{"id":15064,"date":"2018-10-03T14:41:58","date_gmt":"2018-10-03T18:41:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/bbc-childrens-alice-webb\/"},"modified":"2018-10-03T17:49:41","modified_gmt":"2018-10-03T21:49:41","slug":"bbc-childrens-alice-webb","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/bbc-childrens-alice-webb\/","title":{"rendered":"BBC Children’s Alice Webb"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Despite a wealth of competition, both linear and digital, BBC Children\u2019s reigns supreme in the British kids\u2019 market. Across CBeebies, CBBC and BBC iPlayer Kids, the British public broadcaster is serving its mission of educating, and entertaining, young audiences across all the platforms they are using. Alice Webb, the director of BBC Children\u2019s, is committed to that public-service mission, which, she says, is more important than ever. Ahead of attending MIPJunior to speak about the role of children\u2019s programming on public broadcasters, Webb shared with TV Kids<\/em> her strategy for maintaining BBC Children\u2019s ratings, and relevance, to British youth audiences today.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong> What\u2019s driving the overall success of the BBC Children\u2019s portfolio?
\nWEBB:<\/strong> The simple answer is the content. I\u2019m really proud of the range of content we have. It\u2019s a real breadth. We\u2019re still the most-watched and the most-loved [kids\u2019 channels] in the U.K. The other thing that is helping us drive that is our ability to get content to children in the way they want it. BBC iPlayer was ahead of its time and it still continues to be right at the top end of video on demand in terms of the experience. We have a full-fledged kids\u2019 version of it. So we\u2019re making sure we have the right content and are getting it to children in the way that they want it.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong> How is the dedicated kids\u2019 iPlayer doing? What have you learned from the data there about how your audiences are interacting with your content?
\nWEBB:<\/strong> It\u2019s really interesting. It works particularly well for the youngest audience. It\u2019s only an app on mobile and tablets\u2014it\u2019s not on connected TVs\u2014so it\u2019s not on every device. We see week in and week out that iPlayer Kids is visited even more frequently than the main iPlayer. If you\u2019re on iPlayer Kids, you love it even more than being on the iPlayer. There\u2019s something that\u2019s really working for that younger audience with iPlayer Kids.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong> How are you using the data from both digital and linear to inform your programming decisions?
\nWEBB:<\/strong> That\u2019s a really important part of what we do. We have a much broader range of measures that we look at because what represents value to us isn\u2019t just money and eyeballs. We have a strong public-service remit, so it\u2019s about making sure we\u2019re delivering for everybody and that we have a broad range of genres. We judge our shows against lots of different criteria, which means that it\u2019s as much art as it is science. There\u2019s a good dollop of science in there, but of course, there has to be a good degree of art as well.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong> Tell us about your programming teams\u2019 efforts to source and develop content that is inclusive and reflective of all kids in the U.K.
\nWEBB:<\/strong> That\u2019s a topic that is close to our hearts. We get a lot of recognition for the range of diversity that we have on our channels and in our content. It\u2019s a natural part of what we do. Pablo<\/em> features an autistic little boy. It\u2019s a beautiful show that has captured the heart of the entire nation. Apple Tree House<\/em> is from the same stable as Rastamouse<\/em>. It\u2019s live-action drama for CBeebies. It\u2019s set in an inner-city tower block and has an incredibly diverse cast and, excitingly, a diverse crew as well. So it\u2019s not just in front of the camera, but behind the camera, too. We\u2019re pushing that. We have schemes to bring on new, diverse writers, and when I talk about diversity, that is literally in every direction. It\u2019s not just about ethnicity or disability. We\u2019ve had some powerful stories of kids who are discovering things about their own identity. We had a BAFTA-winning show about a transgender [child], My Life: I Am Leo<\/em>. So [diversity is] completely part of our DNA and it\u2019s almost hard to talk about it because it\u2019s something that just happens.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong> The BBC is one of the few backers of high-end children\u2019s drama. What\u2019s the key to getting it right, especially for preschoolers?
\nWEBB:<\/strong> We had a real desire to bring live-action drama to preschoolers, and boy have they rewarded us for that! They absolutely love those shows. We bring the same standards, the same expectations and the same craft to preschool as we do for our older children. A lot of our writers are writing for grown-up TV as well. The way we do children\u2019s drama, it\u2019s not about compromising, it\u2019s not about dumbing down. We believe children deserve the very, very best. And I think that\u2019s an ethos we\u2019ve kept at our hearts. We\u2019re expanding into the 12 to 16 bracket as well, so you\u2019ll see some new dramas coming down the line there. It\u2019s the age-old stories of rites of passage, loyalty, betrayal, finding your place in the world. Overall we are as exacting with our children\u2019s dramas as we are with BBC grown-up dramas.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong> Tell us about the importance of your factual productions. What have been some recent stand-outs for you?
