Report – Attention Seekers

Posted on: Wednesday 05 July 2017 11:45pm by Lyndsey Smith

What do the digital native 10-16 years want these days and how must today’s producers develop their content accordingly?

Takeaway:

• The audience between the ages of 10 and 16 are the toughest to capture
• It’s important to use many platforms – linear TV is not the primary platform for this age group
• Listening to the audience is key – they know what they want and need from content

Detail:

“No audience is as tough to capture as tweens and teens,” said David Kleeman, SVP of Global Trends and Dubit.

Exploring how the panel are managing to do this, Newsround editor, Lewis James explained how they are changing the way that content is produced. He illustrated his points with juxtaposing examples – the recent Manchester bombing and the current trend of fidget spinners. The two very different pieces demonstrated the importance of engaging with new trends and the need of the audience for emotional impact.

Mark Joseph from AwesomenessTV spoke about being the head of a next generation media company with focus on digital first content. Utilising as many platforms as possible is vital, as linear TV moves to become secondary to most others. CBBC’s Dan Berlinka gave an insight into ‘Dixi’ – the online series created to reflect social media. This online programme allows the audience to interact through comments appearing online next to comments from the show’s characters. This style and blending of content on more than one platform allows the audience to emotionally connect with the stories.

Catherine Simonsen and Marienne Furevold-Borland from Norway’s NRK discussed their hit ‘Skam’, made to “bring teenagers back to NRK”. The programme was developed after conducting research through audience surveys with schools and youth groups, as well as Instagram and Snapchat use.

Creators shared how this new way of creating material and having an element of unpredictability over when content is going to be published has kept the audiences involved, with consumers interacting with the characters and each other online. The speakers stressed how vital it is to talk to the audience – to understand what it is they want and need from the content that is devised for them.