“We’re dedicated to creating content that not only entertains but also educates. Understanding our audience’s preferences and engagement patterns allows us to tailor our programming to meet their needs.”

• Mark Denby, Head of Video Strategy, Digital, BBC Kids

BBC Kids, a prominent division of the world’s leading public service broadcaster, provides a diverse range of educational and entertaining programs for children. With an expansive digital video catalog that includes 10 popular YouTube programs such as CBeebies and Blue Peter, BBC Kids has seen rapid growth in its video presence. 

Despite this success, they faced the challenge of optimizing their YouTube content strategy and finding influencers who actually complement their brand. Mark Denby, Head of Video Strategy, Digital, shares how they leveraged data from Tubular Labs to enhance their strategies.

Challenge

Optimizing YouTube Content Strategy

As their digital video presence grew, BBC Kids needed to optimize their YouTube content to ensure it was both engaging and educational. They required detailed insights on viewer behavior, including the best times to upload, effective thumbnail designs, and content that retains viewership.

Finding the Right Influencers

Choosing the right influencers to work with was crucial. BBC Kids needed a way to validate their choices based on data to ensure influencers aligned with their brand values and could engage their target audience effectively.

Action

Data-Driven Content Strategy

BBC Kids uses data to inform every aspect of their content strategy. From the type of thumbnails to use to the best upload times and viewer retention trends, data drives their creative decisions. This approach led to the launch of a new series, Bedtime Stories, inspired by Tubular’s Made for Kids report, which identified “fairy tales” as a growth opportunity within children’s entertainment on YouTube.

“Tubular identified that “fairy tales” was a white space opportunity, in that fact that you’d identified there was a lot of viewership to stories that were classed as “fairy tales”, but ultimately not an awful lot of uploads. So there was essentially an opportunity to deliver that content, and to deliver that audience’s needs. That’s something we’ve certainly built into our thinking.”

-Mark Denby

Marrying Creative and Insights for Influencer Selection

BBC Kids relies on insights when scouting influencers, using data to validate their creative ideas. For example, when creating a new gaming kids’ show, they used Tubular to find UK-based gaming creators with a predominantly UK-based audience. This data-driven approach ensures influencers are on-brand, have the right tone of voice, and can engage the desired audience effectively.

“First and foremost, it’s always ‘Are they right?’ Do they have the right attributes, from tone of voice to point of view? Are they on brand for kids? Do they have the right interests and specialisms for the particular content we’re going to do with them?”

-Mark Denby

Using YouTube as a Funnel

BBC Kids views YouTube as part of a funnel to drive brand loyalty, awareness, and attention to their iPlayer service. This holistic approach ensures they provide value on YouTube while encouraging viewers to engage with their full series on iPlayer.

“When we’re thinking about our content strategy, we’re always thinking about bringing people back and building attribution. That’s not to say that we think of YouTube as purely a marketing platform. But we look at the content ecosystem… as well as providing value on the platform audiences are on, we are using YouTube as the funnel to peak interest in watching the full series on BBC iPlayer.”

-Mark Denby

Growth

Increased Viewer Engagement

By utilizing data-driven strategies and standardized metrics, BBC Kids has seen a significant increase in viewer engagement. Metrics such as longer watch times and repeat views indicate a loyal and engaged audience.

Stronger Stakeholder Relationships

The adoption of Tubular’s insights has strengthened BBC Kids’ ability to demonstrate content value. This has led to enhanced trust and collaboration with parents, educators, and advertisers, resulting in more effective partnerships and educational initiatives.

BBC Kids’ journey underscores the importance of data-driven strategies and standardized metrics in proving content value. By leveraging in-depth audience insights and reliable measurement tools, they have successfully enhanced viewer engagement and demonstrated the educational impact of their programs. This approach not only reinforces their position as a leading children’s content provider but also builds lasting trust with their audience and stakeholders.

Watch the full webinar on-demand here: BBC Kids Enhances Viewer Engagement with Tubular Labs

Request a Demo

The post BBC Kids Enhances Viewer Engagement with Tubular Labs appeared first on Tubular Labs.

“With Tubular data, we were able to find adjacent audience, which we otherwise would have guessed on.”

Allie Sakakibara, Associate Director, Head of Content

Discovery Japan, a powerhouse in real-life entertainment, has captivated audiences worldwide with its inspiring and informative content. By exploring the intersection of televised programs and social content, the global Discovery network has transcended across continents, cultures, and channels. 

Allie Sakakibara, Associate Director and Head of Content at Discovery Japan, shares how they leverage YouTube to complement traditional media strategies.

Challenge

Content Length Optimization 

Initially, the Discovery Japan team grappled with determining the optimal content length for their YouTube channel. Despite consistent efforts with short-form content, breakthrough success eluded them. The team knew they needed to test out longer content that could be repurposed from television shows— but striking the perfect balance would not be easy.

Content Diversification

Following the initial success of their hit show “Marooned,” the Discovery Japan YouTube channel inadvertently became pigeonholed as a survival-themed channel. This posed the challenge of diversifying content to reach a broader audience without losing engagement.

“Discovery Channel Japan was known as a survival channel, which was great because we had really narrowed our niche, but it was also a bad thing because we couldn’t do anything else. So on Tubular, we were able to understand, what other content are our audience also watching? What other content in our Discovery library would our audience also like?”

-Allie Sakakibara, Associate Director, Head of Content

Action

Flexible Content Strategy

Embracing flexibility, the team experimented with content lengths until they struck gold with the longer-form “Marooned” series,  an original Discovery show with a 44-minute runtime. Sakakibara noted there was hesitancy to embrace long-form content, as it was important to also maintain the integrity of Discovery’s televised shows. The team reached a compromise by editing multiple episodes into long-form social media content.

“The video that went viral was uploaded on September 26, 2018. And as you can see, it currently has 5.4 million views [as of March 2021]. This video really put us on the map. So it was a very short period of about one month until we went from virtually no views to really making that first hit content.”

-Allie Sakakibara, Associate Director, Head of Content

Audience Analysis with Tubular Data

Leveraging Tubular data, Discovery Japan gained insights into audience preferences and interests beyond survival content. This led to the creation of diverse content spanning topics like ghost hunting, fishing, travel, food, and more.

