OTTAWA – There’s little doubt the digital sphere and alternative viewing platforms such as YouTube, Netflix, Amazon and others are changing the broadcast landscape. Broadcasters and programmers, though, say they aren’t shying away from the challenges, and instead are taking the long-view and experimenting with different types of content.
Some, such as Shaftesbury, are going digital first with niche content. It’s online-only Carmilla, a teen vampire LGTBQ focused program produced by its digital arm Smokebomb, has attracted about 53 million viewers over multiple platforms through its three seasons.
Christina Jennings, chair of the board and CEO at Shaftesbury, explained in the Media Leaders session at the Canadian Media Producers Association annual Prime Time event in Ottawa on Thursday (pictured in a screen cap from its YouTube live stream) that faced with fewer Canadian content buyers who are spending less money, the company had to come up with a different way to mount programs.
One approach has been to pursue branded content. The company is working with brands such as RBC and Kimberly Clark. This is how Carmilla has been done and Kimberly Clark’s Kotex brand is front and centre.
Because funds in the digital world are over-subscribed, she said, Shaftesbury went the branded content route to fund the program. There aren’t any overt references to the brand and there aren’t product placements, rather there is dialogue around the attributes of the brand, said Jennings.
CuriosityStream is yet example of a programmer experimenting in the digital sphere. It’s an advertising free, subscription video on demand (SVOD) service focused on factual content (a doc series featuring Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield called Miniverse is launching soon).
Elizabeth Hendricks-North, president and CEO at CuriosityStream, explained that in the SVOD space it’s all about reaching the consumer and offering what they, when they want it. This is especially important as more and more people are migrating away from linear TV towards an experience where there aren’t any commercial interruptions.
As for advice, she said to be patient with the market and “to continue to look at what consumers are wanting, where they’re wanting to watch television and how they’re wanting to do it . Anytime, on demand, that’s where we’re moving towards,” added Hendricks-North.
While the question of making money from digital wasn’t specifically raised during the session (although she said Smokebomb is not yet a profitable part of Shaftesbury as yet), Jennings said Shaftesbury has a plan, and it’s all about attempting to migrate digital first content to the conventional TV platform, the megaphone where the big money still resides.
“You’ve got to listen to your audience, you’ve got to build your audience, you’ve got to follow your audience, you’ve got to interact with them.” – Sally Catto, CBC
This is what the company is planning to do with Carmilla. There will be first be a motion picture (shooting begins this May) and then TV will come after. Shaftesbury is working with a Canadian broadcaster on the project.
“Can we take those 53 million eyeballs around the world and bring them to television?” she asked, noting that this is when there will be a big payday.
Finding the right formula to succeed in the digital space is going to see some carnage though. And in CBC’s case, it related to an online comedy feed aimed at millennials, called Punch Line.
Sally Catto, general manager for programming at CBC English Television, explained there was a perception this group of Canadians weren’t watching linear TV not as much as an older demographic so the decision was made “to distance ourselves from our own brand. We’re going to create something new.”
The result wasn’t what the public broadcaster had hoped because it assumed to know what millennials were interested in instead of doing the research to find out. If CBC had done the research, it would have known that millennials are very proud of their country and very proud to be Canadian, explained Catto.
“There’s so many values inherent in the millennial audience that I feel we were actually ignoring because we didn’t research it. We made assumptions,” she said.
Knowing the audience was highlighted a critical piece of advice to others looking to explore opportunities in the digital sphere.
Not only knowing your audience is important, said Jennings, but so too is staying true to them. “You’ve got to listen to your audience, you’ve got to build your audience, you’ve got to follow your audience, you’ve got to interact with them,” she added.
