Digital Delights

From apps to e-books, digital extensions of kids’ properties have become a top priority for brand owners.

One factor above all others is driving broadcasters and producers to invest more of their time, energy and money into digital extensions of children’s TV brands: it’s what the kids want. When children become fans of a show, they expect to be able to engage with it on all platforms, from apps on smartphones and tablets to online and other digital expressions of their favorite content. In fact, a digital extension might be a viewer’s first—and potentially only—engagement with a TV brand. So the onus is on the producer to make sure it’s a good experience.

It’s a skill set that Rick Glankler, the president and general manager at FremantleMedia Kids & Family, takes increasingly seriously. “Today, kids are digital natives on all platforms,” he says. “They want their content to be available when and where they want it—which means we have to make sure it’s available on all platforms.”

WHERE THE KIDS ARE
Finn Arnesen, the senior VP of global distribution and development at Hasbro Studios, agrees, noting, “There are many ways kids connect to a brand today, whether they discover them through linear TV, YouTube, SVOD platforms or a mobile game. Bringing Hasbro brands everywhere kids are is a challenge, but it’s also an incredible opportunity to push the way we tell stories. It’s not enough to take a clip from a TV series and place it on YouTube or another digital platform. Creative teams need to make each of those digital experiences authentic to the platform and tailored to its users. If correctly done it will lead to greater awareness and affinity for the brand.”

At Entertainment One (eOne) Family, the strategy has been to work with “a wide range of creative studios specializing in different forms of digital development to create strong digital experiences,” reports Olivier Dumont, the company’s managing director.

There’s no question that kids’ expectations have gone far beyond finding exclusive content online, although that remains a central digital proposition. For example, Kids Industries developed an immersive digital experience for eOne’s preschool hit Peppa Pig, including a new website and two apps, Peppa’s Paintbox and Peppa’s Activity Maker.

In the case of eOne’s new show PJ Masks, the comprehensive digital strategy included music videos, a variety of extra online content and free-to-download apps that allow the user to become a character in the show and engage in gameplay. The digital brand extensions allow children to continue to engage with the brand beyond the TV show by finding out more about the characters, playing games and watching clips.

LET THE GAMES BEGIN
Meanwhile, the gaming and VR specialist Secret Location helped create a multi-layered gaming app to accompany eOne’s new comedy animation Winston Steinburger & Sir Dudley Ding Dong, produced by Sticky Pictures for TELETOON in Canada and ABC ME (formerly ABC3) in Australia.

“We have created a fun multi-level gaming app aimed at 6- to 11-year-olds,” Dumont says. “There are different ways in which we can use the Winston & the Distractor Beam app, but we think it’s best for broadcasters to pay for it and make it free to download to viewers. Broadcasters can attract viewers to the show by offering an on-screen code that will unlock further levels of the game, which can be played on smartphones or online. It’s our most sophisticated gaming app yet and a neat way to make sure that audiences who engage with the digital gaming experience are motivated to return to the linear broadcast.”

Hasbro Studios has been working with several gaming partners, among them Backflip Studios, in which the toy giant holds a majority stake. “Backflip is tasked with producing new and inventive mobile games based on our top franchise brands,” says Arnesen. “Earlier this year we celebrated the successful launch of a real-time combat strategy game titled Transformers: Earth Wars and you can expect to see more from other Hasbro brands in the near future.”

Dumont says that eOne is planning increasingly ambitious digital versions of kids’ brands, revealing that he is working with Secret Location on how virtual reality and augmented reality (VR and AR) could be combined with children’s properties to create new immersive forms of digital entertainment.

The phenomenal success of Pokémon GO, which is the fastest-growing app in history, has proven that AR can be a mass-market technology and many kids’ content producers and tech companies are sitting up and taking notice, says Dumont.

Early indications are that VR and AR are going to be most relevant to the 6-to-11 set and older, given their fondness for gaming apps. Preschoolers are, frankly, bamboozled by the concept of VR. Whatever the relevance of AR and VR to the kids’ market, developing a successful digital brand extension involves coming up with an appropriate strategic plan, which can be outlined right at the outset of a show.

“We build in original short-form digital episodes to our productions from the very beginning,” Hasbro’s Arnesen says. “Approaching the creation process this way means we’re not focused on digital extension as much as a seamless integration between linear television and various digital platforms. This process remains the same across all genres.”

