Long-form more scalable than short-form branded content, says Nikhil Gandhi of Times Network

Creating content at scale is one major challenge that restricts brands in their content marketing play. Having the right distribution strategy is one way in which brands can scale content. But the first step is the format of the content one chooses.

Nikhil Gandhi, President, Revenue, Times Network, believes that long-form content can provide scale to the brands’ content efforts versus short-form content. He said, “Short-form content is part of small agenda that we drive for brands and is not scalable. The stories that we bring out from long-form content are scalable.”

Times Network’s youth entertainment channel Zoom launched its standalone division of content creation ‘Zoom Studios’ in 2018. In a year, the studio attracted one million subscribers on the back of four original series — The Reunion...Jab They Met Again, Ready 2 Mingle, Imperfect and Mom & Co.

In fact, last year, Myntra inked its biggest content marketing deal on television with Zoom. Under the new partnership, all the shows and anchors of Zoom are being styled by Myntra, which also helps in co-creating content for the channel. The brand is also being featured in the channel's tagline as ‘styled by Myntra'.

The content creation arm of Zoom has seen immense success in terms of monetisation on the back of branded content. Gandhi said, “We commission shows from a planning perspective a year in advance, and my branded content sales happen much before that. We got several brands lined up; we have multiple-year deals signed up with several big brands. So, my model is largely dependent on the brands coming and investing money upfront because you can’t earn much from YouTube.”

Zoom Studios is experimenting in the kind of formats that can be leveraged through web series. The content creation arm is also planning to get into the short film space. A lot of new writers, directors have approached them with their story ideas and even the OTT platforms are open to partner with the studio to create stories for them.

Gandhi said, “When it comes to web series, there is no fixed format. One can make a show from six-seven minutes, 10-30 minutes and from six episodes to 10 episodes. So there is no strict format like that of television, which gives my creative team a leeway to build whatever is successful. So we are not restricting ourselves to formats. We want to get into the short film space.”

Zoom Studios is also building another business model with syndication. The studio is in talks with several platforms across the world — Europe, The US, SouthEast Asia and the Middle East — for syndicating their shows.

Further expanding its reach, Zoom Studios is also launching a new B2B division wherein they will create shows for other platforms such as OTT, broadcasters and advertisers. However, the creation of content under this division will be purely based on the commercial arrangement between the studio and the platform.

Speaking about various commercial arrangements, Gandhi said, “If platforms are investing money upfront and taking care of monetisation, then it is their baby altogether. If we collaborate to build the IP then we will bring our expertise, which we are extremely proud of. We will use our sales force to get the brands. So it depends on the model, if they are going to pay us format fee then I don't have to worry about getting brands on board, they will look into that. If it is an AVOD platform then the money is anyway coming on their way. If it is an SVOD platform, then they have their own business model sketched out.”

Zoom Studios will have a clear differentiation in terms of the content offered under both its B2C and B2B division. The primary B2C division will cater to youth and relationship/stories revolving around the youth whereas the B2B division will span across the division, giving talents and opportunity to explore their creativity.

The content offered by Zoom Studios is available first on its YouTube channel and Facebook and is later broadcast on its television channel Zoom.