Series Mania buyers weigh up strategies in battle to reach young audiences

Series Mania 2023 gets under way

SERIES MANIA: Buyers from a range of broadcasters at this week’s Series Mania event have been comparing rival strategies to bring elusive young audiences to their content, including FAST channels, mobile phone access and gaming tie-ins.

The discussion took place during a panel called Meet the Buyers – Creative Business Inspiration at the Series Mania festival in Lille, France today.

As the TV market continues to shift from the traditional linear channel model towards digital platforms, VoD and free ad-supported streaming TV (FAST), buyers say they are repositioning their content acquisition strategies to pull in children, teenagers and young adults.

Buyers regard this demographic as a potentially lucrative if elusive audience that can attract advertisers looking to target that age bracket.

“We’re going to start an AVoD service early next year with FAST channels – that is our next stage of development,” said Carles Blanch Bachs, director of programme acquisitions at Spanish pubcaster Corporacio Catalana de Mitjans Audiovisual.

“Our aim is to attract young audiences. It’s the main challenge for all of us buyers around the world. Anyone with kids will know how difficult it is to sit with your children in front of a TV set. It’s challenging but we’re embarking on a mission [to change that] now.”

Executives at Samsung TV, meanwhile, believe the company has unique access to younger audiences with its platforms, which can be accessed directly on both Samsung smart phones and smart TVs.

“On mobile phones, Samsung has a unique position and mobile is a key way to address and reach those young audiences,” said Antoine Chotard, strategic partner development at Samsung TV Europe.

“We can offer content partners, such as digital players who are active on social media with very attractive brands for young adults and teenagers, the chance to distribute their FAST channels on a TV set/screen with us.

“People often view FAST as a way of ‘waking up sleeping beauties’ – bringing old back-catalogue content to a platform. That may have been the case a few years ago, but not anymore. For example, we bought first-window of America’s Got Talent and American Idol content for our FAST platform Samsung TV Plus.

“There is also a lot of talk in the industry about the growing link between gaming and TV. We provide a gaming app which gives us a better understanding of young audiences and what they want to watch. It gives us a unique position to leverage that connection between the two industries.”

However, some executives believe platform-agnostic younger audiences are more concerned with the quality of content as opposed to where they can access it.

“Younger audiences are so important right now, but they don’t care where they find shows,” said Gaelle Armentano Conte, head of rights acquisitions at Italy’s Rai Group-owned production, distribution and buying company Rai Cinema. “It’s more important to tailor the actual content to them rather than the platform.”