Dive Brief:
- Looking to tap into a millennial audience, CNN is launching a new video website called Great Big Story, which is largely its answer to sites like Vice and BuzzFeed.
- The site will focus on innovation, food, the environment and the human condition, and CNN is building the initial audience for Great Big Story on Facebook.
- The site is expected to feature three to five non-fiction videos per day covering the four areas of focus.
Dive Insight:
CNN’s latest digital media brand, Great Big Story, will take the form of a video website geared toward an intellectual millennial audience, featuring content on four broad topics: innovation, food, the environment and the human condition. Great Big Story will be available on multiple platforms, but initially CNN is seeking to build its audience on Facebook.
Chris Berend, CNN’s vice president of video development and co-founder of Great Big Story, told The Wall Street Journal, “We wanted to create our brand on Facebook first, as we think we have the most potential right away to connect the deepest on Facebook. Facebook is obviously becoming this really, really powerful force in video. Our entire mission is to tell stories that are passion points for people … and we have a filter that we put everything through. It needs to have a shareable quality and it has to make you feel something.”
David Spiegel, who will head up advertising for Great Big Story, told Ad Age, "The core proposition is show me something I haven't seen, tell me something I haven't heard," adding the videos featured on the site are targeted to 25 to 35 year olds.
