As 2026 unfolds, the streaming business is consolidating even as investment in content expands, leading to more than a bit of audience confusion. That is a problem for streamers seeking to be top of mind as consumers make subscription decisions.
Paramount Skydance plans to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery and align HBO Max with Paramount+. Executives there also plan to fold BET+ into Paramount+ this year to scale reach and streamline offerings.
Meanwhile, Disney is deepening its Hulu integration by bringing its content into the Disney+ app. The company has signaled a move toward a single viewing destination with distinct brand hubs for Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN.
Across the industry, streamers are scaling up ad-supported tiers and lean harder into live sports as they compete for audience attention and ad dollars. Yet, even as services pour billions into original programming, viewers struggle to explain what truly differentiates one streaming brand from another.
That gap between investment and perception sets the stage for new research from Hub Entertainment. Its study, Evolution of Video Branding, examines how TV and streaming brands shape viewer decision-making in an increasingly crowded marketplace. The findings show strong brand recognition but weak brand clarity. Roughly two-thirds of viewers say they feel confident explaining how a streamer differs from competitors. That figure shows no improvement from last year, suggesting that confidence outpaces actual clarity.
Exclusive originals no longer drive streaming differentiation
Many services attempt to stand out through exclusive original programming, but that strategy no longer delivers the impact it once did. Original series now appear across nearly every major platform, turning exclusivity into an expectation rather than a true differentiator.
Hub’s research highlights the limits of that approach. Viewers still cite exclusive originals as a key differentiator for leading services. However, they struggle to identify meaningful differences in value, usability, or content focus. As a result, scripted content feels increasingly interchangeable across platforms, making it harder for viewers to associate any one service with a distinct genre or identity.
Viewers cannot remember where to watch programming
Confusion also extends to where shows live. In a crowded streaming environment, viewers frequently forget which platform carries which title. Less than half of viewers correctly identify where to watch signature series such as Landman on Paramount+, The Pitt on HBO Max, or High Potential on Hulu within Disney+. Awareness drops even further for newer buzz-driven titles. Barely one in 10 viewers correctly identifies HBO Max as the home of Heated Rivalry.
That confusion carries real consequences. If viewers cannot remember where a show lives, that show fails to reinforce the brand behind it. Original programming loses power as a brand signal when it does not anchor clearly to a service in viewers’ minds.
For streamers, sports still breaks through the noise
Sports programming shows a greater ability to cut through the interchangeable scripted landscape in Hub’s research. Peacock’s February coverage of the Super Bowl and Winter Olympics drives stronger differentiation around sports. It underscores that live, culturally significant events can deliver clear brand signals.
YouTube moves closer to a TV identity
While traditional streamers wrestle with differentiation, YouTube continues to move deeper into the television conversation. Long viewed primarily as a social and creator driven platform, YouTube increasingly functions like a TV network in the eyes of many viewers.
Hub’s research shows a near split between viewers who see YouTube as a creator platform and those who see it as a TV or streaming service. Younger audiences lead that shift. Thirty-two percent of viewers under the age of 35 consider YouTube more of a TV or streaming service, compared with 24% of viewers age 35 and older. The growth of long form content and living room viewing pushes YouTube further into traditional television territory.
As consolidation accelerates and platforms bundle more content under fewer destinations, scale alone does not solve the branding problem facing streamers. Hub’s research shows that brand clarity comes less from the volume of originals and more from the consistency of what a service represents to viewers. Services that send clear signals around value, quality, genre focus, or viewing experience stand out more, even as individual programs blur together in viewers’ minds.
Media businesses have had a love-hate relationship with YouTube. As a competitor for ad revenue, it has been a thorn in their sides. But as an audience development and discovery platform it has been part of their video strategy for decades.
That makes sense: the platform has grown over the last two decades into a service that’s too big to ignore. Last year it reportedly generated $60bn in revenue, indicative of its might. Even the most reticent broadcaster has experimented with dropping short highlights onto the service. It has also proven to be an excellent place to host video podcasts, with the visual element acting as a multiplying factor in terms of views.
Most importantly, however, YouTube has been consistent in delivering views to its biggest channels.
That consistency will be a welcome respite for publishers. With AI-powered search results reportedly cutting traffic to news sites’ by up to 79%, it’s understandable that they would look to increase their presence on a platform that is, at least, reliable in at least one way.
To that end we have seen a number of news sites recruiting for YouTube-specialist video producers, suggesting that the platform is climbing publishers’ priority lists in 2026. The Reuters Institute’s ‘Journalism, media, and technology trends and predictions 2026’ found that “in terms of off-platform strategies, YouTube will be the main focus for publishers this year with a net score of +74, up substantially on last year”.
In the UK, for example, Reach Plc’s CFO Darren Fisher noted that Facebook and YouTube “are increasingly rewarding, engaging content”, in the face of falling digital revenue elsewhere.
Where before the platform might have been seen as a source of supplementary ad revenue, it is now being factored into audience acquisition strategies more directly, as legacy media seeks ways to turn off-platform engagement into a viable audience development strategy.
In the UK the platform is the second most-watched service in the UK, behind the BBC and ahead of the commercial-powered ITV. That provides media businesses with a reliable opportunity to scoop up new fans, who can either be monetized through ads on the platform or converted to paying subscribers on the business’ own site.
YouTube personalities
Typically, the channels that succeed on YouTube have a recurring team of creators and on-camera talent, which is consistent with video consumption trends and preferences. This format, aping the traditional television content alongside which YouTube increasingly competes on CTV, is increasingly personality-driven. There are YouTube news stars whose fame eclipses that of traditional television.
That presents a big shift for some media businesses who typically put the brand front and center over individual journalists.
Chris Gallipeau, director of video and audio strategy at Canada-based Postmedia notes that, indeed, the team has found personality-led content – or at least videos with consistent hosts – has worked especially well across its brands/ “We’ve also found that having a consistent host or voice makes a big impact on engagement, he said. “Videos with a familiar, regular personality often see viewership double compared to those without.
“The best performing voices or faces are often well-known contributors and popular names from our opinion and commentary sections of the newspapers where audiences already have a strong connection to their perspectives.”
Similarly, The Sun’s Director of Video Jon Lloyd explains that works well on YouTube, with its reliance on thumbnails that prominently feature the hosts:
“We have found through hosts, shows are more likely to become appointment viewing with viewers. Our viewers for Tactics Exposed love Dean Scoggins and Will Pugh’s football expertise – and let us know in the comments. They come back to it weekly as they know they’re going to have a clearer understanding of the game. They might stay through any dips if they recognize and trust the person speaking, which leads to longer listening sessions and higher completion rates.”
As an example, the group’s Vancouver Sun editor-in-chief Harold Munro is a frequent face on the paper’s channel, speaking with various members of the team in explainer style shortform videos. Some publications have a leg up on that approach, having monetized their personality-led podcasts on the platform for years.
Chris Stone, executive producer of podcasts and video at the New Statesman, says: “That video extends our audience reach on YouTube but also on social platforms. The purpose of that is to grow the top of our funnel. Having video helps to expand your reach on socials, that’s certainly what’s happening with us… and the easiest way to produce that is from our podcasts.”
Consistency and growth
Gallipeau explains that, even if the form of the journalism has necessarily changed, the group’s editorial strategy is an extension of its coverage elsewhere: “Postmedia has found success in both long and short-form video content on YouTube especially for our major news brands.
“What seems to really drive success is the topic. For brands like National Post and The Toronto Sun, there is a big appetite for federal and provincial political content. When we produce videos on those subjects, regardless of length, it generally outperforms the average video.”
That lines up with research about the news consumption habits of US adults. Per a Pew Research Center study, 35% of US adults self-report that they ‘regularly’ get news from YouTube channels.
The big question is the extent to which YouTube will remain consistent and prioritize that sort of news-led content within its algorithm. Writing for Nieman Lab, Joon Lee argues that, as it gets squeezed by Netflix, YouTube has recognized the need for legitimacy of the sort that legacy media can confer.
As Lee puts it, “YouTube doesn’t need journalism to boost ad revenue. It needs journalism to anchor its reputational power in the same way newspapers once anchored civic life.”
Shorts and resources
While YouTube might want legacy content to increase its legitimacy, publishers do have to tailor their content to each platform if they want to succeed.
Charlie Carmichael, Head of Audience at talkSPORT, states that the brand has seen some significant uptick in subscribers as a result of taking advantage of the subchannel option on YouTube. “This platform-first mindset helped us grow our YouTube revenue by 30% YoY in 2025,” he said. “In addition to diversifying our audience and reducing the talkSPORT main channel’s share of views from 81% to 67%. It’s also unlocked new partnership opportunities, and we’ve increasingly experimented with live-streaming non-traditional rights.”
However, despite a media brand’s popularity on shelves or screens, there is plenty more competition on the video site. As a result there are examples of best practice that even the biggest news brands have to adhere to, particularly with regards to recurring personalities and recognizable series.
Gallipeau explains: “On some of our larger brands, we work to apply YouTube best practices to help our video content stand out. We’ve also found great success in using formats like YouTube Shorts to raise awareness and drive traffic to our channels. This has a significant impact on subscriber and viewership growth.”
The benefit of committing to the Shorts format is that – while tweaking is still required – it allows media business’ YouTube efforts to bear fruit elsewhere.
At the New York Times, for example, the video team is investing heavily in vertical video of the sort that can sit on YouTube Shorts in addition to TikTok and Instagram. The paper’s video director Solana Pyne told The Hollywood Reporter that “our videos live both on our own platform and on a whole range of social platforms, Instagram, TikTok, also YouTube. We don’t make video that would live only or thrive only on one platform.”
Unsurprisingly, many other newspapers are making their video content work harder on the platform.
The Guardian, for example, repurposes sections of its longform explainers for the Shorts section. It acts as both a trailer for the ‘main’ video and an antennae that reaches the subsection of the YouTube audience that primarily consumes Shorts.
As YouTube climbs publisher and broadcasters’ priority lists in the face of uncertainty elsewhere, they are to some extent dancing to the platform’s tune in terms of video format Personality-led videos and the parasocial relationships they create with an audience are the order of the day, and Shorts are practically mandatory for discovery.
Alex Rothwell, Head of Video for The Times and The Sunday Times, notes that the team has identified that different forms of video on the platform work towards different ends. He said, “We have different approaches to our multiple YouTube channels to serve specific goals; revenue, audience growth, or a combination of the two.”
He does note, though, that maintaining a consistent identity across those channels is key: “Across all of our YouTube output, we maintain a consistent visual identity by using The Times thumbnail branding. We’ve also developed repeatable formats – such as Explains, Investigates, and Documentaries – which help build a loyal audience over time by establishing a clear and recognisable editorial identity.”
YouTube, then, presents legacy publishers with an opportunity to widen the top of the funnel when it comes to acquiring audiences. It is, though, still a platform over which publishers and broadcasters have next to no control; the trick is in gaming its ability to concentrate audiences around a news channel while increasing investment with the brand itself.
Microdramas, sometimes called vertical dramas, are fast-paced, feature-length video series, shot vertically and split into episodes of between 60 and 90 seconds. They have been popular in China for some time now but the US and Europe are starting to catch on to the phenomenon. Viewers find microdramas a fun and engaging format that can be consumed on the go. For media companies, microdramas offer an inexpensive way to make content that can get millions of views.
Despite progress, there remains cultural challenges that could stymie their growth outside of the Far East. As Tom Harrington, Head of TV at Enders Analysis points out, “People have been trying to make drama more snackable in the West for a long time and it has never really taken.”
Jen Cooper, a vertical drama critic and journalist, sees a change though, with experimentation and interest growing. “America is beginning to tip … people are aware of them and willing to kind of talk about it now. I know from friends in New York that [say they] see people on the subway watching vertical dramas.” However, “America is nine to 12 months ahead of both Europe and the UK,” she says.
The primary audience is “women aged about 25 to 65 who were looking for romance,” according to Cooper. Henry Soong, founder of US-based microdrama company, Watch Club, notes that many in this category have disposable income to be spent on those microtransactions.
While several apps have sprung up, there are currently two major players in the field – China-backed Reel Short and Singapore-based Dramabox. According to Sensor Tower’s State of Mobile 2026 report, downloads of Reel Short increased 115% year-on-year in 2025, with the researchers finding there were 2.3 billion downloads of Short Drama apps over the 12-month period.
Unsurprisingly, the global media industry has started to take notice.
Making mega money from Microdramas
Microdramas are generally monetized via microtransactions; viewers are lured in with free episodes before being asked to cough up cash. Big name brands such as Shein and Crocs are starting to take interest though and back projects, according to Cooper
Research from Omdia back in October estimated that microdramas would bringing n $11billion globally last year. They said: “60% of global microdrama revenue comes from subscription or transactional payments, often following a free introductory model.” At that time, China accounted for 83% of total revenue.
The basic monetization model involves making the first seven to 10 episodes of a show available for free. The companies producing the shows then ask for “about 50 cents per minute long episode, or they charge you a weekly subscription, which could bring in $17 USD per week,” explains Soong. Some also provide the option to purchase digital coins or watch an advert in-app.
The audience hook
The shows find their audience through heavy marketing on social media, drawing viewers back to the platform on which the show is based. That is how Cooper, a bookseller before becoming an expert in the medium, discovered them.
Marketing spend is around nine times the production costs. “It’s all about really aggressive customer acquisition, working around the clock with social media ads, pushing them out, seeing what takes off, experimenting,” she says.
“Spreading on social media is the key. “You want the show to go viral,” says Dan Lowenstein, a director on a many vertical dramas
Crucial to turning people from casual viewers brought in by social media into paying customers is the hook – the episode at which people are required to pay. This is not just a responsibility of the business team, but the creatives too. Lowenstein says it is “part of…my job to make that hook a reality. So, you can play with that a lot. And that’s the that’s the kind of good part of this format is that there’s room to play and room to experiment.”
Cooper outlines that a show has production costs of $100,000 to $200,000. That number is ridiculously low compared to traditional film budgets.
Costs are kept down by very quick shoot times. “The whole thing is that you have these six, seven days to shoot basically a feature film,” explains Lowenstein. “The business plan is about smaller budgets, less risk… you’re shooting on average 12 to 13 pages a day.” That is considerably more than on traditional TVs or movies. The vertical nature of the output helps with this. “You’re not seeing as much you can shoot faster, says Lowenstein.
Another key element of the revenue strategy is making a huge amount of content, possible due to those low shoot costs. “There’s been a race to just put out more and more,” says Cooper. There is an element of throwing everything at the wall and seeing what sticks. Cooper believes that “it does feel with some of the apps it’s kind of quantity over quality.”
Niche content ripe for growth
The truth is, many of these shows are schlocky and low grade, with an emphasis on romance. Some even veer towards the pornographic. (There is a BDSM tag on Reel Short, for instance.) The acting and story lines are basic and hammy. The range of subject matter and quality may need to mature for the format to gain wider traction.
“I would categorize all of these shows on Reel Short and Drama Box as romance” says Soong. “And the reason why people are willing to pay per episode is because it fills a similar emotional need as OnlyFans does.” I’m sure various show creators and actors would dispute this, but the comment is largely a fair one.
Platforms like Reel Short and Drama Box have a huge amount of power and, to access their particular shows, you must have their app. Of course, these firms, which, as Cooper explained, are essentially media ventures back by massive tech companies, can further exploit the IP they create. At a smaller scale, Soong is hoping his firm can build a social network around the vertical dramas, again keeping viewers on the platform.
The content is certainly addictive. I began watching one show when researching this piece and found myself increasingly intrigued as to what would happen next. I later realized I’d watch 26 episodes of a certain show over a couple of different sittings, including navigating adverts to keep going. It wasn’t exactly HBO-style prestige TV, but I had been reeled in.
While the recent growth of microdrama’s is certainly exciting, one high-profile failure looms large in media memory: Quibi. The app, launched by Jeffrey Katzenberg and led by Meg Whitman, which garnered $1.75B and folded six months after launch, was meant to bring shortform streaming to the US.
Maybe it was just bad timing, as we headed into the pandemic and people were at home on big TVs, not swiping on the go on their phones. Maybe the West was not yet ready to consume content in this way, before audiences became acclimated to TikTok, Instagram Reels and YouTube shorts.
Vertical dramas have been popular in China for a while now. Though it’s not yet clear whether their growth elsewhere will be a fad or a genuine shift in consumption habits, however the future plays out, there is currently enough interest in microdramas that the format is worth a look. There is a real sense that this is an area for creativity and a way to capitalize on the audience appeal of social vertical video.
FAST is scaling faster than the infrastructure designed to support it. Audience adoption is real, advertiser interest is rising, and channels are multiplying but discovery, measurement, and standards remain uneven. Through my experience operating the FAST channel Swerve Sports, an important market reality has come into focus: success in this market isn’t just driven by content launches but also how content is surfaced, packaged, and understood.
These fundamental infrastructure realities are is already changing how Free Ad-Supported Streaming TV (FAST) operators think about programming, production, and discovery. Here are practical lessons this reality is forcing FAST operators to address:
Discovery is still driven by people, platforms, and the guide
One of the most consistent drivers of viewership we’ve seen is still the simplest: When athletes tell their social followers to tune in, viewership spikes. Across every sport Swerve has worked with — from boxing and MMA to volleyball, basketball, and football — athlete promotion reliably moves audiences. In a crowded FAST environment, social influence remains a key discovery engine. Leagues and rights holders that understand how to activate athletes have a meaningful advantage.
Platform promotion matters too, and it often favors live events. Swerve streams more than 300 live events per year on average, and there’s tremendous opportunity for expansion in live events on FAST. But one of the more important realities we’ve observed is that live isn’t always the top performer. Across many types of sports, replays often outperform live events. A major reason is straightforward: Viewers are discovering content by browsing the on-screen guide. That behavior underscores the importance of detailed, accurate, informative metadata and the UI decisions that determine whether content is findable in the first place. FAST may be delivered through streaming, but discovery often functions like linear television: What’s visible wins.
Libraries and replays are doing more work than we expected
Because guide browsing is such a powerful driver, FAST can create unexpected opportunities for content that already exists. For new and existing leagues benefiting from investment and momentum right now, FAST provides another shot at reaching a wider audience, especially for rights holders with video libraries of competitions they haven’t showcased because they’ve had other priorities. Replays and libraries don’t just fill hours; they create more entry points for discovery, and more chances for viewers to stumble into a sport or league they didn’t know they’d care about. The fundamentals are there, but channels and rights holders need to package that depth in a way that supports browsing behavior.
Audience appetite is broader than legacy assumptions
With two quarters of data, we’re seeing clear patterns in what performs, while we continue to test and refine programming. Some of the results have been surprising. STIHL Timbersports events, featuring competitive wood-chopping with chainsaws and axes, defy geographic boundaries, with competitions from Benelux countries performing as well as competitions from the U.S. and Canada. Other top-performing standouts include Women’s Football Alliance and Athletes Unlimited basketball and volleyball.
The range of competitions that can perform well — from trampoline to poker to pool — also reflects research Swerve conducted in 2025 showing younger audiences’ willingness and interest in following more than a handful of sports. We’ve leaned into that insight through our partnership with Rebel Girls, launching a weekly family program featuring outstanding women athletes in a Saturday-morning time slot. The point isn’t that every niche will break out. It’s that FAST audiences appear more open than many operators assume. Channels that program with curiosity, consistency, and clear packaging can unlock demand that looks invisible in other distribution environments.
Production investment is a key threshold for success
Another key lesson for new and evolving sports leagues is the importance of production. This is true for long-form live matches, but it’s also true (and increasingly urgent) for short-form video, particularly for anyone trying to capture attention among younger audiences. For newer and smaller leagues seeking to build fandom, production can make or break their ability to develop relationships with fans who are used to established norms.
Production investment also allows rights holders to control their IP, which matters for developing leagues where image and storytelling are inseparable from growth. Not every league has the financial capability to shoot with more than one camera, and some struggle to finance production for an entire season. But technology can help: from AI captioning to cloud production, newer, lower-cost tools have lowered the barrier to entry. What hasn’t changed is the underlying reality that production quality shapes trust and trust shapes retention.
Infrastructure is a barrier to FAST growth
FAST is in a convergence moment, with platform growth, live content appetite, and expanding libraries colliding with a persistent lack of standardization and robust infrastructure. Tracking analytics across different platforms remains challenging. The lack of third-party metrics is maddening. And the industry’s unwillingness to agree to and adhere to common standards creates friction for creators, platforms, and audiences alike.
The live events and libraries are there. The athletes are there. The audience appetite is there. What we’ve learned so far is that the constraint is less about supply and more about infrastructure: standardization, data sharing, and discoverability. FAST’s next phase of growth will depend on whether those systems evolve fast enough to match the pace of the market.
Putting Swerve’s FAST lessons Into practice
Swerve’s early experience on FAST has reinforced that growth alone isn’t the differentiator. Planning full seasons, pairing live events with replays, and making content easy to find has mattered as much as launching more programming. As FAST continues to scale, the operators who win will be those who understand that programming, production, and discovery function as one system and build accordingly.
Media companies are increasingly using artificial intelligence to improve recommendations and personalize the audience’s viewing experience. The primary focus centers on reducing friction in discovery and helping audiences decide what to watch more easily. New research from Hub Entertainment Research shows that audience acceptance of AI closely tracks how clearly it delivers these kinds of viewing improvements, while they remain skeptical of other applications.
Discovery and recommendations drive excitement
Survey results show that audience interest in AI centers around a small number of practical use cases tied directly to discovery and viewing quality. Better recommendations emerge as the leading area of excitement, cited by more than one third of respondents. Improvements in production quality and tools that help viewers decide what to watch next follow closely, each attracting interest from roughly 30% of consumers. Personalization also ranks among the top areas of interest.
By contrast, more experimental applications, such as appearing in content or fully interactive experiences, draw meaningfully less enthusiasm. The data shows that audiences respond most strongly to AI when it supports relevance, quality, and ease of navigation within the viewing experience.
Industry investment follows applied use cases
Industry activity increasingly aligns with these audience priorities. The research documents growing experimentation with AI in production workflows such as editing and visual effects, areas where efficiency gains remain largely invisible to viewers.
Interest in applied AI also appears in rising participation at industry AI conferences, which more than doubled in attendance over a two-year period. At the same time, the study emphasizes that these investments only succeed if audiences value the resulting experiences, reinforcing the importance of consumer acceptance.
AI adoption grows alongside consumer expectations
Consumer adoption of AI continues to accelerate. Nearly 73% of respondents say they have used generative AI tools, up from 57% the year before. Familiarity also increases, with about 75% reporting that they understand AI and how it works.
Audience expectations have risen alongside usage. Almost 90% believe AI will have a big impact on everyday life, and about one third expect it to change daily life for everyone. These findings suggest that AI already feels present and substantial to many consumers, even as opinions about its long-term effects continue to form.
Audience concerns center on authenticity and trust
Despite growing familiarity with AI among the average consumer, concerns remain pronounced. The most common worry involves losing the ability to distinguish what is real. More than 60% cite unauthorized use of personal likeness as a concern, while nearly as many worry about not knowing whether content is authentic.
