from the point of view of what comedians do, but what value we’re providing our audience almost every day.”

CBS is kicking off the comedy rebrand with an event on Wednesday, Sept. 18 at the NeueHouse in Hollywood (in the same building that was once CBS’ original West Coast headquarters). “CBS Presents: You’re Laughing at CBS, A Night of ‘Sit-Down’ Comedy” will feature “The Neighborhood” star Max Greenfield and “Poppa’s House” star Damon Wayans Jr. introducing a night of screenings and Q&A sessions.

The “You’re Laughing at CBS” branding will also be shared in on-air and social spots, featuring content from the Eye network’s comedy casts. Right now, the branding is focused on the four shows, but Benson said it could eventually expand to late night and to hour-longs with comedic bents like “Elsbeth.”

The “You’re Laughing at CBS” tag does share a sensibility with Netflix’s “Netflix is a Joke” comedy tagline, which uses a similar tongue-in-cheek wordplay.

“Netflix does some great marketing, and what they did around stand up comedy, I thought was really appropriate for them,” Benson said. “It was a good reminder that sometimes your campaigns need to be as noisy and as loud as the as the programming itself.”

“Ghosts” and “George & Mandy’s First Marriage” both launch on Thuesday, Oct. 17, while “Poppa’s House” and “The Neighborhood” premiere on Monday, Oct. 21.

Beyond that, Benson said CBS has its marketing plans in place for new series including Kathy Bates’ “Matlock,” the “NCIS” prequel “NCIS: Origins” and the unscripted entry “The Summit.”

“We’ve got a really great provocative campaign that’s still true to the show ‘Matlock,’ but starts to position Kathy Bates as she may not be the Matlock you actually are expecting, because there’s such a great twist at the end of the pilot… and with ‘NCIS: Origins,’ Leroy Jethro Gibbs is someone who all NCIS fans know, but we really want to go out and create this sense of mystery around who and what he is.”

It’s a year after the Hollywood strikes delayed last year’s TV season, and the presidential election also has audiences distracted: So marketers like Benson know they have a lot of work to attract viewers. “It’s been super challenging, and so strategically, it was really important for us to bring football back,” he said. “I’m not only talking about the NFL, but we put a lot of effort into bringing both the Big Ten and the NFL back, and then utilize those as platforms to give us the reach that we need to build excitement for fall.”

Here’s a first look at the CBS promo for “You’re Laughing at CBS”: