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Loading ...Millions of netizens - including me - have taken a great liking to YouTube. And for good reason. You can find videos of practically anything you want. It’s given us the hilarious, the creative, the intriguing. I’ve learned a lot from watching some old videos and have found scenes of old movies that I loved and wanted to see again.
That being said, NBC’s recent closing of its channel on YouTube and pulling of its videos content show us that YouTube, as an entity, is far from being completely vital to content distribution. When push comes to shove, it is actually expendable. At least, that is, to big media companies that have significant amounts of valuable content.
NBC shut down its channel because they’re launching their own service, Hulu. A joint venture with News Corp., Hulu is set to launch in late October.
I’d say this is a good move by NBC. While it may initially cause some confusion at first, once it’s up an running, it will easily be found. The traffic that goes to Hulu will be 100% traffic for the site. On YouTube, someone can watch 10 minutes of something and then hop over to a video of a guy picking his nose. NBC will essentially own their traffic. They can measure it better, the can monetize it better. They’ll be able to create greater brand affinity and loyal communities of interest. The ROI could be excellent. The model is unproven at this point, but so is YouTube.
Filed under: Abraham Harrison LLC, Branded Entertainment, Broadcast Advertising, Commercials, Copyright Issue, Intellectual Property, Internet, Internet Strategy, Mainstream Media, Old Media, Online Applications, Online Avertising, Online Brand Promotion, Online Engagement, Online Entertainment, Streaming Video, Television, Television Over IP, Television on Demand, Web Advertising, YouTube, YouTube Marketing
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[…] Debut of Hulu shows that YouTube is a prince, not a king - Marketing Conversation […]
Just some thoughts as I read your blog post and consider YouTube versus Hulu…
I used to watch some NBC content on YouTube.. about once in a blue moon, but I did watch the occasional Heroes clip. Most of the content I’ve watched there is strikingly independent. I don’t consider the loss of NBC from there to be a significant one. It’s no different than the same kinds of content that was pulled from google before, but YT has the readers, and the community around it.
I think NBC pulling it’s content is a part of the same strategy they pulled with Apple: “Produce the content, own the content, position the content, sell the content. Do what we know how to do, because there just isn’t anything happening over there (there meaning Apple or YouTube) we shouldn’t have full control of.”
This wasn’t anything I wasn’t expecting NBC to do, and both Apple and Google were fools if they actually believed NBC wasn’t eventually going to go somewhere. It’s a miracle in this day and age that Google and Apple held on to NBC as long as they did in their respective presentation models. NBC could have started up an initiative right away to set up their own site that held their own content and they could have begun selling it at the same horribly high prices they sell merchandise for at the NBC store in New York…
NBC’s gone the right way at least with Hulu, and holding off selling the content outright and just getting it done and paid for with advertising.
However, I don’t this will render YouTube irrelevant. There are millions of people using YouTube for distributing their privately produced content that continues to generate huge views. Add to that when Google gets into more content creation, we might see YouTube as a real competing network, competing directly with the likes of NBC and NewsCorp. In the meantime Hulu’s got a long way to go for me to consider YouTube irrelevant.
Anyway, just some thoughts.
Jonathan
First, of all, cool name.
YouTube irrelevant? No, not my point here. It’s still a viable, wonderful resource. It’s still the major player in the online video world. My point was that it wasn’t so essential by itself that major media outlets see it as a must for their own content.
We’re not likely to see any one dominant source for all video.