\nWEBB:<\/strong> My Life<\/em> holds a special place on CBBC for us because it is children telling their own stories. It never ceases to amaze me the emotional cut-through that children can get by telling their own stories, whether it\u2019s I Am Leo<\/em> or The Boy on the Bicycle<\/em> or one about a child whose parents have Alzheimer\u2019s. We have CBeebies factual as well. There\u2019s Do You Know?<\/em>, Maddie Moate\u2019s show. And our Newsround <\/em>service for children continues to be the gold standard. That has now gone international, so you\u2019ll find versions in several countries in Africa. We got an incredible response nationally and internationally when we covered the Manchester Arena bombing last year. That whole sense of how you talk to children about these types of attacks, especially since that one was aimed at children [when terrorists bombed an Ariana Grande concert]. And then I have to mention Blue Peter<\/em>, which is a flagship show and it\u2019s about to be 60! I will be flying back from MIPCOM a couple of days early to attend the 60th birthday of Blue Peter<\/em>, which by any standard is the most astonishing achievement.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong> What do you think it is about that show that has allowed it to last for so long?
\nWEBB:<\/strong> I think it\u2019s a world record for the longest children\u2019s show ever. It could be the longest-running TV show ever. It\u2019s still as relevant today as it was in the days that it started. It taps into everything and anything children are interested in, whether that\u2019s a presenter skydiving in some daredevil way through to campaigning and saving the environment to learning a new sport. Literally everything. We have amazing competitions and of course the ability to win your Blue Peter<\/em> badge, of which there are now quite a few! People like you and I spend a lot of time talking about the world of digital and what it means for children. We receive about 75,000 letters into Blue Peter<\/em> every year. Kids are still engaging with it as much as they ever have done.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong> What were some of the things you learned from your international compatriots at the Children\u2019s Global Media Summit that BBC hosted in Manchester last year about the issues they are facing in their markets?
\nWEBB:<\/strong> One of the things that was a hot topic at the summit, which we\u2019re all grappling with, is that our content lives on many different platforms in many different territories. As responsible content makers, we\u2019re wrestling with, What if my content is on a platform that isn\u2019t as responsible as I am? We had a big open forum devoted to this subject and what level of responsibility we should have as the content makers versus the platform providers. Nobody works in this business without a massive degree of love for our audience. We\u2019d like to see that reflected more by some of the platform providers. As content creator and broadcaster and platform provider, we have that level of trust and safety and responsibility. We\u2019d like to see that with others.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong> What are your big-picture priorities for BBC Children\u2019s in the year to two ahead?
\nWEBB:<\/strong> We\u2019ll be bringing new shows to the channel and to iPlayer for the older age group. We\u2019re going to be getting behind a smaller number of brands in a bigger way. Everybody is clear that if you\u2019re going to break through a very busy, noisy landscape, you\u2019ve got to have a fewer number of titles that punch above their weight. We\u2019ll be doing that. I\u2019m excited that we\u2019re adding more ways for children to connect to the brands and the characters and stories they love. We\u2019ve got apps for CBeebies around stories and games. We\u2019re adding to that with new creative apps coming down the line. We\u2019ve launched CBBC Buzz for that older age group. We\u2019re increasingly doing more around kids\u2019 online wellbeing. At the summit, we launched BBC Own It, which is a great website about helping kids to be empowered to own their online lives. You\u2019ll see more from us in the next six months in that space.<\/p>\n

TV KIDS:<\/strong> Can you give me a bit of a preview of what you\u2019ll be talking about at MIPJunior concerning the importance of kids\u2019 public-service broadcasting?
\nWEBB:<\/strong> Just that\u2014the importance of it. And the fact that it\u2019s more important than ever that there is a strong public-service broadcaster as a staple of a kid\u2019s media diet. Making short-term decisions is easy. We all create a patchwork of funding to get a show made. And if we\u2019re not careful, what we\u2019ll be doing is selling our future. If we\u2019re all reliant on big SVOD platforms, we risk finding we\u2019ve sold our future and our ability to fund shows. Public-service broadcasting needs to make sure that it\u2019s still funded well enough around the world to be a great partner.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The director of BBC Children\u2019s shares her strategy for maintaining ratings, and relevance, to British youth audiences today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":290,"featured_media":15065,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[1829,4045],"class_list":["post-15064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","","category-interviews","tag-alice-webb","tag-bbc-children","pmpro-has-access"],"yoast_head":"\nBBC Children's Alice Webb - TVKIDS<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/bbc-childrens-alice-webb\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"BBC Children's Alice Webb - TVKIDS\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The director of BBC Children\u2019s shares her strategy for maintaining ratings, and relevance, to British youth audiences today.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/bbc-childrens-alice-webb\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"TVKIDS\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-10-03T18:41:58+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2018-10-03T21:49:41+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2017\/07\/Alice-Webb-MIPCOM2018-TH.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"434\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Mansha Daswani\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Mansha Daswani\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"9 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/bbc-childrens-alice-webb\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/bbc-childrens-alice-webb\/\",\"name\":\"BBC Children's Alice Webb - TVKIDS\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2018-10-03T18:41:58+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2018-10-03T21:49:41+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/#\/schema\/person\/83da304c8bad8bfdb3edd7eb47cfe5ad\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/bbc-childrens-alice-webb\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/bbc-childrens-alice-webb\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/bbc-childrens-alice-webb\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"BBC Children’s Alice Webb\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/\",\"name\":\"TVKIDS\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/worldscreen.com\/tvkids\/#\/schema\/person\/83da304c8bad8bfdb3edd7eb47cfe5ad\",\"name\":\"Mansha Daswani\",\"description\":\"Mansha Daswani is the editor-in-chief and associate publisher of World Screen. 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