Job loss also ranks high among concerns, cited by more than half of respondents, followed closely by concerns about copyright infringement. These issues persist even among consumers who report high levels of comfort with AI.
Comfort varies by who uses AI and for what
Acceptance also depends heavily on who uses AI and for what purpose. About 40% of respondents say they feel completely comfortable with regular people using AI for personal tasks. That figure drops to roughly 20% when influencers or companies use AI to build audiences or generate revenue. The data underscores that audiences apply stricter standards to commercial uses and expect greater responsibility and oversight from organizations.
Knowledge continues to shape acceptance. Among respondents who describe themselves as most familiar with AI, about two-thirds express interest in generating content using well known entertainment IP. More than half of this group also considers that an ethical use of AI. As understanding increases, openness expands, particularly when audiences perceive clear boundaries and responsible application.
Transparency around AI remains a baseline audience expectation
Across all segments, transparency in the use of AI stands out as a requirement among audiences. Nearly 90% of respondents believe companies should disclose when AI plays a role in creating content. Disclosure does not register as a differentiator but as a baseline expectation. Audiences want clarity around when AI contributes and how it fits alongside human decision-making.
Audiences show the strongest interest in AI that improves recommendations, enhances production quality, and simplifies discovery. They express greater caution around uses that affect authenticity, identity, or trust. For media companies, success depends less on how advanced these applications become and more on how closely the use of AI aligns with audience priorities.
As AI becomes more embedded in media workflows, the opportunity lies in focus and execution. Viewers already signal what they value most: better ways to find content and better experiences once they start watching. The challenge now centers on delivering AI-based benefits clearly, responsibly, and in ways audiences recognize and trust.
YouTube is now the biggest TV platform in the world. In the US it accounts for over 20% of time spent watching streaming apps on television screens, and in the UK it sits second only to the BBC for viewing. But for years, media executives dismissed YouTube as a platform you used, not one you built on. That misunderstanding cost some companies millions OK so that’s and handed others a generational advantage. While traditional media focused on reach, creators focused on return visits. While brands polished campaigns, creators bonded with people. And while executives debated algorithms, loyalty quietly became the most valuable currency on the platform.
YouTube rewards speed over polish, feedback over control, and consistency over campaigns. Results aren’t simply about reach, but something harder to manufacture later: audience trust and habitual viewing. For organizations accustomed to control and predictability, capitalizing on the true value of YouTube has been challenging to say the least.
These dynamics came into sharp focus during a panel I moderated at the Content London conference in December on the Secrets of YouTube Success. The panelists were Patrick Walker, Senior Advisor at Electrify Video Partner and founder of Nowherian, Luke Hyams, co-founder of Pangaea and former Head of Originals at YouTube, James Loveridge, Co-Managing Director of Little Dot Studios, and Sam Glynne, Head of EMEA, Entertainment and Culture Marketing at UTA. Between them, they represent some of the deepest institutional memory the platform has, people who were there before YouTube knew what it was going to become.
The topic of our discussion was straightforward: What lessons from YouTube’s evolution can be applied today to build audience loyalty, sustainable monetization, and long-term relevance in a rapidly shifting video landscape? For executives, it’s not just about understanding history; it’s about recognizing the behaviors, relationships, and creative choices that will determine who thrives on the platform in the next few years. Many media companies and brands still treat YouTube as a bolt-on distribution channel rather than what it actually is, a direct and ongoing relationship with audiences.
Media leaders have seen this movie before
I first encountered YouTube professionally in 2007, when I was Global Head of Digital at Fremantle. At the time, the idea that a user-generated platform could be a serious commercial partner was controversial, if not seditious. Despite that skepticism, we signed one of YouTube’s earliest global partnerships, which went on to generate tens of millions of dollars for the group. Not because the content was radically different from what we were already making, but because the relationship with the audience was.
Later, as Managing Director of ChannelFlip (one of the early YouTube creator studios), I saw the same pattern repeat. Creators who understood their audiences deeply, published consistently, and responded to feedback in real time routinely outperformed far better resourced traditional media brands. The lesson then, as now, was simple: YouTube rewards those who treat viewers as participants, not recipients.
From distribution to relationship
Early in our panel, it became clear that the industry took years to understand what YouTube truly was. For many companies, success was initially measured in uploads and views rather than in loyalty or trust. Creators, by contrast, quickly learned that the real value was in return visits. They read comments, adjusted formats, experimented publicly and often failed in full view of their audiences. That feedback loop made them faster, sharper, and more relevant than traditional media teams working behind layers of approval.
For executives used to broadcast scheduling, YouTube requires a rethink of what drives loyalty and revenue. While formats, devices, and business models have evolved, the principle of building habitual viewing and trust remains as true today as it was in 2007.
The algorithm is not the villain
YouTube is often described as unforgiving. That’s true. However, it is not arbitrary. Luke Hyams, former Head of Originals at YouTube, reminded the audience that many creators learned early to “post first and apologise later,” experimenting quickly and learning from audience feedback. Thumbnails, titles, and pacing are not optional marketing add-ons; they are part of the storytelling. Optimisation, as James Loveridge noted, is a creative act, not just a technical exercise. Patrick Walker framed the challenge another way, describing a “post-algorithm world” where sustainable businesses build audience ownership rather than relying solely on platform mechanics.
Over-reliance on algorithmic growth is a trap. Formats age, platform dynamics shift, and businesses built entirely on rented reach are fragile. Companies that succeed are those that use the algorithm to find audiences, then work deliberately to keep them. Audience ownership, not algorithmic dependence, is where long-term business value lies.
Why brands still struggle
Brand success on YouTube remains uneven, not because audiences reject brands, but because brands struggle with the loss of control. Content cannot be quietly taken down or endlessly revised. Comments accumulate. Audiences talk back. Trust, once broken, is visible.
Sam Glynne highlighted that brands often attempt to behave like creators but underestimate how quickly audiences notice inauthenticity. Our panel agreed that brands perform best when they treat YouTube as a studio, not a campaign channel. This means investing in talent relationships over time, respecting the audience’s expectations, and accepting that authenticity cannot be reverse-engineered. Creators have always understood this instinctively; organizations are still learning it.
Connected TV and the return of long-form
Another strategic opportunity is the growth of long-form viewing on YouTube via connected TV. Audiences may be leaning back, but they still expect creator-led storytelling, direct address, and a sense of intimacy. Companies that assume connected TV automatically validates old commissioning models will struggle. Those that design long-form formats specifically for creator ecosystems will find growth.
YouTube strategy now cuts across content, brand, product, and distribution. It cannot sit in a social media silo. This is an urgent operational and strategic issue for executives responsible for long-term growth and engagement.
Key takeaways for media executives
For media and advertising leaders, the lessons are practical and immediate:
Stop treating YouTube as a distribution endpoint; treat it as a relationship platform.
Optimization is part of creativity; packaging and format matter as much as content quality.
Views without loyalty are not a business; retention and habitual engagement matter more than scale.
Brands succeed when they behave like studios, not advertisers, investing in long-term talent relationships.
Long-term value comes from audience ownership, not algorithmic favor.
YouTube is no longer the future of television. It is part of today’s media infrastructure. Leaders who invest in audience-first thinking, treat creators and talent as strategic partners, and prioritize trust and habitual engagement will find sustainable growth and loyalty. Those who cling to legacy approaches risk irrelevance.
About the author
Claire Tavernier is a media and technology adviser and board chair. She was previously Global Head of Digital at Fremantle and Managing Director of ChannelFlip.
Artificial intelligence significantly reduces the cost and time required to produce video. Across major digital platforms, that shift coincides with a notable increase in low-quality, AI-generated content designed to perform well within algorithmic recommendation systems.
