Brad Dancer

BA, 1995, Communication

Senior Vice President, Research & Digital Media

Brad Dancer was one of the first 10 employees in the newly launched National Geographic Channel in May 2000. As the Senior Vice President of Research and Digital Media, Brad heads up all areas of research in support of the network’s program development and strategy, scheduling, ad sales, consumer and promotion. He also spearheads the channel’s digital media operations, including broadband, video on demand and mobile units. Highly respected in the industry, Brad served as the 2007 CTAM Research Conference Chair.

In 2008, Brad oversaw the redesign and relaunch of natgeotv.com, which included a fully interactive TV schedule, multiple casual games, full-length video streaming and a complete infrastructure change.  He managed the launch of NGC’s online video hub site with eight broadband channels, and more planned. Brad also manages content for NGC’s VOD service, one of the widest distributed of any cable network, expected to grow to over 42 million by December 2009. Additionally, digital content distribution has grown from one outlet to over 12 including Hulu, Youtube, MSN, Myspace, AOL, and Sling. 

Prior to joining the channel, Brad served as Director of Programming & Research for FOX 5 WTTG-TV in Washington, D.C. In this role, Brad helped develop one of the leading FOX stations in the country and the highest rated station in the Washington, DC market. There, Brad negotiated deals with the Washington Redskins and numerous syndicators. At 26, Brad was one of the youngest people ever to manage the programming and research areas of a top 10 market station.

Brad stared his career out of college as Research Coordinator at WKBD-TV UPN 50 in Detroit, Mich.  At age 23, he became Director of Research for WLFL-TV FOX 22/WRDC-TV UPN 28 in Raleigh, N.C.

Brad is a former International Radio and Television Society summer fellowship recipient and worked with Katz Media in New York in programming research in 1995. Outside of the office, Brad spends much of his time “analyzing the competition,” or in other words, watching a lot of TV with his two young daughters.

Brad earned his MBA in 2007 from University of Maryland University College and received his undergraduate from Purdue University in film studies and telecommunications with minors in anthropology and supervision.