“In our Tubular Labs dashboard, you can see Audience Also Watches Creators and Videos. I was able to pinpoint three huge YouTube creators that had a very similar audience to us. One of them was a very popular food and fishing channel. So we took a gamble and put a food channel show on, which has nothing to do with survival, but people loved it. With Tubular data, we were able to find adjacent audiences, which we otherwise would have just guessed on.”

-Allie Sakakibara, Associate Director, Head of Content

Growth

Diversification and Audience Expansion 

By diversifying content and catering to broader interests, Discovery Japan expanded its audience base. The success of “Marooned” paved the way for the channel’s transformation into a hub for diverse content, attracting viewers interested in various topics beyond survival.

• In February of 2024, Discovery Japan was the #3 Japanese creator on Facebook in Science & Tech 
• In the past 365 days, the channel’s top 6 videos were all YouTube #shorts, allowing them to reach new viewers
• 90% of their YouTube audience also watches videos about Humor, and 70% also watches videos about Film

Discovery Japan’s journey exemplifies the power of adaptability and testing out different strategies. Making data-informed decisions can empower creators to take strategic risks. By embracing experimentation, leveraging data insights, and leaning into niche content, Discovery Japan has solidified its position as a leader in captivating audiences on YouTube, Facebook, and more. 

Download the full webinar to watch on-demand here: Growing Audiences on YouTube with Discovery Japan

The post Discovery Japan leverages niche content for rapid growth appeared first on Tubular Labs.

“It was clear that Tubular had the most extensive data available for us. I’ve used other performance tools, and when it comes to video performance and video data, I think Tubular is really best in class. I use it almost daily, I’m a super user. Whenever I have a question, the Tubular team is quick to answer it.”

Grace Shen, Influencer Marketing Operations Manager

Roblox, the online game platform, allows users to create and play their own games within a vast, virtual universe. As of January 2024, the company reported 70.2 million daily users. Their monumental success has propelled virtual realities into the daily lives of its users.

Roblox has forged its own unique path to success, building an unprecedented influencer program and strategizing for explosive growth during the COVID-19 pandemic. When Roblox sat down to speak with us, their team revealed they adapted to a “build the plane while flying” approach due to the massive uptick in usership over lockdowns.

“The world was going through a really difficult time, and being at Roblox, it was an extraordinary moment for us. We called it the Covid Effect because a lot of people were staying at home because of the pandemic. You can see before March 2020 we had about 2.5B monthly social media views which we thought was pretty strong, and then that more than doubled once we hit the pandemic.” 

– Grace Shen, Influencer Marketing Operations Manager

Now, let’s get into the nitty-gritty of how Roblox achieved this success, and how Tubular insights assisted them along the way.

Challenge

Managing Rapid User Surge

With the onset of pandemic shut downs, Roblox witnessed an unprecedented surge in platform users and doubled its viewership and engagement on social. While the sudden influx was exciting, it also created? a challenge in ensuring server stability, content moderation, and providing a seamless experience for the rapidly growing community.

“Roblox was growing so fast, but we didn’t want to just stop and take our time in trying to get everything organized. The mentality was like we got to run with everything that was happening and just get it going. Now, it would’ve been a lost opportunity if we didn’t take charge with it. So we’re really happy”

-Grace Shen, Influencer Marketing Operations Manager

Adapting to Shifting Social Dynamics

The sudden shift in social dynamics during the pandemic prompted Roblox to reconsider its social content strategy. The platform evolved beyond a gaming hub, transforming into a virtual space where people sought not only games but also entertainment and meaningful social interactions. Adapting to this changing landscape required strategic adjustments in social content curation and community engagement.

Action

Build a Strategy to Fuel UGC & Influencer Partnerships

Social content creation = Roblox user engagement

Roblox identified the powerful correlation between social viewership and engagement on their own platform. They created an exclusive influencer program, Roblox Video Stars, which now includes over 700 diverse influencers, embracing a variety of talents and Roblox gaming niches. This incentive empowered those that already qualified for the Video Star program, and encouraged those that aspired to be a part of the program. This encouragement resulted in an influx of user generated content across all social platforms. 

From 2021 to 2022, TikTok user generated content saw a staggering 993% YoY growth in video uploads, reaching over 13 billion people and garnering 1.4 billion engagements.

“With Tubular, we were able to look into the data and see the landscape of YouTube viewership for Roblox. Looking at the big picture, we came up with three very specific data-driven criteria in order to be in our Roblox producers program. You have to have more than 10 million cumulative Roblox video views, 25,000 average views per Roblox video, and 100,000 followers on your channel.”

-Grace Shen, Influencer Marketing Operations Manager

Roblox then leveraged these social creators to swiftly adapt to its rapid expansion during the pandemic. The company utilized theVideo Stars and their prolific cultural understanding and deep product knowledge to help inform their strategy, improve the company’s standing, and introduce product updates. In return, the Video Stars Program provided creators with incentives, creating a mutually beneficial relationship.

Roblox also uses Tubular to predict where they see growth in certain countries or adjacent categories. Then, they partner with influencers in that category to help drive that growth.

Diversifying Content Based on Audience Preferences

Roblox recognized that its appeal extended beyond traditional gameplay videos. By embracing alternative social content like music videos, funny moments, songs, memes, and even virtual concerts, Roblox transformed into more than just a gaming platform. The company became a lifestyle brand, particularly during the pandemic, where it provided a virtual haven for millions seeking meaningful social connections. 

“Seeing all these types of social media categories from memes to animations, role play, gameplay, and even music videos— it’s really indicative that there is a diversification of content. Whether you are a Roblox YouTube creator or you are a creator on the platform, they really run parallel and mirror each other in that sense”

-Grace Shen, Influencer Marketing Operations Manager

By revealing niche video categories on social media, Tubular helps Roblox understand what is trending on their own platform. This helps them make the virtual world of Roblox even more fantastical every day.

Growth

Despite the obstacles, Roblox experienced exponential growth, increasing its influencer program from 200 creators to 700 within the span of a year. The company’s ability to innovate, pivot quickly, and capitalize on opportunities showcased a remarkable example of “flying a plane while building it.”

• From May of 2022 → May of 2023, views on Roblox user-generated content increased by 85%.
• From April 2022 to 2023, Roblox dominated TikTok UGC content, outpacing its two biggest competitors with 43% of the pie. 