New research from Kapwing, an online video editing platform, documents the global rise of what many creators and technologists refer to as AI slop. Rather than defining this content by topic or format, the report focuses on how it is produced and distributed. AI slop is created quickly, published at high volume, and optimized to trigger engagement metrics that recommendation systems use to rank and surface content.
Kapwing’s analysis places AI slop within the mechanics of platform distribution, helping clarify what drives visibility. Across YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook, algorithmic systems prioritize scalable engagement signals rather than editorial attributes. Understanding those incentives is essential for publishers to assess where they remain exposed to algorithmic churn and where alternative approaches to audience growth can still exert leverage.
Share of AI slop in recommended video feeds
Kapwing’s analysis of YouTube recommendations finds that a substantial portion of videos shown to new users qualifies as low-quality AI-generated content. In recommendation feeds generated for accounts with limited viewing history, AI slop appears repeatedly rather than as isolated suggestions.
The research identifies entire channels devoted exclusively to producing AI-generated videos at scale. These channels rely on automated workflows to generate visuals, narration, and scripts, often publishing multiple videos per day. Some achieve significant reach and generate revenue through standard platform advertising programs.
Kapwing’s findings suggest that this visibility reflects how recommendation systems function when personalization data is limited. For new accounts, platforms rely more heavily on generalized engagement signals to populate feeds. AI slop frequently meets these criteria, increasing the likelihood that it will be surfaced early and often.
The content itself commonly features recycled visuals, synthetic voiceovers, loosely assembled scripts, and broad or ambiguous topics. Kapwing emphasizes that AI slop is not defined by the use of artificial intelligence alone. Instead, it reflects a production approach designed to maximize engagement metrics such as watch time, posting frequency, and volume.
The earmarks of AI slop
The report distinguishes AI slop from other uses of AI in media production. Many publishers and creators use AI tools to support editing, translation, accessibility, or workflow efficiency. AI slop, by contrast, involves minimal editorial intervention and relies on automation to scale output rapidly.
The defining characteristic of slop is not automation itself, but the absence of editorial oversight. Content decisions are driven primarily by performance data rather than by subject expertise, reporting, or narrative intent. This distinction allows Kapwing to identify slop based on observable production and publishing behaviors.
Signals prioritized by recommendation systems
This research highlights the role of engagement signals in determining content distribution. Across algorithmically curated platforms, recommendation systems rely on metrics that are easy to measure and compare at scale. These include watch time, retention, posting frequency, and consistency.
Editorial attributes such as accuracy, sourcing, originality, and narrative structure do not directly factor into these systems. Their exclusion reflects platform design choices about which signals are incorporated into ranking models.
AI slop is produced to generate high watch time, frequent posting, and consistent engagement. These are the same signals recommendation systems to rank and surface content. High posting frequency increases the likelihood of repeated exposure, particularly in feed-based environments.
Global distribution patterns
Kapwing’s findings show that AI slop is not limited to a single market or language. The report identifies similar patterns across regions and content categories. Channels producing AI slop appear in multiple countries and serve audiences in diverse linguistic contexts.
This distribution reflects shared platform systems rather than localized editorial practices. Where algorithmic recommendation governs visibility, similar outcomes emerge regardless of geography.
From this perspective, AI slop is not an anomaly or a fringe category. It represents a production strategy that performs well within existing algorithmic distribution systems. The research clarifies the distribution dynamics that allow AI slop to scale. This content’s prevalence across platforms, regions, and formats reflects shared incentive structures rather than changes in audience demand.
For media executives, the spread of AI slop underscores a hard truth about today’s distribution economics: platform visibility is driven by scalable engagement signals, not by editorial judgment or quality. When scale and engagement signals drive distribution, automated content gains structural advantages. Publishers must continue to reduce reliance on feed-driven discovery by strengthening direct, first-party audience relationships and prioritizing formats that build habitual, intentional consumption.
Digital video is the preferred form of media for many audience demographics. Those audiences, highly engaged with video, provide fertile ground for advertising revenue, sponsored video content, and even paywall revenue growth.
However, despite the undisputed appeal for audiences, it presents media businesses with a conundrum: produce video content cheaply to maximize ROI, or invest in quality video leveraging the brand, with the risk of a lower return. So how do media businesses choose which topics or subjects are right to build a video strategy around. And when do revenue opportunities like sponsors enter into those discussions?
Commercial viability
For most outlets, video has to pay its way. Documentary-style video is expensive to produce. Therefore, it is often simply not worth the investment for primarily text-based commodity news publishers.
To offset that issue (i.e., the high cost of video production and the risk of spending money on content that doesn’t pay off), The Independent created Independent TV with a clear rule: No video series gets made unless it already has a sponsor or advertiser committed to funding it.
This commissioning bottleneck of sorts serves as a test of whether the subject was of worth to a potential sponsor in video form. The approach does present potential frustration lin that that advertising priorities dictate what gets made, meaning creative or editorially strong concepts could stall if they didn’t appeal to sponsors. However, this approach prevented the paper from spending a significant amount of money on a video project that might never have been commercially viable.
A similar approach is taken by The Sun, which has seen its video share of digital revenue increased to 18% in the latest reported results. Jon Lloyd, Director of Video for the newspaper says that, “Making video in isolation doesn’t make sense at The Sun; when commissioning Sun Originals the commercial considerations are right at the beginning. That was the genesis for Sun Originals: high quality shows which advertisers like to sponsor.
“It must always be editorially driven and work for our audiences. But editorial teams will work with the commercial teams in order to launch the show and build the commercial aspect in, tailoring it to the client. It can’t just be their name on the show anymore.”
As a result of that strategy The Sun is working with clients who “have never used us in a digital capacity before, like M&S and Card Factory”. Recognizing the synergy between its consumer-focused news approach and the commercial opportunity, it has been focused on two specific content verticals for Originals commissioning: sports and Fabulous, which encompasses women’s fashion, beauty and lifestyle.
At the same time, commercial considerations do not factor into discussions around video creation for news organizations whose commercial proposition is more supporter-based.
The Guardian confirms that they do not create videos with sponsors in mind. Those discussions are not part of the overall decision about when and where to launch a video series.
Nevertheless, the company is not ignoring the audience growth opportunities of digital video and is set to invest further in using it for storytelling. As its editor-in-chief recently told Press Gazette, “I mean, at the moment, [when] we get a big story, it usually will have a podcast attached for example. It will usually have a video explainer attached. It will usually have all sorts of stuff attached already, but I think it’s the next stage of that.”
Cost vs return
Some major titles are increasingly looking to video as an audience growth opportunity first. The idea is that audiences attracted by video are likely to convert, even if that form of content does not exactly match the majority of the paper’s content.
Juliet Riddell is head of new formats at the Financial Times, which has been experimenting with news-led short films. Its latest, ‘Recall Me Maybe’, is a short fictional film that examines dementia, AI, and the unreliability of memory and artificial intelligence. That’s quite the departure for the title. However, its position in front of the paywall speaks to its belief that video of this sort is worth investing in as an audience acquisition tool.
Speaking to Media Voices, Riddell explained: “All the films are trying to connect an audience with something that’s happening now and that we feel we need to communicate now.”
We also see a number of publications investing in digital video to diversify the audiences that are exposed to the brand, albeit with a far lower cost base. That is particularly true for those media businesses looking to convert more audiences by creating more touchpoints.
Chris Stone is executive producer of podcasts and video at the New Statesman. He explains: “We’re already producing podcasts, so adding video to that production workflow doubles up on the content that we’re making, so we’re getting more out of a single record. That video then extends our audience reach on YouTube, [and] also on social platforms. And the purpose of that is to grow the top of our funnel.”
He also notes that the ROI of a piece of content – in any form – is based on how widely it can be repurposed: “If I was starting something from scratch, I wouldn’t start with original video. I would start with multimedia content that can be repurposed on lots of different platforms.”
