Web TV Service SeeSaw Launches
SeeSaw, the new Arqiva-owned online TV service that rose from the ashes of Project Kangaroo, launched last Wednesday.
The new service aims to offer ‘Best of British’ content free to users as well as international programming which will form part of a paid for service to be launched later this year.
At present, SeeSaw can offer 3000 hours of content, a mix of ‘catch up’ and archived programming, from deals they’ve signed with the BBC, Channel 4 and Channel 5. A further 2000 hours, largely sourced from the US, will be added when the ‘paid for’ service launches in a few months time.
Advertisers will be able to purchase ‘unstoppable’ 60 second ad breaks either before or during the streamed programmes as well as being offered other commercial opportunities such as programme sponsorship. However, the waters are muddied somewhat by the fact that Channels 4 & 5 retain the right to sell advertising within their own programming, so SeeSaw will not be selling all the available inventory on the site.
SeeSaw is launching into a small but already crowded marketplace. All the major broadcasters already offer their own catch up services – the BBC reported over 100m downloads requests on its iPlayer in December alone – and higher profile sites such as YouTube and MSN Video Player are already in this arena. To complicate things further, the US based web TV service Hulu is reported to be entering the UK market some time later this year and hoping to line up an exclusive content deal with ITV.
Content will be king in this battle for viewers – much of what is available on SeeSaw is also available on its competitors – so securing exclusive content programming probably direct from the production houses, is going to be key. The winner will be the operator who manages to offer the most desirable content in the simplest way, and gets the pricing and the pricing model right – either subscription or transactional.
From a advertiser standpoint, those supporting the service are the larger FMCG and retail brands such as Cadbury, Guinness and Sainsbury’s but services such as SeeSaw could prove an attractive route to market for premium and luxury brands in the future. Web TV services are predicted to be more popular amongst premium consumers who’s TV viewing is lighter and for whom ‘cherry-picking’ their viewing is both more attractive and more achievable than heavier TV consumers. It also allows advertisers to tap into the more upmarket profile of BBC viewers for the first time. And SeeSaw arguably offers a more ‘premium’ environment for luxury advertisers than rivals such as YouTube.
For the time-being, we’d advise you to ‘wait and see’. By the end of this year we’ll understand more clearly how big this market is set to become and who’s likely to win the audience share battle.