Roblox’s astronomical journey to success offers valuable insights for businesses aiming to build similar programs. By nurturing user relationships, aligning with creators, and staying ahead with data-driven insights, Roblox has established itself as a powerhouse in the virtual world. Their influencer empire allowed them to soar to new heights during a global pandemic which demonstrated the immense potential of fostering creativity and collaboration in a digital landscape.

Download the full webinar to watch on-demand here: Roblox’s Influencer Marketing Empire.

The post Roblox builds a data-driven influencer marketing empire appeared first on Tubular Labs.

“We use Tubular for long-term development decisions. For example, how can we increase our market share in the documentary field? Around this, we use the demographic data and the full-scale data Tubular gives us.”

Sebastian Katthöver, Head of Audience Development

Deutsche Welle is Germany’s international broadcaster that first launched in 1953. Today, it is one of the most watched international outlets thanks to its multimedia network that broadcasts in 32 languages and reaches over 250 million weekly users worldwide. In October 2023, DW acquired 156.6 million unique viewers on YouTube and Facebook, according to Tubular Audience Ratings. DW extends its reach via social media by connecting with audiences around the world.

Deutsche Welle’s Head of Audience Development, Sebastian Katthöver, sat down with Tubular to discuss how the media broadcaster strategizes universal and localized content alongside each other.

Challenge

Synergizing social, digital, and television Content

Many traditional news & entertainment companies are struggling to connect with social audiences and allocate resources to new platforms. After all, younger generations are looking to social platforms to get the latest news on entertainment, politics and breaking headlines. 

Deutsche Welle, amongst all other long-standing media brands, has been tasked with the responsibility of bringing news & entertainment to the social media generations.

Expanding into new audience demographics

As a leading international broadcaster, Deutsche Welle not only has to understand audience interests, but they also have to understand variations across many countries and languages. This requires a need for many different data sets and a birds eye view into their localized and national content.

Action

Start with Social

Sebastian Katthöver shared that Deutsche Welle actually uses social analytics to inform their television strategy. Traditional TV doesn’t offer in-depth behavioral insights, so by leveraging Tubular’s nuanced data, Deutsche Welle can understand the topics that are resonating with specific audience demographics online, and translate that into televised content for those groups.

“We look at what our YouTube audience is interested in. Not the TV audience, the YouTube audience. What do they want? What are they looking at? What are they watching? What we show on TV is based on what our audience on YouTube likes.  That’s the way digital transformation works and that’s where our role as audience development comes in at certain points” – Sebastian Katthöver, Head of Audience Development

Social trends move fast, and the right data can tell us not just how many people are watching, but how much they’re engaging.Tubular data can uncover topics and storylines that resonate with audiences on social – to then transform longer segments on television. By following this formula, Deutsche Welle creates both social and televised content that resonates with audiences and feeds off one another.

Combining Creativity with Audience Data

Creative editorial teams excel at presenting culturally relevant stories and content ideas— but these ideas can always be improved and refined by data. A good storyline idea isn’t enough to win audience affinity. In-depth data from Tubular provides the insights to help media companies understand the elements that make a viewing experience pleasurable and seamless.

“It is a strategic goal for Deutsche Welle to reach more female and younger audiences, so we try to match that with an idea. The editorial team has a great idea and then we take a look at Tubular data for the demographics. Everything including content length, understanding the competition, and even thumbnail design. It was great to see what in the market is resonating with younger or female audiences.” says Katthöver.

Understanding specific content parameters that resonate best with target audiences, as well as getting a peek into competitor strategies, helps solidify the success of a new show launch.

Growth

In October 2023, Deutsche Welle, was a top global Media & Entertainment property across Facebook & YouTube:

• • Reaching 156.6M unique viewers around the world 
  • Amounting to 2.4 Billion Minutes Watched 
  • Reaching 3.1% of the world’s population

As a leading international broadcaster, Deutsche Welle has a lot of ground to cover across many countries, languages, publishing platforms, and more. They are able to reach so many markets without spreading themselves too thin by repurposing content and optimizing their audience targeting with data.

Their paramount success is due in part to their ability to understand diverse audiences, study their competition, and synergize content strategies across platforms. 

While DW is a broadcaster originating back to 1953, it continues to reach new heights and capture the attention of audiences by leaning into modern strategies. 

Access to in-depth behavioral data helps Deutsche Welle: 

• Align strategies across social, digital, and televised content
• Create localized content that appeals to target audiences
• Supercharge creative ideas with data-driven strategy

With so many platforms, formats, audiences, and topics, it’s difficult for major media companies to move at a quick pace while maintaining a unified view. That’s where Tubular comes in.

Tubular offers you a bird’s eye view of what’s happening on social video across categories, as well as how well you and your competitors are performing. 

Want to hear more of Deutsche Welle’s success stories? Watch the full webinar here. 

The post Deutsche Welle keeps the world connected through localized content appeared first on Tubular Labs.

“Tubular informs our strategy around formats that are performing best on the different social platforms and what’s working well for our competitor set. The Tubular video taxonomy makes it easy to spot some of the top performing categories, subcategories, and also white space opportunities when we’re looking to innovate in new areas.”

Jon Birchall, Director of Editorial Strategy

LADbible Group, founded in 2012, is defined as news & entertainment for the social generation. As one of the biggest names in media, this forward-thinking company is paving the way to show more traditional publishers how to keep up with evolving trends, measure success, and drive their commercial sales engine. 

When LADbible sat down with us in 2023, leaders from the company emphasized that they see content creation as a two-way street. Creating content for “Generation Social” means the team prioritizes a deep and unwavering understanding of evolving audience interests, passions, and preferences.

Challenge

Connecting with Generation Social

Generation Social is any audience, group, or community that uses social media as a part of their daily lives. 

As a media company catered to “Generation Social”, LADbible has taken on the never-ending challenge of actually keeping up with the ever-evolving social landscape in a digitally connected world. While some measurement & social listening platforms might provide a birds-eye-view of the social network, only Tubular also delivers a granular view of micro-communities and emerging trends on social.

Standing Out to Brands & Advertisers

A challenge that many media companies face is cultivating a strong synergy between both content strategy and the commercial side of business. Views are great, but they’re not enough to solidify competitive brand partnerships. To win against a sea of media publishers, LADBible needed data to prove their in-depth understanding of Generation Social and unmatched audience loyalty.

Action

Reaching Beyond Social Listening

LADbible has been a long-time client of Tubular, and they are also users of our partner, Chartbeat. While Chartbeat delivers impeccable real-time data for owned & operated sites, Tubular provides a bird’s eye view of personal, competitive, and overarching category data. This allows the company to detect changes in both macro and micro trends across site & social.

Aside from third-party data, LADbible also connects with Generation Social directly through LADnation, an internal youth research panel that shares what their audience is thinking, feeling, and caring about. They also tap this panel to get perspective about specific brand partnerships and ensure they are listening to the clientele before making business decisions. This solidifies that LADbible’s content is aligned with audience preferences and their audience feels understood.

Aligning KPIs across Content and Commercial Teams

LADBible knows that long-term commercial success cannot exist without content that achieves exceptional engagement such as viewers commenting, sharing, and reposting videos —something all advertisers are looking for.

Jon Birchall, Director of Editorial Strategy, says LADBible’s engaged audience “allows us to drive those bigger commercial outcomes because we can have really honest, transparent conversations with clients. We can say: ‘Look, we’ve got a fantastic audience relationship. This is something that you’ll want to play into.’”

In order to support these conversations, LADBible comes to the table with Tubular’s behavioral data that looks beyond likes & views to prove true audience loyalty and affinity. 

Growth

• In August 2023, LADbible garnered 286M engagements across platforms (more than 10 of their nearest competitors combined).
• In September 2023, LADbible was the #1 Media & Entertainment property across Facebook & YouTube
• LADbible reached 12.2% of the global population on Facebook in September of 2023 with 614.2M unique viewers.

LADbible’s unprecedented growth can also be attributed to the publisher’s ability to synergize their editorial + social strategies. Data shared across the company keeps all moving parts informed on macro and micro trends, content performance, and growth goals. 

“Everything we are doing is data-driven. We have such a vast amount of data at our fingertips, so we want to make sure that everything that we are looking at, reading, and interested in is being shared widely around the business, so that all of the teams are able to utilize them.” – Anna Cole, Sr Insights & Research Manager

Want the full overview? Read our LADbible customer story recap to see how Chartbeat + Tubular fuel LADbible’s strategy.

Tubular: What types of data sources do LADbible teams use to uncover some of the latest audience insights?

Among other tools, Tubular is a main part of the LADbible Toolkit for both the content and data intelligence teams:

JB: Tubular is incredibly useful when we get briefs to understand a brand; have we done any work with them before and how has that previous work gone? Any kind of category learnings that we can have, what are our competitors doing? This allows us to have a really strong standardized way of reporting. We’re able to get stats from Tubular and share into the market, which gives us a really good position against other brands for pitches.

LADbible has achieved momentous digital success using data to align editorial, social, and commercial teams. According to our LADbible partners, their people are practically knee-deep in data at all times. 

Access to in-depth behavioral data helps LADBible: 

• Make minute-by-minute decisions to keep up with the fast pace of media
• Form lucrative partnerships with brands
• Align internal teams on growth goals and pain points

With so many platforms, formats, audiences, and topics, it’s difficult for major publishers to move at a quick pace while maintaining a unified view. That’s where Tubular and Chartbeat enter the chat.

Tubular offers you a bird’s eye view of what’s happening on social video across categories, as well as how well you and your competitors are performing. 

Want to hear more of LADbible’s success stories? Watch the full webinar here.

The post LADbible wins more engagements than top 10 competitors combined appeared first on Tubular Labs.

“With Tubular, we were able to gain an understanding of what else was going on outside of our own YouTube analytics and stay on the cutting edge of content creation.”

Isaac Quiroga, Director of Video Engagement, Mattel

Global toy brand Mattel achieves relevance by harnessing the power of social video intelligence to know what their fans wanted to watch, play with, and buy. As a result, they are among the top 10 most-watched brands in the world.

The key to their success? According to Isaac Quiroga, Director of Video Engagement at Mattel, they “ looked at what types of formats were resonating with a particular audience segment and would create videos in many of these formats and then test them. It’s impossible to know how audiences will react to content without testing and iteration.”

For a while, they focused on views, as they were the main indicator of audience interest and purchase intent. It didn’t matter if it was paid or organic views, either — all of it seemed to be working.

But their approach would eventually evolve after their insights team found that engagements are more compelling to a specific property’s audience. “[Engagements] are a better indicator of how audiences interact with content. We adjusted our approach at that point, and figured out which viewership to engagement ratios we had to achieve to reach our goals,” said Quiroga.

Creating videos that audiences love with smart content strategies

Mattel’s team of YouTube strategists, marketers, and creatives publish a constant stream of first-class video content, have a footprint in all social-video arenas, and consistently monitor key performance indicators from views to watch time. 

One aspect of quality that Mattel prides itself in is strong storytelling. They start with character and story and ultimately create products to extend that storyline. “We get to create a cast of characters that we ultimately put in our content and unlock kids’ imaginations,” said Quiroga.

But good stories alone aren’t enough to cut through today’s highly competitive content marketplace. In order to stand out in a crowded category, Mattel needed the right strategies to fuel its social video growth. 

We asked Isaac Quiroga for an in-depth look at how Mattel was able to drive growth & engagement with their social audience, and how they were able to translate social video growth into stronger sales as well.

Challenge

Mattel needed to differentiate itself with engaging and entertaining content in the increasingly crowded kids’ entertainment space. As early adopters of social video intelligence, they knew they needed to leverage data and analytics to inform their content strategies. 

Action

Using Tubular Intelligence, Mattel was able to analyze the social video landscape as a whole to help them understand which content types, formats, and topics resonated with different audience segments. They also evaluated the creators who were having success with their target viewers. 

Fueled by their learnings and insights, they developed fool-proof content strategies that drove massive growth in their social channels as well as their product sales.

Growth

• Mattel grew its social presence overall with 42% growth, from 3.3B views to 4.7B in a year
• Barbie’s YouTube channel saw +36% growth in views corresponding 14% increase in product sales
• Hotwheels channels’ monthly average views & engagements grew 66%, with a 7% increase in sales, securing their spot as the #1 selling toy in the world and the #1 vehicle property in the world

Tubular: What is your perspective on the enormous growth you’ve seen in the past year?

IQ: We’ve seen a lot of growth in Barbie on YouTube specifically, we’ve grown about 36% year over year. In terms of sales growth, she’s up 14% from last year, and she’s had 5 consecutive quarters of growth which is awesome. 

