EbonyJet Joins YouTube

by Jade

October 7, 2008

As I have said in the past, professional content will be the bread and butter of YouTube’s revenue stream in the future if they want it to be a profitable business. So, when the press release hit the stands yesterday announcing that YouTube and EbonyJet had launched a new YouTube channel, I was excited to see it but not surprised. Since they started, the channel they have been adding videos from their vault as well as more recent video (basically spanning the 80s until today).

Along with new, original programming and video from EbonyJet.com, one of the Channel’s features will be classic clips from the popular TV program, EbonyJet Showcase, which featured revealing interviews with some of the world’s most famous entertainers before they became superstars.

I feel like a kid in a candy store.

EbonyJet did a good job integrating their brand in to the YouTube channel. Their brand colors smack you in the face, and the main navigation all leads back to EbonyJet.com. But there is one major issue once you get past that point.

My main gripe with this channel is that the YouTube videos are not integrated with the EbonyJet site well. You have to scroll down below the fold to find the link to the YouTube channel. Plus the image and font they use to notify the reader of this great offering gets lost in everything else on the site (one of the drawbacks of a magazine layout). Then, if you go in to the video section of the site the videos are not the videos featured on the YouTube channel (there are only 9 videos on EbonyJet.com) and they are using the all to familiar brightcove player. Since they did their softlaunch back in September (or rather, that is when they joined YouTube), one would think they would have integrated the YouTube videos in to their site by now in terms of at least having one featured video at the top of the fold on their homepage.

Despite the lack of integration this is still very exciting. It is nice to see this kind of partnership between a black company and an internet juggernaut. It is also a step towards really having a black multimedia online conglomerate. I’ve always dreamed of one of those and figured the internet was the tool to make it possible. Now, I don’t know if EbonyJet will be the one to completely run with it, but they are certainly laying the ground work for how to do it with this channel.

Still, thinking of the future, there is one issue/item that this does somewhat overcome but not completely by using YouTube: Going Mobile. YouTube is integrated with just about all mobile devices, including of course, the iPhone. As people are accessing via mobile devices, and internet providers are starting to cap the amount of data people can transfer per month, media size and distribution are going to start becoming more and more of an issue. Videos tend to be big and difficult to view on mobile devices. Just something to keep in mind, especially since every week a new black video site or video offering seems to be popping up.

Have you had a chance to go through the EbonyJet YouTube channel yet? Found any gems?

Category: Launches, News, web 2.0 | Tags: channel, digital content, EbonyJet, YouTube

Eric Easter

Hey Jade, great post and thoughtful observations.

You will indeed begin to see more integration of the YouTube channel into EbonyJet.com in coming weeks. One clarification, though - there are 9 categories of videos on EbonyJet.com, not 9 videos. Once you click a category, all the others in that category repopulate the space. We try to opt for a clean intuitive feel without too many instructions. But you may have pointed out a flaw in that design if you didnot find the other videos. Thanks for that.

One problem with integration of YouTube - and a cautionary tale for others thinking about such a move - is that YouTube is revenue sharing. There are times when an advertiser wants the content safety of your space without much noise. The YouTube channel does not always provide that safety. Also, there are times when you want to keep all the money yourself, frankly, and your own player that allows you to control syndication makes more sense in that instance.

We also want to initially push people to YouTube. Putting all those videos on EbonyJet.com at first takes emphasis off YouTube when we want people to focus that way. One it's established that it's there, you'll see videos in both places.

Good observation also on lifting up YouTube promotion above the fold, which is coming, but we also launched EbonyJet Radio and our Landmarks map at the same time, and for the site's purpose, getting traffic to those places with paid advertising is more necessary at this point.

Keep checking us out - something even more huge to announce in about a month.

Eric Easter - Chief of Digital Strategy, Johnson Publishing

Herb

Hi, Jade. Great article. You mentioned one part which particularly resonated with me - we also "dreamed" of an online black multimedia conglomerate, but we didn't see any companies in the space providing for our community's needs. So, for one of our projects, we decided to create a Video Sharing Social Network for the Black community called BlackBottom.com.

We don't do much press, VIP events, etc. but this hasn't slowed our rapid growth. Some of the items Eric mentioned ("old school" video clips, radio, maps) have been the cornerstone on BlackBottom.com for some time ("old school" Black video clips, BlackBottom.com Radio, and BlackBottom.com Maps) and have performed quite well (~1M uniques within the last 30 days alone), but we still have _much_ more to do. The community has been _very_ supportive with ideas for more features, content, tools, etc; we will be busy for the foreseeable future. As a technology company (with most stuff created and collected in-house vs. "partnering"), one of our chief goals remains the same - to lead the space in Black content delivery using the _absolute_ best technology and processes available. In fact, we'll have a special announcement in about three weeks. :)

Thanks,
Herb Pinder Jr. - Founder & CEO, Netellectuals LLC

Jade

@Eric Easter Thanks for your comment. I've worked on a few projects that have used brightcove and I've never been to fond of any of their navigation schemes. They aren't very intuitive IMO and always require an outside navigation to navigate the videos in a way that makes sense... and sense they host the videos that is so much extra work. But, I suppose it is one of the most popular products for a reason.

I've been really curious about the YouTube revenue sharing thing, so thanks for the input on that. Good to hear from someone who is doing it. And, as always I think YouTube is a great place to start to get organic adoption of a video offering so I get wanting people to know it's on YouTube.

Congratulations on all you current launches, and I look forward to seeing what is coming up in the next month.

@Herb Content is king as always :) and I love technology so hearing about black companies using the best and being innovative always makes me smile. I look forward to seeing the announcement in the next few weeks.