Original video series are scoring some big wins on Snapchat

Simon Owens
The Business of Content
3 min readJun 12, 2020

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Original series are scoring some big wins on Snapchat

Why it’s interesting: “In the first quarter of 2020, more than 60 shows on Snapchat attracted at least 10 million unique viewers each month, compared to 50 shows in the fourth quarter of 2019.”

Facebook News is steering clear of horse race politics, for now

Why it’s interesting: “The most notable thing about Facebook News is that it includes almost none of the stories that do well on the rest of Facebook.”

Paid subscribers picked up during quarantine are churning at low rates

Why it’s interesting: Readers who subscribed during the pandemic are less likely than average to cancel their subscriptions once a trial period is up.

Amazon goes easy on large news publishers

Why it’s interesting: At any point a tech company can yank away your distribution/revenue and hand it over to a mainstream media outlet that did nothing to earn it.

This artist built a huge following on YouTube with time-lapse videos

Why it’s interesting: Jono Dry’s time-lapse videos of his drawing have generated tens of millions of views. Here’s how he leveraged platforms like YouTube to become a world-famous artist.

The slight wording changes that can increase subscriber conversion rates

Why it’s interesting: Some interesting insights here about how slight tweaks to wording and pricing can help grow subscriptions and reduce churn.

The New York Times is now competing with Substack and Patreon

Why it’s interesting: Some star journalists have come to realize that they don’t get to actually benefit from all the wealth they’re generating for their employers.

What we’ve learned so far about monetizing virtual events

Why it’s interesting: Publishers have been vigorously testing out virtual events over the past few months. This article takes stock of whether they’ve been met with real consumer interest.

How Google’s Panda update killed a content farm

Why it’s interesting: “There was no doubt about it: Google was killing us, and though none of us wanted to admit it at the time, we deserved to die.”

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