Name: How New Media Platforms Can Compete with Facebook and Buzzfeed
Uploaded: 2016-11-03
Duration: 4 min 31 s
Description: Editor-in-Chief of Ozy.com Carlos Watson explains

This focus on the new and the next or what I would call enterprise journalism- Yeah- Which I'm very passionate about, I mean I love it I believe in it. But increasingly our business seems to belive that you have to kind of follow the herd and weigh in on those high traffic Stories that everyone's talking about, that's the only way to get big, and get scale and to win. So do you think that you don't need that scale to win, or do you think that with this kind of product you will eventually get that scale? Well I think the answer was in your earlier segment [ LAUGH ] Facebook seven billion quarter [ LAUGH ] They're happy to have Buzzfeed, and Mike, and Bussell, and Skim, and all the other [ UNKNOWN ] just repeat the same stories over and over again. Because they end up with $ 7 billion of profit in their coffers, and they say it was a really good quarter. I think that people are more selective than that. I think that people have known That there's an opportunity to get an Apple, an HBO, a Tesla, back in the day I would call a Starbucks was in this category, meaning a really premium offering at a reasonable price. And so when people knew they could get that, they went out of their way for that Starbucks cup of coffee, or once upon a time for those Nike shoes, or for that wonderful Sex in the City show, or the Wire. And so, I think people will deal with less as long as it's super high quality. You call it enterprise journalism, I call it cutting edge profiling the new and the next. And so far we're seeing really good results. Not only in terms of our traffic and our audience. But in terms of how we, I hate to use this word cuz I know it sounds jargony, but how we monetize it. So, but like it or not, people are gonna lump you into this sector with these big behemoths. Buzzfeed, as you mentioned, they are incredibly enormous, and Vice, and so how do you compete with them? I mean. I think a little bit the way some of the insurgents along the way have, whether those. Insurgents have been called HBO or Tesla, or others. And so we thought about it in at least two ways. One again, I think our ambition has to be different. If all we're gonna do is just repeat the same Kardashian or Cat story, that's for Buzzfeed, that's for Mic, that's for Bustle, that's for those guys. But if we really think that we can introduce you to rising trends and interesting stars, and we think that you've got, A curiosity gap that we can fill there, then I think we can do that. The other piece is how we end up making money. I mean, to give Shane and the guys at Vice a tone of credit, I think they were pioneers in saying if we just rely upon advertising, we'll do well, right? In the way that Huff Po and others have. But if we think about a more diversified revenue stream, that in their case included creating ads, essentially becoming a creative agency in television, that's something that's much sturdier. Now they're the only ones really in our space who have done it, until Ozzie. And so we think, similarly, there's an opportunity not only around ads. In television but also we think a big opportunity is a live event. So do we at Fortune. Yeah and you know what? And to your guy's credit you guys really use the Atlantic I would say have been two of the really pioneers there. And I think you guys Fortune women conference I think has been one of the few new conferences I would say in the last decade that really has matted. I mean South by Southwest has been there for a number of years Davos has been there for a number of years, Coachella and others. It's the value of bringing these people together in an environment that people really wanna connect. I'm gonna ask you one other thing. Your site is aimed at millennials, I mean it's a young person's site. Or we like to say it's aimed at the curious, many of whom are millennials. That's true. We've been lucky enough to have Bill Gates Call us one of his favorite and regular places to go, and he's not quite a millennial. And, but yes, we are 75 % millennial and gen x. So my question is so do you think they actually have a longer attention span than others would have us believe with stories like 10 things that go better with ketchup, which is one of my all time favorites [ UNKNOWN ] [ LAUGH ] Do they really want more, more depth? I think they do. I mean look, there will always be people who have an appetite for buzz feed and mic, and the like, right? And they're always gonna look at cat videos and simple stuff and all power to those guys, they're gonna do really well and I think that's great. But I do think that people want stuff that's both clever and flavorful. And I don't think they think they should have to choose, right? And I think part of the reason why HBO had so much success, not just with millennials but a whole generation of people. Part of the reason why Netflix is having a bit of moment here is that they had figured out that you can create shows that don't have to be either smart or sexy But you actually smart and sexy, right? And that you can do both. And so that's what we're trying to do as well. [ SOUND ] [ BLANK_AUDIO ]

Editor-in-Chief of Ozy.com Carlos Watson explains