Our real-world testing was highlighted in the Harvard Business Review
Whatever you test, think small. And sippable. No one has the time to navigate the ocean anymore.
How do you survive abundance?
If that sounds like a strange question, just ask anyone in the media business who is trying to attract new customers. When everyone is drowning in an ocean of content, offering another glassful is a tough sell.
After decades of hustling to adapt to the advent of digital, media companies now have to hustle even more. What can they do to create real value for customers?
We think there is an opportunity to shift from a mentality of ‘content provider’ to one of ‘content service provider.’ What’s the difference? At the risk of extending the metaphor too far: don’t just offer the opportunity for subscribers to set sail across a content ocean; instead, offer a navigable pond or lake, too, maybe even with a trusty guide.
Free content has bedeviled the media business for decades. It started with companies like Napster blatantly infringing on copyrights by sharing music via peer-to-peer networks. A little litigation later, the dam was rebuilt.
But it didn’t matter for very long. The rise of so-called user-generated content gave birth to a creator movement, and suddenly free content, albeit of varying quality, was everywhere.
How do media companies compete with free? By offering gigantic pools of mostly high-quality content, so there’s no need to swim anywhere else.
On its face, it sounds like a good strategy. After all, as a consumer, it’s easier to rationalize paying for the handful of top shows you want if you're getting ‘so much more!’.
The problem is, more is not always more. As content—both free and paid—has proliferated, consumers are maxed out. They are looking for ways to navigate rising seas of virtually every type of content.
How do we know? Take a look at winning strategies in the content world:
Mini-Subscriptions. From Tiktok to YouTube, creators are (still) on the rise—and making money. What’s changed is the rise of mini-subscriptions on platforms like Substack. Individuals like Heather Cox Richardson offer a point of view and an oasis of calm in a chaotic content environment.
Talent Cooperatives. When talent drives the revenue, why shouldn’t it own the company? Companies like Puck are partly owned by their talent, who are compensated on the number of subscriptions they drive.
A La Carte Menus. Want to subscribe only to New York Times Cooking and skip the news? You got it. Giant content pools are being broken down into pieces (some of which are still pretty giant, tbh).
So you’ve got a lot of content and you’re looking for growth. What should you test?
1. Something special.
For one Spark No. 9 media client, subscription growth for an all-you-can-eat model was starting to slip. But the underlying content was valuable—it just took a lot of effort to find what was personally relevant.
What worked? Creating ‘buckets’ of content that aligned to audience segments. We tested multiple buckets of content with lots of audience segments that seemed like a good match. The buckets had lower customer acquisition costs with corresponding audiences compared with marketing the entire trove of content to a general audience.
Making content 'just for you' shows you care about your audience.
2. Something human.
In an era of AI, people want content delivered by real live humans. Consider testing new products that are created by an individual or two. Will they cannibalize your giant content pool? Not if they’re expressly designed for an incremental audience. Also, this is why you test, so you know the pitfalls before you launch.
Years ago, the now-defunct Tribeca Shortlist offered streaming movies curated by humans in the form of shortlists. Ahead of their time? We think so.
3. Something tiny.
Will someone subscribe to a single football game? Apparently so.
Whatever you test, think small. And sippable. No one has the time to navigate the ocean anymore.