Beyond digital video
Given the scale of investment in video podcasts over the past few years – with a recently announced collaboration between Spotify and Netflix acting as the cherry on top – it is unsurprising that newsbrands recognize the value of delivering its star audio content in another broadly-accessible format. Vox, for instance, has just poached the NYT’s Astead Herndon, appointing him as a host and editorial director with a remit to launch and lead a new multiplatform video podcast.
This approach bears fruit for publishers that have been investing in multimedia content for years: the podcasts have already proven to be commercially successful in audio, and the additional costs of filming and editing them are relatively small. In commissioning these relatively small, these media businesses take advantage of advertisers’ hunger for video content, and video’s ability to open up new audiences.
Whether it is a high-quality audience play like that of the Financial Times, or the more commercial-led commissioning approach, video is increasingly seen as a must-have for news and magazine brands. Finding the sweet spot between commercial growth and audience development is paramount, but dependent on the wider commercial strategy of the title.
In her new book, Streaming Wars: How Getting Everything We Wanted Changed Entertainment Forever, journalist Charlotte Henry examines how the promise of “everything, everywhere” upended the media business. Once dismissed as fringe disruptors, streaming platforms such as Netflix, Disney+, Apple TV+, and Amazon Prime Video have reshaped not only how we consume entertainment but also how it is financed, produced, and valued.
Henry traces this revolution from the early days of streaming libraries filled with forgotten shows to the moment Netflix bet big on original programming. When House of Cards premiered, it was more than just a hit series. It marked the point when Silicon Valley investment and data-driven decision-making began to rewrite Hollywood’s rules. What followed was a full-scale transformation that saw the rise of direct-to-consumer platforms, the unbundling and re-bundling of services, and an industry racing to keep pace with changing viewer habits.
As Henry explains, the streaming boom has entered a new phase focused on business discipline. Subscriber growth alone no longer satisfies investors, and profitability and sustainability are now the top priorities.
The following excerpt from The Business of Streaming explores how those pressures are reshaping strategies, from ad-supported tiers and staggered release schedules to new debates over value, access, and creative control. It is a timely look at the realities behind the entertainment revolution we all helped create.
The business of streaming
As well as changes to the type of content being offered, there are changes on the business side of streaming too. Crucially, as time has gone on, investors and top executives have increasingly begun to demand a focus on revenue growth, not just the growing subscriber numbers, which was the original goal. Companies have had
to update their strategies accordingly. One of the key moves was the introduction of cheaper, ad-supported membership tiers from Netflix and Disney+ as they attempted to get more people to pay something, anything, instead of sharing an account with friends and family or passing up on the service altogether.
The challenge faced by all streaming providers is that as the number of services available increased, so did the frustration from viewers. Customers started to realize that the programming they wanted to watch was spread across a wide range of platforms, all of which required a separate annual or monthly payment. There is a limit to how many different providers people are willing to fork out for. The later arrivals to the market struggled to make an impact. Indeed, some quickly became part of a bundle offered in conjunction with linear television providers such as Sky, who offered some Peacock programming with their packages in the UK. (The two broadcasters have the same parent company.)
Whereas originally a service would release whole seasons of a show at the same time, allowing viewers to binge-watch, they are now spreading things out and releasing episodes on a weekly basis. For instance, Netflix split out the release of the fourth season of its hit series Stranger Things into two volumes – one in May 2022, the
second in July 2022. This meant that to watch it all as soon as it came out fans had to have a paid subscription for multiple months and in at least two financial quarters, a boost to the company’s results.
There is a distinct possibility that we could be returning to the kind of structure seen in the classic cable TV days, when the cost of a bundle was relatively high, but consumers got a lot of what they wanted from a few key gatekeepers. And you had to
wait a few days for the next episode of your favourite show! Maybe those water cooler moments have not completely disappeared after all.
While much of the attention is on visual content, the discussion around streaming should not forget the changes in music and other audio industries. When Steve Jobs finally managed to charm and bully the music industry into submission, artists were delighted with the arrival of the likes of iTunes. It seemed to solve the ongoing problem of piracy posed by Napster and other websites that offered free downloads of their music at varying quality. With iTunes (now Apple Music) and Spotify coming to prominence, it was easier to get high-quality music recordings legally than illegally. It has also never been simpler for musicians to publish music. However, even the biggest stars worry they are not being remunerated fairly for their work, an ongoing source of tension within the music industry.
Podcasts are historically associated with Apple and the iPod, but Spotify has, in recent years, invested considerable sums into the medium, launching originals and putting a paywall around some popular content. It had to rethink this approach amidst a dif!cult post-Covid pandemic market in 2023 and scaled back its efforts.
For some, streaming is another phenomenon altogether. It is not about big budget shows and movies but content produced live by online creators. This often revolves around video games, as people tune in to watch others play and pay money to support their favourites.
As ever, the story of streaming is not just about companies or content. There are key individuals behind these seismic shifts – the likes of Netflix co-founders Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph, Zack Van Amburg and Jamie Erlicht at Apple TV+, and Spotify’s Daniel Ek. They, and many others, have played key roles in how the public consumes media.
Streaming services of all kinds are, to a lesser or greater extent, the centre of most of our media diets. It’s time to really look at the fallout caused by the arrival of these services and explore the possibilities of what might come next.
Streaming Warsby Charlotte Henry (a frequent contributor to this site) was published by Kogan Page and is available to purchase now.
The playbook for sports media is being rewritten. As fans spread their attention across streaming apps, social feeds, and nonstop highlight reels, the competition for their time has never been tougher—or more revealing. The next phase of sports viewing isn’t just about where the game is played, but how it’s experienced. Understanding where audiences are going, what keeps them engaged, and how they define value in this new environment offers a clear look at the future of sports, entertainment, and media itself.
Sports is transforming faster than ever. HUB Entertainment Research’s latest study, “What’s the Score? The Evolution of Sports Fans and Sports Media – Wave 4,” reveals how streaming, social media, and shifting fan behavior reshape the sports experience. HUB’s findings show that while enthusiasm for sports remains strong, the ways fans discover, watch, and engage are changing rapidly.
HUB’s data confirms that streaming now anchors this transformation. Fans increasingly identify digital platforms rather than traditional broadcasters as their primary source for live games, highlights, and commentary. This marks a profound shift in where attention and media investment converge.
Streaming takes the lead
Sports continue to move full speed into streaming, expanding opportunities for rights holders and audiences. Viewers rely on ESPN+, Prime Video, and Netflix for live games and highlights. According to HUB, fans overwhelmingly believe ESPN+ provides the best sports coverage, while Prime Video and Netflix rate comparably to cable and broadcast networks.
This report reveals a new hierarchy in sports media. The value of live rights now depends on how well a service integrates sports into a broader digital experience. According to consumers, streaming offers flexibility and personalization, traits that align with younger, mobile-first audiences.
Streaming also strengthens brand perception. Two-thirds of avid sports fans and 40% of casual sports fans say they view a streaming service more favorably if it includes live sports. For companies like Disney, Amazon, and Netflix, sports is a differentiator and a retention tool, creating real-time engagement in an on-demand environment.
At the same time, more choices bring new challenges. Fans juggle multiple subscriptions to follow their favorite teams, and nearly half say finding the sports they want to watch is getting more confusing. Yet engagement remains strong. The passion for live sports continues to drive audiences to adapt, even as the media model evolves.
Social media becomes the stadium
As streaming changes where fans watch, social media redefines how they connect. HUB finds that 42% of teens aged 13–17 and 24% of adults aged 18–34 consume most of their sports content through social media, compared with just 12% of fans aged 55 and older.
