Mamamia plans to double the revenue it makes from branded content and has appointed Ruby Thomas as head of branded entertainment to spearhead the push. Thomas previously worked at BSkyB, MSN International, NewsUK and Shine Australia, helping to define and execute their digital marketing and branded content strategies.
The Mamamia Women’s Network already sees 60% of its total revenue generated from branded content, and recently-appointed managing director Kylie Rogers told AdNews that while the publisher hasn’t formalised its offering with a set studio, it is already operating as a fully-fledged creative shop for brands and providing what she calls “transmedia story-telling”, which merges real life experiences with online platforms.
“For brands, this means we’re able to take the consumer from the discovery stage through to consideration and purchase without ever seeing a standard ad,” Rogers said.
“There is huge demand from marketers for this content, multiplatform, branded on and offline story-telling campaigns through bespoke event, video, audio, social and written content."
Where branded content should sit – commercially or editorially – is something publishers are grappling with, but Mamamia doesn’t see any distinction.
“We have influential talent within our network who create both our authentic editorial content and our commercial content - there’s zero church and state, and brands are benefiting.”
Thomas will be working with the publisher's national strategy director, Georgia Thomas, who told AdNews that in her previous role at Ikon she would work with brands in a consultancy style and advise them on who to communicate with consumers and that the MWN is working in a similar style with clients.
"We’re going to start bringing brands into workshops to do exactly that; to work out how their brands communicate with women and how they can use our network and [get across the message that] until the brands start communicating the right way, it won’t produce the best result because everybody knows when a brand is being fake and not talking to women. Just trying to tweak their messaging doesn’t work,” Thomas said.
When asked about how the publisher's offering is different to all the others playing in the space, Rogers told AdNews: “We're the authority on women. We know our audience. We know what real women want and we're delivering on that.
A version of this story originally appeared in the current issue of AdNews magazine (2 October). Need to see the whole mag? Never fear, you can subscribe right here.
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