“On TV & Video” is a column exploring opportunities and challenges in advanced TV and video.
Content publishers are making fewer distinctions between short- and long-form video.
Short-form video giant TikTok, for example, produced a docuseries for its platform, and Google recently started making YouTube Shorts available on TV screens.
Video creators like Tastemade are also blurring the lines.
Tastemade launched in 2012 to create food-focused video content for social media platforms, including Instagram, Pinterest and YouTube.
As a social-first platform, Tastemade built its viewership base by engaging niche audiences in an environment with little to no “barrier of entry to fandom,” said Jeff Imberman, Tastemade’s head of sales and brand partnerships.
But the exploding growth in connected TV viewership has triggered a “natural and obvious transition” for Tastemade to expand into a broader media company that includes streaming channels, Imberman said.
Tastemade now runs a subscription-based streaming service called Tastemade+, in addition to four FAST channels, including Tastemade Home, which launched last month.
But it hasn’t been a cakewalk.
Streaming has its own host of consumer engagement and ad measurement challenges, Imberman said.
Imberman spoke with AdExchanger.
AdExchanger: Tastemade started out on social. What sparked the transition into streaming?
JEFF IMBERMAN: Tastemade was a video-first company at its core, so it was positioned to follow video viewership trends, including the migration away from cable bundles and into more digital means of consuming media.
It felt like a natural next step for our brand to build our first TV channel using our already-existing short-form video library on social.
How are most consumers watching Tastemade now?
A majority of our viewership actually doesn’t come from VOD-like experiences within our streaming app but from FAST streams in linear or subscription environments like YouTube TV, Xumo, Roku and Samsung TV Plus.
What’s Tastemade’s ads strategy for FAST and VOD?
Our channels and streaming platform have a very traditional ad model. We transact commercial times in 15-, 30- and 60-second spots.
But what makes streaming unique from traditional legacy television is the dual revenue stream of programmatic and direct sales. We have a team of direct sellers signing partnerships with brands and agencies for our streaming channels. We also have a programmatic ad stack that’s monetizing a significant portion of our streaming impressions, and that includes open market, programmatic guaranteed and private marketplace deals.
Tastemade uses the same monetization scheme for AVOD and FAST environments, but there are different benefits between programmatic and direct sales. On the direct side, for example, we can sell really compelling brand sponsorships that just aren’t possible in a programmatic marketplace.
During the pandemic, the trend was for people to watch streaming content on-demand. Are you surprised to see more viewership moving to FAST from VOD?
I’m not surprised, because FAST channels lack a barrier to entry.
For a while, TV viewing trends trained us to associate premium video with on-demand experiences. But now, consumers are increasingly preferring the lean-back environment of FAST. Viewers want a level of content recommendation from publishers.
One reason platforms want to stream Tastemade channels is brand awareness. Familiarity makes content discoverability easier for consumers who are scrolling through an electronic program guide.
What are some of the challenges of getting a new channel off the ground?
Discoverability. It’s a challenge right now in the FAST environment because of how many channels have been thrown on the electronic program guide.
We’re operating on platforms that are exploding with content choices, so, despite our brand equity, we still have to work hard to engage our audience through both marketing and premium content in what’s becoming a very competitive environment.
How does Tastemade engage its audience?
Content flow is very important. Viewers in a lean-back experience expect an intuitive programming flow that makes sense. Tastemade’s channels are thematic because it’s more engaging for users.
We also measure minute-by-minute impressions to generate the biggest possible audience in a channel stream. Measurement is still a challenge, though, because every publisher platform offers different data sets to their programming partners.
What does Tastemade make of streaming’s measurement mess?
The problem is that multiple measurement vendors are in market with their own solutions, and platforms differ in the kinds of data they’re willing to share with programmers. There’s no measurement standard like there was when Nielsen was the uncontested currency.
Tastemade started working with iSpot.tv last year, and iSpot is really helpful for measuring our brand campaigns against demographic audiences on streaming.
Still, it’s a challenge to wear both hats as a programmer and a monetization strategist.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