This generational divide reveals a new form of engagement. For younger fans, social media isn’t just a companion to live sports; it is the experience. Platforms like YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and X deliver nonstop clips, commentary, and behind-the-scenes access. Fans scroll, post, and share in real time, creating a participatory environment that often replaces traditional broadcasts.
For leagues, rights holders, and brands, this shift demands a new strategy. Discovery now happens through short-form video rather than scheduled programming. Advertisers view social platforms as critical spaces to reach fans who may not watch full games but still connect deeply with teams and athletes.
HUB’s data makes it clear that this shift is permanent. Younger fans’ reliance on social media represents a lasting reordering of the sports media value chain, one where fans don’t just consume content—they shape it.
Confusion and competition
While streaming brings more choices, it also adds more complexity. HUB finds that fans increasingly struggle to navigate multiple platforms and shifting rights. Nearly half say it’s harder to find the sports they want to watch, and more than one in four call it a hassle to use multiple services during a season.
This fragmentation mirrors the early days of entertainment streaming. To counter this, former competitors are collaborating. HUB highlights the rise of “new bundles,” partnerships that unify sports rights across services to simplify access and improve scale.
New tools also aim to reduce friction. Some services help fans track games across platforms or buy short-term passes for key events. These efforts show the industry’s awareness of fan fatigue and its push to restore the convenience that once defined pay TV. Even with these challenges, enthusiasm keeps steady. Fans continue to adapt, proving that while fragmentation frustrates, it isn’t diminishing the passion for live sports.
The big picture
HUB’s research confirms that sports fandom is as strong as ever, but how fans watch is evolving fast. Nearly half of viewers are frustrated by fragmented access across platforms, even as overall engagement continues to climb. For networks, leagues, and streaming platforms, this shifting landscape is both a challenge and an opening. Those streamlining the viewing experience while staying agile across digital channels are driving the next wave of growth. By aligning affordability, accessibility, and authenticity, media players will shape the future of sports storytelling and keep fans connected to the game wherever and however they watch.
The shift to streaming hasn’t just changed what we watch or how we watch, it’s changed everything behind the scenes, too. The premium video playbook has largely been rewritten. And while the audience now enjoys more content and control than ever before, media companies are working just as hard to keep up.
For broadcasters, the challenge can appear especially acute. Unlike streaming-first platforms, broadcasters aren’t digital natives. They are often navigating change while juggling strict regulations, legacy systems, broad audience demographics, and a different media economy. But with the right focus, they can keep pace and also lead. In this article, we explore three areas where broadcasters can take control and future-proof their business and find streaming success.
1. Make the viewer experience the priority
Audiences today have many options to choose from when watching content. While broadcasters still have an edge when it comes to trusted, high-quality content, they can’t afford to take it easy when it comes to UX. The viewing experience – especially the ad experience – can make or break a viewer’s loyalty.
As we’ve seen, advertising is becoming a conduit to access premium video. Viewers aren’t against it; they just don’t want a bad ad experience. Repetitive, irrelevant, or disruptive ads are what turn people away. For broadcasters making their journey into streaming, there are ways to address these issues. Our research at FreeWheel shows that simple steps like managing ad frequency, rotating creative more effectively, and improving relevance go a long way toward keeping viewers engaged.
Tools that smooth out the ad experience can help broadcasters strike the right balance: keeping viewers satisfied while delivering results for advertisers. But it’s not just about tech. It’s also about data. By building stronger first-party data strategies, broadcasters can better understand what drives their audiences’ choices, and how to attract new viewers.
This data can inform everything from better content recommendations to granular ad targeting. It also makes it possible to serve more relevant ads across devices, which matters more than ever as viewing continues to fragment. A data-led approach leads to a viewing experience that feels consistent, relevant, and personal, whether someone’s watching live sports on streaming or catching up on dramas on VOD. That kind of seamlessness builds deeper customer trust, and keeps viewers coming back.
2. Be ready for live, technically and strategically
Live programming has always been a stronghold for broadcasters. Sports, news, and major televised events are all familiar territory. But in the streaming world, live comes with new demands.
When audiences tune in en masse for a live event, there’s no room for error. Spikes in viewership, inventory exclusions, and creative approvals not lining up are just a few of the critical challenges. When they have an impact, it’s not just the experience that takes a hit. It’s also revenue and the value of the inventory.
This is why tech readiness is critical. Broadcasters need the right infrastructure to handle the unpredictability of live events in a streaming environment. That means being able to adjust campaign pacing in real time, ensure creatives are pre-approved and ready to go, and facilitate access to a broader range of advertisers, even those without the optimal tech stack.
Traditionally, programmatic technology has offered an answer to some of these issues. And recent advancements have made it easier to automate and scale ad delivery on live content. Even when viewership spikes unexpectedly, advertisers can still reach their intended audiences, and broadcasters can capture the full value of that demand.
This is where technology and live experience can intersect to create seamless transactions and efficient audience targeting. Broadcasters know how to do live. With the right tools in place, they can now do it better, faster, and more profitably in a streaming world.
3. Streamline access to unified inventory
The push for simpler, more efficient supply paths isn’t new, but with the evolution of the premium video landscape, it has taken on a new meaning. Advertisers want easier, direct access to quality inventory. However, that inventory is now fragmented across screens, channels, and types of transactions. So, while broadcasters have what advertisers seek – premium, brand-safe environments with scalable reach – the trick is making those connections easier in a unified manner.
A streamlined, unified access to inventory doesn’t just help advertisers. It helps broadcasters, too. It enables them to gain better visibility across all demand sources, optimize ad decisions (including pacing and frequency), and reduce friction in transactions. It ultimately unlocks more value across all screens and sales channels.
Bottom line: Focus on the viewer
As the lines between traditional TV and streaming continue to blur, broadcasters who focus on the viewer, live content and unified inventory, can position themselves to lead. Yes, they already have unique advantages, including the quality of the content, audiences at scale and engaged viewers. However, there are other areas that TV stakeholders will need to further work on to compete effectively, not least working together and facilitating access to their inventory.
This is an increasingly important issue which deserves to be looked into separately. Ultimately, broadcast (premium video) quality will continue to be the gold standard. So, it is important that advertisers and their agencies consider these points carefully when planning their media buys.
But, unlike a number of other legacy social networks, the platform continues to go from strength to strength. Back in 2022, I argued on these pages that media companies need a dedicated YouTube strategy, a sentiment that remains equally relevant three years on.
Here are six reasons why many media companies need to reconsider the value they attach to YouTube, and six proven tactics to help maximize their impact and approach to the platform.
YouTube enjoys huge reach and engagement
According to the Business of Apps website, YouTube has more than 2.7 billion monthly active users. Over 238 million of these users are in the U.S., the StatsUp site notes. In terms of reach, that makes it either the biggest, or second largest, social network in the world, depending on your source. Either way, it’s a huge audience.
Lastly, engagement dwarves other social networks. “YouTube takes the lion’s share of … social media time,” commentsSimon Kemp, the Chief Analyst at DataReportal. “The world spends almost twice as much time using YouTube as it spends using the platform’s next nearest rival, TikTok.”
Despite this, many publishers continue to treat YouTube as an afterthought compared to shinier, newer, visual-oriented platforms like the aforementioned TikTok or Instagram.
Esra Dogramaci, a digital news executive and YouTube specialist, who has worked for international broadcasters including Al Jazeera, BBC, DW, and others, agrees. “News organizations [and] publishers should have always been paying attention to YouTube,” she told me. “We often forget that YouTube is the second biggest search engine, and [the] world’s largest video platform.”
It’s a core platform for reaching Gen Z and Gen Alpha
Efforts to more effectively engage younger audiences is a key goal for many media companies. It’s no surprise that YouTube can be a pivotal plank in these strategies. Afterall, as Rande Price, VP, Research at Digital Content Next, recently reflected, “prioritizing video formats that are concise, authentic, and visually native to social platforms is essential to reaching Gen Z.”