“Whatever your ambitions, [a show’s] target age demographics and genre are important in shaping the digital plan,” says Frank Saperstein, the executive VP of kids, family and animation at Tricon Films & Television. “A live-action drama would need a different approach than a comedy animation aimed at 6- to 11-year-olds. With preschoolers, there are the added complications of a range of compliance issues to consider, as well as the parents’ role as gatekeepers.”

BRIDGING THE AGE GAP
FremantleMedia’s Glankler agrees that “there is a big division between preschoolers and 6-plus viewers when it comes to the digital experience—they engage differently. Preschoolers are still primarily looking for lean-back type experiences when they watch content, and any interactive material is probably best to be more story-based. By the age of 6 and above, kids are more into the excitement of discovery of more content and getting involved in more active gameplay.”

For example, with FremantleMedia’s Kate & Mim-Mim, preschoolers can dip into a series of YouTube music videos, which can also be accessed via the Kate & Mim-Mim Facebook page. For a live-action kids’ drama in the School of Rock vein, a likely digital extension would be a backstage or after-show video exclusive, or a music video available to watch online or download. An animated comedy series like FremantleMedia’s Danger Mouse, meanwhile, would suit a gaming app. “Our original online game for the first season was wildly successful, so now we are creating a version for the BBC offering gameplay for younger kids as a way to attract the next generation of viewers to the show,” Glankler says.

For live-action kids’ properties, digital extensions have to be more meticulously pre-planned, advises Jonathan Laor, CEO of Applicaster, a leading developer of apps for broadcasters. That’s because all digital content has to be planned and acquired at the same time as the TV show itself is recorded.

“Animation is more forgiving—you don’t have to think about everything in advance, and you can go back and produce and dub more content as your digital strategy evolves,” Laor adds.

According to Laor, the majority of your energy and investment should be directed toward the development of apps on all devices—particularly mobile and tablet, iOS and Android—followed by TV platforms such as Apple TV and Google’s Chromecast.

BRAND BUILDING
There’s no doubt that digital development pays dividends, as Tricon’s Saperstein underlines. “Digital iterations of TV shows allow you to start marketing content and build a global audience before you hit the air. On Counterfeit Cat, our animated comedy co-pro for Disney XD worldwide and TELETOON, in addition to the 52×11-minute show, we produced 11×2-minute shorts. We released the show on a linear platform in the U.K. in May but not until June in the U.S., and it won’t be seen in Canada until December 2016. We have been using the two-minute digital shorts on YouTube. Kids in the U.K. were blogging about episodes, and kids in the rest of the world have been reading them. Easy, straightforward marketing play—it was pretty successful.”

Saperstein adds that every couple of days, he and his team check YouTube to see how the shorts are performing—and dig into where they have been pirated. “We discuss whether we need to take [the pirated versions] down.”

He continues, “Being able to use this global community is an advantage in publicizing and marketing your show. It allows you to paint outside the lines, by which I mean keeping shows and characters present in the minds of the audience even when the show isn’t on the air.”

Applicaster’s CrossMates second-screen solution is one way in which apps are being created by third parties as white-label solutions to offer fans 24/7 digital engagement with entertainment brands beyond the broadcast window. It’s designed to allow viewers to engage in a continuing conversation with their heroes in TV shows when the show is on and off the air. Viewers are rewarded for extended digital engagement on mobiles or tablets with tailored text messages from a character, exclusive information and prizes.

“It amounts to a mobile extension of the TV show with synchronized second-screen activity,” explains Laor. “You can integrate sponsored products into the conversations and provide followers with discounts and coupons. And remind them to tune in to the next show. This kind of digital engagement extends the life of shows for viewers beyond airtime and can work for reality TV, teen series and cartoons. As long the content has clear characters.”

PILOT POTENTIAL
Another advantage of digital development is it can act as a pilot, hothousing new linear content, says Tricon’s Saperstein. The company is on board a series of 104 2-minute comedy shorts, Me, Myself & My Selfie, a French/Canadian co-pro created by Savoir FER and REAZ. The non-verbal concept features a character who tries to take the perfect selfie to attract friends but keeps messing up. “We developed it thinking it would work for Netflix or mobile downloads where the first one is free and the rest are pay,” Saperstein says. “But we found that broadcasters were interested in it for digital and linear as interstitials.”

