• by Tobi Elkin  @tobielkin, June 6, 2017

Video content creation isn’t cheap, so what’s the recipe for success in monetizing video? And what’s the strategy for creating video content for all the different channels—platforms like Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Snapchat, and Instagram, along with over-the-top TV (OTT) brands?

Those were just two of the questions panelists addressed at MediaPost’s Publishing Insider Summit on Tuesday.

Developing a strategy in which video content can live on many different platforms is critical, said Andrea Mazey, director, online video & partnerships, Bonnier Corp. “Sometimes it’s not possible to create just one piece of content that can do that. You need to know which platforms are critical to your business.”

Mazey added that her company thinks more about where there’s an immediate return on investment “to a fault, versus where the audience is.” She believes that the focus should be on where the “eyeballs are" rather than ROI.

According to Richard Routman, president, Minute Media, whose business is fan-generated video content, “it’s more about creating video that can sit inside of fan-originated content. We’re trying to build the right tonality to correspond with our brands. We do all short-form video.” Minute Media's audience is age 30 and under.

Andrew Budkovsky, chief revenue officer, Digital Trends, said his organization thinks of video holistically, as everything from branded content to an original series -- and all companies need to produce content for every format. He named a few: Roku, Go90, SlingTV, and DirectTV Now. “We need to be on all of these platforms in front of audiences, and the revenue will come,” Budkovsky said.

“The challenge is that you have to be different everywhere, too,” Mazey said. “Consumers can see when a video has been made one way for every single platform. You can’t put out the same video on Instagram that you’re putting on OTT.”

Russ Ellis, VP, group publisher/home & garden group, Trusted Media Brands, said he’s using social platforms to drive people back to places where he can monetize video content. The company is focused on appearing on more OTT platforms.