I’ve got some crazy stats like a Dreamhouse is sold every 2 minutes, and 100 barbie dolls are sold every minute— which is kind of crazy if you think about it. 

Hotwheels– which is another huge iconic brand of ours, has seen about a 66% growth YoY in YouTube views and attention. Hot wheels sales are up also 7% and it still remains the #1 selling toy in the world and the #1 vehicle property in the world. 

Mattel as a whole has seen 42% growth with about 4.7B views in 2018 up from 3.3B views. We continue to see growth and we’re really proud of our achievements.

T: Tell us what you do at Mattel. How do you make the magic happen?

IQ: I try to inspire, educate and entertain kids and families around the world. And the way we do it is through content— lots and lots of it. 

I started through an acquisition of Mattel, and I was in traditional content distribution and, licensing programs. Mattel needed someone to run their YouTube program and business because they saw a huge opportunity there. So I went to work working with the brands to establish best practices on YouTube. 

We essentially needed to create a content framework that could scale across the company with just a few people. What’s wonderful about working on YouTube is the amount of resources and tools that YouTube offers you so you can be successful on the platform. 

In the world of broadcast distribution, I couldn’t just Google “how do you license programming to TV broadcasters?” But when I started at Mattel, all I did was Google all day long— “How you build a video marketing strategy on YouTube,” “What is YouTube all about?” You can even get certified in different areas. So I took all these different courses and became the biggest YouTube nerd– and my team did too. 

What we found was that Google had already created a content framework which was the Hero Hub Hygiene. It was a content framework for advertisers who wanted to start getting into content programming, and we essentially scaled that approach with different brands around Mattel. That helped in terms of how we organized the content throughout the year and how we thought about the different mixes, roles, and objectives that the different content would play. 

We built and organized our content library, pipeline, and volume in a way that was meeting our marketing objectives and timelines. It was all there in the playbook which was all useful and helpful. 

But then we started seeing more competition in the space, more creators, and a lot of new entrants so we had to start thinking about how we could become more and more differentiated so that we could penetrate the already saturated marketplace.

And that’s when we started leaning in on creativity. How do we change up our strategies a bit more so that we’re really being more authentic to our audience? When we truly understood exactly what our audience loves to watch, and what they’re obsessed with— that started putting us into another stratosphere. 

The growth doesn’t happen overnight. It’s taken me four years to grow this big and it’s been a lot of work to get there. But enjoying the process is the best part about it. 

T: How do you find out what your audience loves?

IQ: Tubular Labs! Haha! Honestly, what was great for us being new entrants is that we looked for video intelligence. Because we could see our YouTube analytics and our channels and what our audiences in our channels appreciated and loved with our content, but in order to go past that we had to look at the video landscape itself. 

We were one of the first adopters of Tubular and we’re so happy that we did because we were able to see the landscape as a whole and started understanding what types of content were truly getting the maximum engagement out there. The types of audiences that were out there, and the different segments as well. It was really about video intelligence and understanding where the audiences were, what they were into, the types of format they were watching, how long the content was that they were watching, and the types of creators they were also watching. We really did use that as a main strategic input to what we were trying to do. 

The post How Mattel Grew Social Channels 42% in a Year appeared first on Tubular Labs.

“Tubular enables us to identify content themes and topics our competitors are using to find success… I don’t think that we would even be doing some of the research we’re doing if it wasn’t for Tubular.”

 Head of Data Analytics, BuzzFeed

Key Results

Challenge

BuzzFeed needed to quickly and effectively prove the value of its advertising across multiple platforms.

Action

By having a solution that housed all video data in one place, Tubular enabled BuzzFeed to run more advanced analyses that they previously never had time to do. Through bespoke saved searches on content categories, creators, trends, and competitors, BuzzFeed analysts could quickly gather data and provide the creative with inspired insights.

Result

BuzzFeed was able to create higher quantities of relevant content for their channels which increased average monthly views by over 11%. They also attract advertisers by proving dominance in each vertical.

BuzzFeed, one of the world’s most-watched media companies, made a name for itself by providing news and entertainment content to hundreds of millions of people around the world. Its mission is to produce “the most shareable breaking news, original reporting, entertainment, and video content,” and it does so through multiple social channels under its umbrella with key verticals in beauty, home crafts, travel, and food.

Monitoring views and engagement is crucial to content creation and advertising sales, but it gets complicated at this scale. On top of managing their own content for channels across virtually every social video platform, there are millions of new videos uploaded in these verticals every single day. In the age of social media where trends need to be up-to-the-minute, BuzzFeed needed a way to continuously stay on top of what’s trending. 

BuzzFeed needed a solution that would let them effectively evaluate whether and how to change content to address the interests of viewers. And since BuzzFeed has a presence on just about every social platform, they have to keep a pulse on what strategies work best on each, and understand how closely the competition is nipping at its heels.

We met with Darris Lee, Head of Data Analytics and Measurement at BuzzFeed to get an in depth look at how they use social video intelligence to stay relevant and drive growth.

Watch the video:

Companies like BuzzFeed use Tubular to:

• Win branded sponsored content deals by attracting advertisers by proving dominance in each vertical space.
• Benchmark their success against competitors with standardized cross-platform social video metrics.
• Optimize content and channel strategy for effective social video campaigns.
• Streamline content KPI tracking in a simple, cross-platform view.

The post BuzzFeed Increases Average Monthly Views by 11%+ appeared first on Tubular Labs.

As the evolution of the media landscape accelerates, so too does GroupM’s innovation around digital and social strategies. They look to Tubular for the insights and analytics that let them demonstrate to their clients why social video is an essential tool in their media planning toolbox. 

Key Takeaways

Challenge

GroupM Indonesia needed support in proving the growth and relevance of social video to their clients, to win and retain business. 

Action

GroupM leverages data from Tubular Intelligence to provide benchmarks for social video, and to identify areas where their performance outshines the competition. They  include the most relevant insights in their client presentations, including weekly views, engagements, and insights on video categories and trends. 

Growth

Tubular data plays a considerable role in GroupM’s ability to prove reach and demonstrate the growth of creators and genres so they can win new business and retain current clients. These valuable insights help the agency advise its brand partners to shape their content strategy in ways that best connect with their audiences.

