Wednesday 4 May 2011

Where New TV is At: YouTube's Next New Networks


YouTube's Investment in User Generated Content
Exciting news about YouTube's acquisition of Next New Networks and creation of YouTube Next, a team that will focus on 'supercharging content creator development on YouTube, driving deeper expertise in partner audience development, and incubating new ideas that can be shared with the broader community.'

One of Next New Networks' projects is Beyond the Trailer which is a YouTube movie review channel fronted by Grace Randolph (in the video above) because she says 'Movie Critics Can't be Trusted'. She is very funny and her channel shows what a little bit of marketing and investment can do. Apparently since signing with Next New Networks, she has developed her show and built up a strong audience (in September 2010 alone, BTT racked up 2.8 million views).

Essentially, it seems that Next New Networks is YouTube's plan to help amateurs/or online producers take it to the next level. What I find personally exciting this this invitation from Next New Networks:

So what's your specific interest? Is there a community you're a part of that lacks, wants or needs shows that only the Internet can provide? Let us know. And if you're a writer, producer, or creator who's passionate about your community, then maybe you should join Next New Creators and be a crucial part of our next new network.

What does this mean for broadcasters/production companies?
Mike Henry at Ad Age Digital writes about the impact of this acquisition and investment in YouTube talent, and sees it as a red flag to traditional producers and production companies. Henry says they need to get more serious about their Multi-Platform strategies and investment, and offers these 5 tips if the want they want to be well positioned to compete with the the going-Pro YouTube creators:

5 Useful Guidelines to Producing Online Content:
  1. Start with great characters and stories
  2. Consider not the just age/gender/psychographic of their audience, but where and how this audience will likely consume the content
  3. Carefully develop production strategies and cycles to deliver assets that can be packaged in different ways for various platforms, audience and markets
  4. Consider and explore international markets from project inception
  5. Place a high value on the social networks attached to talent with whom they work

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