The lines between traditional media and digital are completely blurred, certainly for anybody under the age of 12, says Saperstein. “As many kids now watch media in a nonlinear time-shifted space as watch broadcast content—something that broadcasters have to be increasingly aware of when analyzing who is watching.”

The other significant benefit of digital from a broadcaster and producer’s point of view is the potential of creating new revenue streams. Time spent on online viewing can be commercialized, apps can be charged for and exclusive content can be pay per view.

Glankler is excited about FremantleMedia Kids & Family’s latest CBBC project, Bitz & Bob. Set for a 2017 release, the CGI-animated com­­­edy adventure from British animation company Jellyfish Pictures features an 8-year-old female inventor and her younger brother engaging with the principles of science, technology, engineering, arts and math to solve problems that crop up in their lives. In terms of digital, FremantleMedia has created a companion live-action show, Bitz & Bob Let’s Make It, which gives viewers a step-by-step guide to making what they saw in the episode for themselves—from lean back to lean forward, and engaging directly with the brand on a personal level. Let’s Make It will offer kids (and parents) a pathway to retail too, with some of the ideas available in kit form in the shops. “It’s offering the right form of content and a path to purchase,” Glankler says. “You can watch it, make it and go out and buy it. It’s going to be revolutionary for us.”

One of the key questions for creators is how to build e-commerce successfully into digital media. It can be a difficult trick to pull off, particularly with content aimed at children.

“In the gaming world it has tended to be the add-ons to free downloadable games that generate the money, typically in a shooter game by buying more weapons or firepower,” Tricon’s Saperstein says. “That’s more difficult to replicate in the kids’ and family world because kids don’t have access to the credit card and, unsurprisingly, parents don’t want them to have that access.”

THE MONETIZATION QUESTION
Laura Tapias, General Manager of LATAM and Spain at Applicaster, advises that e-commerce in kids’ TV can be a “delicate” business, “but there are ways around it. For example, the food brand Danone has successfully offered free monthly subscription codes to kids’ entertainment brands in family packs and paid for that privilege. You just have to be a bit more creative to make this work.”

Saperstein adds: “It’s more about building an audience into a community and then finding a way to monetize that community, rather than direct monetization of the show.”

That’s the direction Tricon is taking with the revamp of its “tweenybopper” talent-show format The Next Star. “We need to bring it up to date with kids’ fast-changing media consumption habits,” declares Saperstein. “The touring audition show component of The Next Star will need a website where kids can vote and post their submissions, which will be the focus of the show’s digital community.”

Whatever the approach adopted, it’s key that the digital offering finds a way of standing out from the crowd. And the digital world is certainly a crowded place. There are over 2 million apps each on the Apple App Store and Google Play, and research shows that on average an app has just three seconds to make an impact. Even if kids find you and download your app, you are not yet in the clear: the majority of apps are only opened once, destined to languish unloved on phones until deleted.

Experts agree that to make apps stand out, developers should keep it simple and build games with a clear understanding of the play patterns of their target demographic.

“If you have a very strong content brand but less well-produced digital destinations beyond the TV experience, then you might not have a continuous direct touchpoint with your audience,” Applicaster’s Laor says.

The danger then is that your audience goes off to YouTube or other content-rich platforms where, Laor suggests, it is all too easy for them to get distracted. “It has no cost or complexity, which kids love. They use it all the time, and while YouTube serves brand discovery, it also serves brands [being forgotten].”

Another tip is to keep a close eye on what others are doing. Development moves fast in digital, so learning from imitating what works for others and avoiding what does not is a good way of moving forward. Getting something done and out there a month earlier is probably going to be better than waiting for something to be perfect. And don’t be afraid to try something new.

Ultimately, success in digital is based on the same fundamentals as success in TV—it all comes down to strong storytelling, says Hasbro’s Arnesen.

“My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic and Transformers: Robots in Disguise both have strong digital engagement because they offer fans rich, exciting new stories, week in and week out. Extending those stories on digital platforms allows us to delve deeper than ever before into the show’s characters and bring fans inside the brand with exclusive short-form content, games, apps, fan votes and everything in between.”

Pictured: FremantleMedia Kids & Family’s Bitz & Bob.