YouTube Plugs Away at Content Development
Not to be outdone by TV (though it currently is), YouTube is prepping a second round of content investment into its growing list of channels.
Their new round of investments will go to 30-40% of YouTube's 100 content developers, based on their success rate over the past year. Initial content developers each received between $1 million to $5 million in development money from YouTube last year.
The big winners from Year One? Programming for young demographics in humor, music, cars and sports. Losers? Celebrities and solid content without an equal push for building the channel's audience.
"Celebrity alone isn't enough to drive it," said Courtney Holt, COO of Maker Studios (creator of Tutele, Mom's View and forthcoming Maker Music). "You need to have a commitment to the platform, to understand how to build your audience."
Audience is everything for these budding content developers: they can't run their own ads (vs. YouTube's) until they pay back the money to YouTube. How? By garnering 50 million views for every $1 million invested. If they haven't hit that number by now/end of Year One, it'll be tough to get an allowance when Big Daddy opens up his wallet again.