In order to win and retain business in the age of social video, GroupM Indonesia needed to first prove the relevance and impressive growth of social video to their clients. Not only did they need to benchmark social video on success, but they also needed to project future growth through AI learning models.

Once the relevance of social video is locked in, the next step is exhibiting GroupM’s expertise and knowledge within categories like gaming, beauty, electronics, and beyond. This global media investment company has an incredible understanding of the macro-media landscape, but they needed a way to prove that they were just as strategic within sub-genres and emerging content spaces.

Insights to Actions

GroupM uses Tubular Intelligence to obtain the most trustworthy cross-platform insights available today. They regularly use Tubular’s data to benchmark views and engagements. These capabilities let the media investment group track patterns in categories and content so they can easily spot a trend before it goes viral.

For example, GroupM used data to surface topic areas that are popular with beauty creators on YouTube. This helped them identify unsaturated content that was steadily performing well. It also helped them find creators who were already thriving and connecting with the unique audiences brands wanted to target. The agency was able to identify subtopics that resonated the most with creators.

Impact

Tubular data paired with GroupM’s creative advertising expertise makes the agency unstoppable and exponentially increases the success of their client’s investments. They are able to prove social video reach and demonstrate the growth within specific genres and creators. For existing clients, this means they can better determine their campaign ROI and increase loyalty to the group. For prospective clients, GroupM can offer more thorough pitch decks that project with greater accuracy the benefit of potential partnerships.

These valuable insights help GroupM advise their brand partners, refine their content strategies, and create campaigns that connect with their target audiences.

The post GroupM Validates Social Video Relevance to Win New Business appeared first on Tubular Labs.

“We rely heavily on [Tubular’s] V30, because of our conversations with brands. They tell us it’s not enough to have views; they want quality experiences correlated with quality content… We believe [V30] should be the #1 indicator if a publisher is good or not.”

Guy Oranim, CEO, First Media

Key Takeaways

Challenge

Growing an audience and monetizing unique channels in the over-crowded, highly competitive world of social video.

Action

The creative department worked closely with the insights team to create a data-informed content strategy. The sales team used V30 as a metric to prove to potential ad partners that they have “quality” content. Quality, evergreen content means advertisers get a high return on their investments as viewership continues to grow and ROI compounds over time.

Results

First Media grew from less than 100K followers in 2016 to more than 110M followers and 1.5B monthly views across its properties

In 2004, First Media was founded as a TV network — but in 2016, everything changed. When the network realized that the video ecosystem was rapidly evolving and that its highly female audience was seeking lifestyle content on social platforms, the company launched its digital-first model into the stratosphere.

The results? First Media grew to more than 87M Facebook page likes, and 28M YouTube subscribers across its properties, including Babyfirst, So Yummy, and Blossom. This growth positioned First Media among the top 10 US Digital First Media Companies with the broadest global reach.

Blossom, specifically, continuously finds itself among the top 10 Home & DIY publishers with the broadest global reach (62.4M unique viewers across Facebook and YouTube in February 2022).

Blossom garnered a whopping 15.7M views per video in the first 30 days after upload on Facebook in February 2022 – for reference, the average V30 for Home & DIY videos is 1.1M. This positions them as the #1 Home & DIY media creator on Facebook based on average V30 views.

When it comes to content, less is more

The cluttered world of social video is incredibly competitive. Every month, 13M creators upload almost 100M videos online, and in February 2022 the Home & DIY category received more than 16B views and over 190M engagements.

First Media has cut through the clutter and reached its audiences by aligning all actions with its brand promise: inspiring action to make the everyday extraordinary through its diverse content offerings in verticals like DIY, lifestyle, food, and beauty.

So what’s First Media’s secret sauce?

They regularly create unique content that people want to watch by striving for quality rather than quantity. While hundreds of thousands of publishers believe that churning out content is the way to remain relevant, First Media proves that investing in fewer, high-quality videos inspired by trustworthy data is the way to grow an audience in both size and loyalty.

It all starts with a process of collaboration between several people from traditionally disparate teams. By pairing data analysts with creative masterminds, actionable insights inspire content production from one video to the next. As a result, First Media publishes high-quality and high-performing social videos consistently.

Virality is hard to replicate, but applying data-informed strategies to creativity allows First Media to create videos that its audiences love.

Pitching to brand partners using Tubular’s V30

First Media’s strategy leverages Tubular Labs to identify what is most relevant to its audiences by tracking shifting values, interests, cultural trends, and consumer behaviors.

First Media uses Tubular’s time-based video ratings as a proxy for content quality. With the V30 metric (the number of views within the first 30 days after publishing), they can objectively compare performance since videos accumulate views over time.

“If you’re able to make people watch your content consistently over 30 days, that’s the best evidence of your quality.”

Consistently maximizing views per video is critical to media companies like First Media because that is how they prove success to brand partners. In other words, long-term views on content prove compounded ROI during pitches.

First Media uses the V30 measurement across market to compare its success to its competitors. “With this data, we don’t have to compliment ourselves. We can prove that our videos are performing the best relative to our direct competition,” said Oranim. When pitching to new brands or benchmarking success with current partnerships, First Media presents its V30 against competitive sets in each vertical.

The post First Media Proves Quality Over Quantity to Brand Partners appeared first on Tubular Labs.

“Tools like Tubular provide an immense amount of value to us.  Whether it’s revealing demographics, geo-data, insights related to specific posts, handles, and hashtags — it all helps us tell a richer story. Telling a richer story means we build stronger relationships.”  

Rich Calacci, Chief Revenue Officer at Overtime

Key Takeaways

CHALLENGE

Overtime needed to change the way younger audiences watch sports. While Millenials & Gen Zs have generally shifted away from TV to social, they still tune in the old-fashioned way for live game broadcasts. They needed to focus on converting traditional television sports viewers into social/digital viewers. 

ACTION

Armed with social intelligence data from Tubular, Overtime set out to revolutionize the sports viewing experience to embrace the benefits of a social media community such as engagement, direct conversation, and shared experience. 

They used Tubular’s social video solutions to understand their audience’s viewing preferences and create strategies that would capture their attention. 

Overtime creates clips & game highlights to supplement full-length game steams. They also offer a multi-dimensional sporting experience by showing behind-the-scenes footage, player highlights, and other entertaining content. 

Additionally, they leverage Tubular data to tell richer stories when pitching to potential advertising partners. Having the ability to pull data like demographics, geographic data, and video performance data relating to specific posts against specific handles or hashtags helps their teams find timely and relevant data insights. 

