TripAdvisor-produced video series on Amazon Prime racks up 3 million streaming minutes
The Wanderer, TripAdvisor’s video series on Amazon Prime, has racked up three million streaming minutes on the platform, reports The Drum. The series, which follows travelers visiting new places, is produced by TripAdvisor’s in-house content studio, Waderlab, and is being touted as a new frontier in travel advertising.
The series collaborates with travel bureaus and tourist offices across the world. For example, the latest episode was produced in collaboration with the Moroccan National Tourist Office and features two tourists as they explore Moroccan deserts and markets.
Another episode, produced with the tourist office of Abu Dhabi, has had 200,000+ viewers in 97,000 households, driving 1.1 million+ streamed minutes, 120 million impressions and 528,000 clicks. It’s also now included as part of Etihad’s in-flight entertainment.
The series also appears on TripAdvisor’s site, and the overall project includes other elements, such as curated itineraries made available to readers and a sweepstakes competition as well.
The idea for the show was rooted in research the company conducted earlier this year, which found that 63% of people see shopping as an important part of their travel budget, with a fifth (20%) ranking shopping as the activity they spend most on while traveling.
Video content has become increasingly popular as part of brand publishing strategies. Slickly produced series are the cornerstone of publishing strategies for brands like Salesforce, which has a streaming destination featuring original series with Salesforce+, as well as Vizio, whose series, Clean Break, focuses on organizational hacks. The growing popularity of this also dovetails with increasing interest in branded entertainment – where brands try to entertain, versus educate, their audiences.
Earlier this year, BMW and Saint Laurent launched two short films, both of which premiered at Cannes. Guitar brand Fender is also creating a short film, working with musician Steve Lacy to promote a new guitar, the Signature Fender Stratocaster. As competition for audience attention continues to grow, we expect entertainment, particularly through video, to become a larger part of the brand publishing portfolio in the coming year.
Betr is using content to lower its customer acquisition costs
It’s been a year since Betr, the micro-betting company launched by YouTuber-turned-boxer Jake Paul and sports betting exec Joey Levy launched. The company, which had a unique strategy in that it launched as a media business first and then layered a sports betting business on top, started by creating 10 videos a day in an effort to build an audience base it could then monetize.
Today, Betr is operational in Ohio and Massachusetts and is valued at $300 million. Speaking to EGR, Betr CEO Levy said he views the company as a “sports betting-focused media company,” and has used the brand awareness and affinity generated by the company’s content endeavors as a way to convert audiences over to the Betr betting product. Levy added that the media efforts have contributed to what he sees as “best-in-class brand awareness and brand affinity” and that the company now has a $0 customer acquisition cost. “The brand we’ve developed provides this halo effect that we think will contribute to best-in-class efficiency on the paid user acquisition and retention side.”
Betr’s biggest competitors are FanDuel and DraftKings, which have also been using content to draw audiences in a competitive market. DraftKings now streams video content 24/7 on Samsung TV Plus and its own site. FanDuel also launched a streaming service in September last year and plans to license podcasts from Spotify-owned Ringer.
Levy says that despite going up against those two giants, there is still a lot of market left to be captured. “There are very sophisticated operators out there that are very well capitalized in OSB, fantasy, and media – but we’re doing all three at the same time.”
Levy’s comments – and the continued growth of the sports betting-media love affair – also imply that Penn’s well-publicized breakup with Barstool Sports wasn’t necessarily a sign that things on that front will slow down. Instead, it appears that the Penn/Barstool breakdown has made more brands wary of acquisitions as a way to build publishing operations. For many, the advantages of building in-house over buying existing properties include not having to deal with the messy business of post-acquisition integration, and potentially a much more cohesive editorial organization that feels part of the main business.
Disney’s decision to enter the sports betting wars was years in the making
After pulling the plug on Barstool, Penn Entertainment signed a major deal with Disney-owned ESPN, which will launch a betting app next month. However, according to the WSJ, the deal was years in the making and came with plenty of agonizing over how the House of Mouse brand could exist alongside sports betting.
How brands are using AI to create content
Noah Brier interviewed Work & Co’s Rachel Bogan and Oliver Dore, who have been working with brands to figure out how they could integrate AI into their products, workflows, and processes. Some are using ChatGPT to build job descriptions, while others are experimenting with using AI to create content for product descriptions, said Bogan.
Sherwood continues to build out its ad sales team
Scott Marino, a former director at Morning Brew, joined Robinhood-owned Sherwood Media as it builds out its sales team. The company is pitching advertisers to sponsor its newsletters and also plans to introduce a podcast and events in 2024.
Why five former journalists left the industry
One word: money. Featured in this Nieman piece is Ashley Lose, a user experience writer for a learning management company. “The job is remote, which gives her the flexibility to spend time with her young son during the day. Just as importantly, it pays an annual salary of $90,000, more than she could envision making as a reporter.”
A new survey finds 26% of marketers are using generative AI
Deloitte Digital’s newest research focuses on generative AI in marketing content production. Twenty-six percent of surveyed marketers said they’re already using generative AI, with 45% planning to by the end of 2024. Sixty-five percent of companies are very or extremely concerned about intellectual property or legal risks of using AI for content.