{"id":657484,"date":"2013-05-11T11:00:47","date_gmt":"2013-05-11T15:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/paidcontent.org\/?p=229258"},"modified":"2013-05-11T11:00:47","modified_gmt":"2013-05-11T15:00:47","slug":"pay-to-play-can-youtube-succeed-with-its-paid-channel-subscriptions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/657484","title":{"rendered":"Pay to play: Can YouTube succeed with its paid channel subscriptions?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Are you ready to pay for YouTube?\u00a0Earlier this week, YouTube launched paid subscriptions in cooperation with a few select partners<\/a>, resulting in a total of 53 subscription channels that can be accessed for as little as $0.99 per month. The move had been rumored for at least two years, and it\u2019s just the beginning of a much more ambitious strategy that will eventually give every qualifying publisher a self-serve option to launch a channel subscription.
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There may admittedly not be an easy answer to the above\u00a0question, given the nature of YouTube\u2019s subscription model. The site isn\u2019t charging users for an all-access package, but isinstead turning individual channels into paid subscriptions. Some of them will likely fail, while others may well succeed. But you can learn some lessons from YouTube\u2019s past to get a sense of how this paid future will play out.<\/p>\n

To succeed on YouTube, you need to understand YouTube<\/h2>\n

It\u2019s especially worth looking at YouTube\u2019s other ambitious monetization plan — the site\u2019s premium channels, which received sizeable advances from Google to produce higher-quality content in late 2011<\/a>. YouTube\u2019s initial lineup included a lot of A-list celebrities and big-name media brands. Madonna, Tony Hawk, Ashton Kutcher, Reuters and Lionsgate all were part of the initial lineup. They were joined by genuine YouTube-born celebrities like Phil DeFranco and Cenk Uygur, who launched new channels with additional content as part of the content push.<\/p>\n

Guess who succeeded? Here\u2019s a hint: DeFranco\u2019s SourceFed channel<\/a> clocked more than 345 million views to date. Reuters TV<\/a>, on the other hand, only got 11 million views. Many of the outside media brands simply didn\u2019t know how to talk to YouTube\u2019s audience, and as a result failed to get enough traction on the platform. That\u2019s why quite a few of them didn\u2019t make the cut to get additional funding when YouTube renewed its commitment in November. Only 30 to 40 percent of the original channel lineup was part of a second round.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s a lesson that may be true for paid subscriptions on YouTube as well. Brands and personalities who already have a dedicated fan base on the platform will have little trouble asking them for $2 or $3 a month, provided that they come up with an interesting value proposition. Outside brands that want to use YouTube as an additional platform to sell their content may have a much harder time — which is why it was so surprising that the first slate of subscription channels largely consists of outsiders.<\/p>\n

Sure, there\u2019s a market for some of them. But in many cases, that market may not be on YouTube. A sales pitch like \u201cdiscovering movies you\u2019ve never heard of is part of the fun,\u201d as used by the $5-a-month channel BigStar Movies<\/a>, may just not fly with YouTube users when the site also hosts tons of movies we\u2019ve never heard of for free.<\/p>\n

People do pay for niche content, if it\u2019s done right<\/h2>\n

The contrarian argument to this is that there is a proven market for niche content, and there\u2019s no reason that this couldn\u2019t extend to YouTube. In fact, the site already has a subscription success story: Long before YouTube announced its subscription plans, it started offering a subscription package for Indian cricket games in cooperation with Willow.tv.<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s part of Willow\u2019s online subscription service, which is available on a variety of platforms, with Google doing the billing for users subscribing on YouTube. And Willow.tv seems to be doing really well, because it delivers content unavailable elsewhere.<\/p>\n

Other niche players have shown that people are willing to open their wallets as well: Two months ago, Crunchyroll announced that it now has 200,000 paying subscribers<\/a> for its Anime-focused video service. There\u2019s no reason this kind of content wouldn\u2019t work on YouTube as well.<\/p>\n

And people may not just want to pay because of scarcity: Sesame Street videos are widely available online, including on PBS Kids, Sesamestreet.org, YouTube, Netflix and Hulu. But especially on YouTube, it\u2019s often just one click from a cute Elmo video to one of someone setting an Elmo doll on fire. Giving parents an option to access full-length-episodes, and keeping kids glued to the official Sesame Workshop channel, may get quite a few of them to pay a few bucks a month.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not whether YouTube succeeds, but who about who succeeds on YouTube<\/h2>\n

In a way, if YouTube can succeed with its subscriptions seems almost to be the wrong question to ask. It\u2019s more about who can succeed with subscriptions on YouTube – and I suspect that we are going to see many failures and quite a few success stories.<\/p>\n

And if you ask me, my money is on Cenk and Elmo.<\/p>\n

Image courtesy of<\/a> Flickr user\u00a0\u00a0sushi\u2665ina.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

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