GROWTH

Overtime reached a monthly average of 36.3 Million unique viewers P13-35 on YouTube and Facebook since 2021, outperforming major competitors like ESPN, Barstool Sports, & Bleacher Report. 

They also attracted a broader network of advertising partners, from working with sports-centric early adopters like Adidas, Nike, and Gatorade to mass-market brands with a reach that extends well beyond athletics, including Google, Netflix, Amazon & Prime Video.

Customer Story: Overtime

With one of the fastest-growing audiences in the game, digital-first media company Overtime is paving the way for other broadcasters to embrace the possibilities of social video. By leveraging data and insights from Tubular, they have generated explosive growth and outperformed some of their biggest competitors including ESPN, Barstool Sports, and Bleacher Report. 

We sat down with Overtime CRO, Rich Calacci, to dig deeper into exactly how Tubular’s social video intelligence empowers them to innovate and capitalize on social. Calacci shares what he believes is the highest form of audience engagement and how they achieve that through understanding cultural relevance. 

How does Overtime define success? And what makes you successful with your audience?

It’s a pretty easy metric for us. When we think about success as it relates to being an original content creator, it defaults to our community. And the community can be evaluated in several different ways: the 50M+ fans and followers we reach every month, and the 100M+ people who touch our content during the month. 

At the end of the day, the way we assess success is through engagement. That’s where we show market leadership, where we’ve shown unbelievable growth, and where we can say to clients and other strategic partners that we’re doing something different. 

Our community is highly engaged with the conversation we’re having (which is around sports as a subject matter), but the way that we define the conversation and frame the conversation and the way we include the community in the conversation– that’s what really sets us apart. 

We want to help our clients use online social video to understand culture so they can be more relevant. Do you agree that engagement and relevance are part of the same thing?

I do. Cheating is bad in sports, but we do “cheat” a little bit at Overtime in the sense that we’re not offering such a wide panorama of content. We try to fix the best recipe when it comes to engagement. We try to stick to our knitting and stick to sports as subject matter. 

We tell different stories and we tell them in a lot of different formats. Ultimately, the engagement we receive from our community of fans signals to us that we’re telling relevant stories.

The opportunity for us to have a direct conversation by DMing our users reinforces this whole notion of relevance. When they reach out or give a shout-out to Overtime by name, it’s more than just giving a “thumbs up” on the content or a share, or even just commenting below. But responding to engagement that’s coming directly from Overtime, I think that’s a differentiator. 

The highest valuation for us in terms of an engaged member of our community that expresses relevance is when they go into our shop and buy our gear to rep the O in the street—that’s so much stronger than just saying, “Hey I really appreciate what you guys do in terms of the community you provide and the content you serve.” [By wearing the O] I’m now signaling to everyone else who may not be part of this social media network that this is my community and part of who I am. 

I think that the representation of Overtime as being part of who you are is the strongest indicator of relevance. The same way you may wear a Red Sox shirt and I may wear a Yankees shirt, which signals what our fandom is. Overtime gives a different signal but communicates the same amount of relevance and the same level of engagement. 

The most terrifying thing for a CMO is to blindly guess. Does Tubular help you eliminate some of the guesswork?

100%. I’ve always had the mindset that as a Chief Revenue Officer, there are things you control and things you don’t control. You can always control your energy, your effort, your mindset, and a lot of things in the process— even the price you negotiate. 

But there are things you don’t control and one of them is the tools you use. Whether you’re building a house or building a social media empire, you’re largely dependent on high-quality tools. 

Tools like Tubular provide an immense amount of value to us— whether it’s revealing demographic data, geo data, or data relating to specific posts against handles & hashtags. That helps us tell a richer story and in telling a richer story, we build stronger relationships. 

While my relationship with Tubular is really important as a business enterprise, my relationship with General Motors or Rocket Mortgage or State Farm, or PepsiCo is even more important. In that case, I’m highly dependent on the Tubular tools in order to do the job that I’m charged to do.

Would you rather have a magic microscope that allows you to understand exactly what’s going on today in granular detail, or a terrific telescope that will let you see into the future? 

I lean toward the latter pretty heavily. Entropy is a time’s arrow. And I think being able to look into the future is way more valuable than being able to have a look into what you’re doing today. I grew up in a business where there was analysis paralysis for a period of time. There was too much data covered by too few people, and as a result, the whole notion of a false positive was revealed. 

I think trying to understand where business is going directionally is much more valuable. That’s part of the reason why we spent so much time, effort, and resources on building Overtime. 

We’re not trying to redefine basketball for 16-18 yr olds. We’re trying to redefine the game presentation of basketball for the future. If I can get a glimpse into what the future looks like and what the demand curve looks like 5 months out, 5 years out, 5 decades out— that’s way more valuable to us because of our growth mindset. We’re builders. We’re not trying to overweigh the importance of understanding exactly what’s going on today, because things are ever-changing. 

If I’m going to invest my resources in a growth mindset, understanding what we’re worth today is valuable just like it’s important to understand what a stock is worth today. But what you really want to know is what the growth potential is for that stock or that business in the future. 

If you have tools that better equip you, like some of the data we get from Tubular Labs, to give us better insights into what our path of growth looks like and what that trajectory can be, we can forecast that out reliably. Even though we’re taking real-time data to do that, being able to project that into the future is incredibly valuable to us as a business.

The post Overtime Steals Sports Fan Attention from TV, Attracts Advertisers appeared first on Tubular Labs.

“Tubular helps us track our station video performance, identify our best performing content, and stay on top of market trends. We consider it a valuable tool in managing our digital video business.”

Director of Digital Business Development at Hearst

Hearst Television is a premier publisher that owns and operates 26 local television stations across the US, each with its own independent social media accounts. With numerous awards for distinguished journalism and innovation, it is crucial that this premier distributor has the necessary tools needed to lead on social and bring news stories to younger, engaged audiences.

Traditional news publishers are undergoing an exciting period of evolution. As younger audiences rely more on social platforms as their main news source, publishers are challenged with understanding what types of content and topics perform best on each social channel. What works on YouTube doesn’t necessarily work on TikTok or Twitter.

Social audiences have different expectations and preferences from app to app. That’s why the copy-and-paste method that entails repurposing televised content for social is not necessarily effective. Studying each social app and creating a tailored content strategy for each might seem like a daunting task, but Tubular’s behavioral insights make understanding social easy.

