Member Article

Making content more profitable

In 2020 Amazon’s very high budget, professional version of The Great British Sewing Bee, ‘Making the Cut’ with Heidi Klum and Tim Gunn was launched as the “first-ever global and instantly shoppable series.” The premise? That each of the winning outfits would be available for sale in the Making the Cut shop on Amazon. Every single item of clothing from the first eight programmes sold-out within minutes of the episode finishing. The same was true of Season 2.

However, outside of Amazon is it possible to monetise content to this extent?

The answer is overwhelmingly yes. It all lies in the data and CRM strategy, which in today’s competitive landscape should no longer be a nice-to-have for production companies, but must be built into the programme’s development DNA.

The TV industry is no stranger to data. After all, the advertising funded model has been built around understanding viewing information for decades. And as audience proliferation increased the demand from brands for more granular audience data was omnipresent as they looked to reach increasingly discrete cohorts of relevant customers. Unsurprisingly, as a result, media buying is now far more complex than merely paying for a slot in the Christmas episode of Coronation Street.

Data is now also being put at the heart of content creation. Perhaps the most well-known example is Netflix’s House of Cards. The development team invested $100 million and commissioned 26 episodes without ever seeing a treatment or taster. They rode roughshod over the traditional ‘pilot’ TV test process and instead ran the organisation’s substantial data.

By analysing 30 million plays, four million ratings and three million searches, it was concluded that the programme would be a success. This approach was then further enhanced at launch. When the trailers of House of Cards were aired, Netflix created different content for different audience profiles. For example, David Fincher (the director of House of Cards) enthusiasts were served trailers showcasing classic Fincher techniques. Likewise, people that had searched for political dramas previously would be served a trailer focusing on the politics.

And the data wasn’t wrong. Despite famously not releasing viewer figures, it was announced that over 670,000 people binge-watched the entire 13-hour first season during the first weekend of its release – at the time that was a whopping two per cent of total Netflix subscribers. Unfortunately, for House of Cards, the data didn’t predict the show’s ultimate demise, but that’s another story… Clearly, data within the TV sector is extremely powerful, yet true enablement is confined to just a few players.

One reason for this is access to data. Amazon and Netflix have it at their fingertips as they own the platforms, so too do broadcasters. It is production houses that struggle as it is difficult to gain access to the insight they need. However, creating CRM strategies to accompany a series will result in greater revenue opportunities.

Data enables new ways to incentivise consumer behaviour, revealing the true market value for content, feeding into the creation of new content, sales opportunities and providing more data for targeted marketing. For example, Golf’s Greatest Holes, Sky Sports’ golf-focused TV series. Embedding data strategy into production

The show launched a data strategy and CRM programme to boost commercialisation of the series and generate deeper viewer engagement. This includes a website to accompany the series, which encourages viewers to sign up.

Using sophisticated data analytics, segmentations and end-to-end marketing automation, viewers that sign up to the site will receive exclusive, targeted content further to the programme and personalised offers from partners including, golf merchandise companies, travel firms and golf courses.

Golf is one of the most popular UK hobbies with golfers spending an average of £755 per year on their pastime, therefore the opportunity for monetisation of the series is huge. It enables understanding of the viewing audience which is important for ad revenue, but having a deeper knowledge of who they are and what motivates them adds to the longevity of a programme.

For instance, in this case you can find out which golf holes viewers want the presenters to visit in the future and you can design the offers around this insight bringing value to both the show’s partners and the viewers themselves.

In today’s fragmented market designing a value-based ecosystem around a TV series ultimately results in deeper viewer engagement, quality insight for advertisers and revenue generating opportunities for sponsors and partners – a win-win for everyone involved!

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Beyond, Putting Data to Work Ltd .