Data published at the end of last year found that more than seven in 10 Gen Z consumers (71%) discover new media content (such as music, podcasts, and TV series) through YouTube, only just behind social media as a whole (72%).
Moreover, 73% of U.S. teens aged 13-17 (a mix of Generation Z and Generation Alpha, a demographic born after 2010) say they use YouTube every day. According to insights from the Pew Research Center, that means YouTube is “the most widely used and visited platform” among this age group. That includes 15% who said that their use of the platform is “almost constant.”
Short-form video is growing in popularity
There are multiple ways to harness YouTube to attract younger audiences. As Price points out, “tone, pace, and relevance” are intrinsic to this. Those sentiments are applicable to all content on the platform, including YouTube Shorts, an area seeing considerable growth. Last month, Neal Mohan, YouTube’s CEO, revealed that “YouTube Shorts are now averaging over 200 billion daily views!”
That audience isn’t just Gen Z, although they are a significant share of Shorts consumers.
Publisher’s short video strategies therefore should encompass YouTube, as well as TikTok, and Reels on Facebook and Instagram. These formats can also encourage consumption of long-form video, as well as acting as their own, standalone, genre.
“YouTube Shorts is… the ‘take away’ version prior to the ‘dine in’ experience,” contends Dogramaci. She argues that Shorts can serve as a gateway to your main channel especially if it is fully optimized. (For tips on how to do this, read to the end of the article!)
“It appeals to younger audiences with short-form content,” she says, “provided that you’ve done all the housekeeping in terms of channel and video optimization.”
According to Edison, YouTube is the most popular service for listening to podcasts in the United States, ahead of Spotify and Apple. So, if content creators aren’t distributing their podcasts on YouTube, they are potentially missing out.
Furthermore, “YouTube is often the first place people go when looking for a new podcast,” the platform’s blog claimed earlier this year. To aid with this discovery, in May, the company began releasing a weekly chart of YouTube’s Top 100 podcast shows in the U.S.
And as the differentiation between video and audio content continues to blur, Gen Z is driving much of this trend, Edison found. Their research stated that this age group feels that “video provides a better understanding of context/tone through facial expressions and gestures,” and it also enables consumers to feel “more connected to the podcaster(s).”
It’s big on screens of all sizes
Although the smaller screen garners a considerable amount of YouTube consumption, the growth of connected TV’s (CTV) has also been pivotal in YouTube’s continued growth.
That said, the platform is at pains to point out that this isn’t the same as “the ‘old’ television,” pointing to Shorts (which are popular on TV, just ask my kids), live streams, podcasts, sports, and full shows, as part of the platform’s content mix.
Given these findings, in an age of investment in FAST channels (Free Ad-Supported Streaming Television) it’s a reminder that brands and media companies still need to factor YouTube into their video strategies. Its TV audience is simply too big to ignore.
YouTube matters to news consumers
The variety of content on YouTube, and its reputation as a source for entertainment, influencers, and User Generated Content (UGC) can mask its popularity as a platform for news and information. New data from the Digital News Report 2025 emphasizes this. Around a third of their global sample uses YouTube (30%) for news each week, just behind Facebook (36%). Given that weekly usage of YouTube for any purpose stood at 63% this is a high percentage of global digital news consumers using the platform for news.
Source: Slide 15 of Esra Dogramaci’s presentation (see below)
In major markets such as India, the use of YouTube for news stands at more than 50%, an important consideration for international news brands seeking to gain a foothold in the world’s most populous nation. Large news audiences on the platform can also be found in other major emerging markets such as Nigeria, South Korea, the Philippines, Indonesia, and Brazil.
Making inroads into these markets won’t necessarily be easy for traditional media brands, however, as much of the consumption is centered around what the Report authors refer to as “alternative media voices.” This category includes online influencers and personalities, independent journalists, as well as politicians who can go direct to audiences, by-passing traditional media gatekeepers.
Nevertheless, given concerns about misinformation on YouTube – and other social networks – there are opportunities for trusted news and media brands to meet user needs for news and information. And they are in a position to do so in a manner that also offers the credibility that audiences desire.
Conclusion
YouTube’s reach, variety of content offerings, and resonance with younger and news audiences mean that it is an essential distribution platform for publishers in 2025. Of course, it’s not without its challenges. Around 70% of content is algorithmically recommended, meaning that YouTube’s recommendation engine can divert viewers away from publisher channels to other creators. It can also be very difficult to drive traffic from the site back to your own properties.
Yet, YouTube’s size, versatility, and reach – especially with Gen Z and teens – make it hard to overlook. Whether your goal is audience growth, revenue diversification, or brand-building, a dedicated YouTube strategy will be a must for many content creators. Publishers who invest in understanding and leveraging YouTube’s evolving ecosystem will be best positioned to thrive in the digital content landscape; and the pivotal role YouTube plays in this space.
Bringing it all together: 6 essential tips to successfully implement a YouTube strategy
Esra Dogramaci has been leading teams innovating on YouTube for more than a decade. Her experience includes leading the BBC World Service YouTube channels, through to receiving a YouTube Innovation Grant in 2023. The grant enabled her to develop and iterate on YouTube Shorts, while working as the Managing Editor at SBS, one of Australia’s public broadcasters.
In June 2025, Esra presented a session on YouTube for Changer on behalf of the Google Digital News Initiative on YouTube for busy newsrooms. The presentation is here.
Based on that presentation and our conversation, here are six practical recommendations that will enable media companies to nail their presence on YouTube.
Ditch the “Archive” Mindset: Stop treating YouTube as a mere “archive or simple video upload mechanism,” she says. Many media companies with a broadcast arm fall into the trap of “cutting and pasting TV content onto YouTube.” This material “regularly fail[s] to perform because the audiences are different.”
Meet User Needs: Success on YouTube is “less about volume, and more about understanding your audience and curating an offering that will resonate with them,” Dogramaci advises.
She highlights how former Vox producers Cleo Abram and Johnny Harris use YouTube to illustrate this. They “upload once or a few times a month and their videos will typically perform better” because “they know their audience, so they can engineer their content to perform.”
Presented in a style that “is a far cry from the buttoned down presenter reading your evening TV news bulletin,” their work remains substantial and substantive. It’s not dumbed down and connects with audiences by explaining “why this matters,” or “why you should know,” or “why this affects you.”
Prioritizing the Right Metrics: Don’t get fixated on views alone. “A view can be one second, it can be 10 minutes, it can be the same person watching a clip over and over again.” Instead, Dogramaci advises that the most important performance indicators on YouTube are watch time, subscribers, and active subscribers.
Watch time, representing the “actual amount of content consumed,” is crucial; “the more the better,” as it signals resonance and makes your video more likely to be surfaced.” Think of subscribers as your “loyal fans,” she suggests.
Engineer Every Video for Peak Performance: This means obsessing over the thumbnail, a “shop window” that must entice viewers. Your headline must be catchy, and accurate, supported by keywords, tags, and accurate video descriptions. A great banner, custom URL, and content organized into playlists, are also vital for success.
Embrace Niche and New Formats: The “best performing channels are those that know their audience and don’t try to be everything to everyone.” Even big broadcasters might see that their best-performing content is focused on niches. This content, like Deutsche Welle’s “dress code” series, can be evergreen. In contrast to broadcast, “YouTube content [often] has a much longer shelf life,” Dogramaci says.
Implement Continuous Improvement Don’t just upload and forget. Dogramaci recommends bringing different YouTube teams and channels together to learn from each other. By sharing best practices, Dogramaci helped oversee growth at 20 BBC YouTube channels, akin to “the biggest growth of any off-platform product in those years (300% in watch time and 550% in subscribers).”
In applying these principles, media leaders should avoid simply piling more work onto busy teams. “The bottom line is… always about doing less, just doing it better,” she says.