With Tubular on their side, Hearst TV is making serious moves toward being a leading news publisher on social. Find out how they did it below!

Challenge:

• Hearst TV needed to increase aggregate video views across its ecosystem of social channels.

Action: 

• Hearst leveraged Tubular as a centralized tool to oversee their network of social channels and form data-driven content strategies.
• Hearst TV monitored overall content performance to gain a deeper understanding of what types of content perform best on different social channels.

Growth with Tubular

Using these insights, the Hearst TV capitalized on disseminating high-performing, trending news clips and growing their social audiences.

• Facebook Views Increased 320%
• Facebook Engagement Grew 310%
• Cross-Platform Views Increased 198%
• Cross-Platform Engagement Grew 240%

The post How Hearst TV Grew Facebook Engagement by 310% in One Year appeared first on Tubular Labs.

“We use Tubular to get at the type of videos that we think our readers and viewers will watch and want to consume, as a one-stop shop looking across social platforms in one-consolidated dashboard.”

Russ Torres, VP of Digital Content and Strategy, USA TODAY

Gannett is a leading mass-media company that effectively reaches 43% of the U.S. online population through renowned properties including USA Today and 109 local media organization across 34 states and Guam.

Traditional publishers like Gannett have faced the challenge of moving beyond their previous strategies of mass broadcasting to delve deeper into a network of localized channels that cater to specific audience interests and granular content trends.

Navigating content opportunities, emerging trends, evolving audience preferences, and new platforms is an intricate undertaking. Strategies that once relied on a generalized understanding of public trends now demand deeper insights into micro-communities, subcategories, and platform nuances. Consequently, the expertise and caliber of insights possessed by today’s analysts have become more crucial than ever.

For traditional publishers like Gannett, there are two sides of the coin to consider:

1. How to create and disseminate content that nurtures their audience
2. How to attract and cultivate relationships with advertisers

To shed light on Gannett’s distinctive customer story, we will explore how Tubular insights have empowered the publisher to overcome challenges and meet business objectives on both fronts.

Advertising

Challenge

First, let’s understand why video is so important to Gannett’s advertisers.

“Video gives us an opportunity. It’s a medium that holds [viewers] on the page and keeps them more engaged longer than a traditional article. That boosts our numbers. It’s better time spent, better engagement, likely VCR, and hopefully even CTR. Those engagement numbers are advertiser-friendly. Video makes more monetization.”

Ilana Leven, Director of National Ad Sales in the West + Midwest, Gannett

What is the primary challenge that publishers like Gannett encounter when it comes to establishing relationships with advertisers? One might assume that for a trusted household brand like USA Today, this would be a straightforward deal. However, the reality is that today’s advertisers want guaranteed views. The Gannett team constantly receives this demand, but guaranteeing views is virtually impossible due to the uncertainty and unpredictability of social platforms.

Solution

While advertisers can’t guarantee viewership or engagement in advance, they do have the opportunity to leverage real-time insights from Tubular. These insights enable them to understand why a sponsored piece of content isn’t performing as expected and quickly make adjustments to direct viewers and maximize value for advertisers.  

With Tubular’s capabilities, Gannett can ensure that advertisers’ money is effectively utilized and that their goals are reached.

Success

When Gannett acquired a sponsor for their World Series coverage, they faced an initial setback when the first two pieces of content did not generate the views or engagement they anticipated. It’s understandable that the type of content that resonated in the past for this event doesn’t necessarily work today. However, Gannet’s insight team swiftly leveraged Tubular insights to identify the reasons behind decline in viewership and offered suggestions to enhance the sponsored content. This proactive approach played a crucial role in boosting performance and satisfying their sponsor.

While advertisers will never have access to guaranteed views, partnering with trusted publishers like Gannett, who have access to real-time insights, is the next best option. This enables publishers to quickly pivot strategies and improve content based on up-to-date insights.

Today, Gannett has strengthened their client development, as returning sponsors place their trust in Gannett’s network to utilize real-time insights and effectively ensure sponsors get their money’s worth.

Content Creation

Challenge

Gannett needed to maintain leadership in a new distributed digital video age by producing engaging video content. This posed several key challenges

• Determining the types of videos to produce and selecting the most suitable platforms 
• Transforming a centralized television strategy into a network of localized channels that cater to diverse audiences and platform variations
• Competing with other publishers who are rapidly expanding their presence across social subcategories

Needless to say, today’s content strategists are under immense pressure to navigate these challenges successfully.  Keeping pace with the dynamic social video landscape is nearly impossible without comprehensive insights that provide access to emerging trends and evolving audience preferences.

Solution

Gannett used Tubular audience data to evaluate white space opportunities that drove new franchises under their umbrella.

“Tubular is helping us identify white space and understand who the leaders are in particular categories. Those are ways that we get at the type of videos our viewers will watch and want to consume— and then we think we have an opportunity.”

– Russ Torres, VP of Digital Video Content and Strategy

Gannett leverages insights to understand optimal content types for different platforms. For instance, what works on YouTube doesn’t always work on TikTok or Instagram. Understanding that copy-and-paste is not a content strategy, their content team uses insights to strategically tailor their content to new platforms.

Success

Gannett’s insights and content team learned what was working in the news space, adapted to content trends, and implemented specific strategies for each platform, all in one place.

Gannett leverages insights to identify what subcategories present unique white space opportunities to grow audience reach. One huge win has been the company’s Humankind franchise. Using Tubular insights, they understood that the channel’s most successful subcategories included military, animal, and kids content. By identifying these granular audience preferences, they were able to launch successful offspring channels under the Humankind umbrella, including Militarykind, Animalkind, and Kidskind.

The evolution of traditional publishers like Gannett necessitates a shift from mass broadcasting to social channels that cater to audience interests and emerging content trends. Navigating the complex social landscape requires deeper insights into micro-communities, subcategories, and platform nuances.

Gannett’s focus on nurturing their audience and cultivating relationships with advertisers highlights the dual objectives they face. By harnessing Tubular insights, Gannett empowers themselves to overcome challenges, achieve business objectives, and drive success in the dynamic world of social media.

The post Gannett Builds Trust with Advertisers & Identifies White Space Content Opportunities with Tubular appeared first on Tubular Labs.