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Interactive television may still be years away, but the major television networks are slowly trying to get their brands on the Web in preparation for the arrival of audiences and bandwidth. Although a few (such as ESPN SportsZone or MSNBC) have turned some of their content into successful Web properties, many seem to have no clue how to transform their video-based content into compelling text-based Web sites.
CBS is the latest network to try tackling the problem, and on 1 February will launch the official CBS.com Web site as its first real attempt at online content. Like NBC and Warner Brothers before them, CBS is following a neighborhood model: It will use its network affiliates to create localized microsites, and partner like hell to pad out those sites' content.
Dean Daniels, vice president of CBS new media, says that CBS is trying to "take steps today that dovetail with digital television in the future," as well as any other direction interactive technology might take. The breadth of that mission might explain what sounds like a bland approach to creating content.
The project uses an Oracle-built network (called "CBSNow") that will allow 155 US affiliates to plug their own content into a template built and centrally maintained by CBS. Visitors who come to the CBS.com site will input their zip codes; they'll then be delivered to the "neighborhood" homepage branded by their local CBS affiliate station, where they can read whatever local content the affiliate wants to provide, plus national CBS content (focusing on stocks, sports, and news).
To fill out the rest of the local content, CBS has lined up a hodge-podge of partners including Infospace (directory services), TheTrip.com (travel reservations), Intellihealth (health information), The Weather Channel, Barnes & Noble, and CDNow. Not yet announced, but also included, is a partnership with Infoplease (an online almanac) and a Sidewalk/CitySearch-type entertainment listings partner.
Rather than putting the partnered content into their own templates, CBS will link visitors to the partner's local sites, customized for each particular region.
The approach is nearly identical to NBC's Interactive Neighborhood, which launched in October and boasts 100 affiliates. On NBC, after inputting your city, you are a sent to your "neighborhood site" where you can search for a new car or apartment (courtesy of Auto-by-Tel and Realtor.Net), do searches via Infoseek, get Happy Puppy games information (why that needs to be localized is anyone's guess), and use Big Yellow directory services. MSNBC and Sidewalk entertainment listings round out the picture, as well as local news in areas where the affiliates have translated their broadcasts to text.
A compelling strategy?
What the networks have going for them is a recognizable brand, TV advertising, and some locally produced news - what they don't have, they'll get from partnering. But some wonder what will happen once consumers realize that they can get those localized restaurant reviews by going directly to Sidewalk, or airplane reservations by going straight to TheTrip. Why would they bother to click through a network's site first?
"People trying to aggregate links to localized content don't realize that the value becomes marginalized," points out Mark Mooradian, analyst with Jupiter. "Are you going to drive enormous traffic? Because the revenue for that kind of model is going to depend on you being the gateway on the Web for localized content."
By trying to be the default "neighborhood" sites for users, the networks are competing with city guides and search engines like Yahoo, Sidewalk, or CitySearch, as well as newspaper sites. But although they are trying to make content partners out of the former, the competition from the newspapers is going to more difficult. The online newspapers and news services already have a recognizable brand known for text-based news, and a relatively simple process converting their print content to the Web. The network affiliates, on the other hand, have to convert their video-based content into text - a kludgey process that doesn't always result in compelling content.
"Video-based content doesn't work well on the Web, so the repurposing effort is substantial," says CitySearch CEO Charles Conn.
This is similar to the issue that Warner Brothers ran into a year ago, when with much fanfare it announced its CityWeb project. After delaying the project for a year, Warner Brothers is going forward with a plan that won't just give affiliates shell sites focusing on news and aggregated links, but will create quasi-webzines with specially produced programming from Warner Brothers (and other Time Warner affiliates) that will be 100 percent affiliate-branded. To promote the project, the affiliates will give up costly on-air advertising time and marketing support.
"When you go down the chain from CNN online to MSNBC down to Channel 6 - who's going to go to Channel 6 to hear the latest on the Clinton scandal?" asks Jim Moloshok, senior vice president of Warner Brothers online. "There is a content void in every plan the networks have offered.... We will create quality entertainment that's branded as the affiliates," including lifestyle, kids, teens, home improvement, and women's content.
The project currently has affiliates from NBC, ABC, and CBS signed on, but CityWeb won't launch until it has signed on stations in 60 percent of US markets (they're currently at 40 percent.)
Regardless, the "neighborhood one-stop shop" market continues to become more competitive and crowded, and most markets won't be able to sustain the number of competing city guides that are emerging.
"A lot of it boils down to what their core content assets are," says Mooradian. "The three people in the best position, in this order, are probably the newspapers, the new media ventures, and then the TV networks. But rather than pitting everybody against everybody, you're going to see a lot of alliances."
