KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia’s largest integrated media group, Media Prima Bhd, is now working with US-based video platform YouTube through its Player for Publishers service.
This will enable Media Prima – which currently ranks third in terms of digital audience reach in Malaysia – to reach more viewers and access greater monetisation opportunities by consolidating its online video content through YouTube’s video streaming service.
The collaboration – in line with the group’s transformation to become Malaysia’s leading digital-first content and commerce company – will see all Media Prima video content available on YouTube. It will also enable the group to reduce costs by embedding YouTube’s video player across multiple devices. This move will allow Media Prima to generate sustainable revenue through programmatic advertising, one of the fastest growing digital revenue segments.
Datuk Kamal Khalid, Media Prima Group Managing Director, said the group is expanding its digital presence and this partnership will solidify its position as the largest local digital media company in the country.
“There’s huge demand for digital content from our audiences and advertisers. Given the huge popularity of our local content and YouTube’s popularity among Malaysian viewers, we see this as a sustainable solution to unlock the full potential of our content, to generate greater revenue.”
“As the Internet has ignited a boom in the way we reach our audience, the way forward is to introduce more collaborations. YouTube will give Media Prima the ability to tract which content rates well with the public, in real time,” he said.
Kamal said, in the past three years, Media Prima has come up with various ways to collaborate based on a win-win formula, such as home shopping CJ Wow Shop, Grab and now YouTube.
“We’ve done a lot of things to be more relevant in the digital space. The revenue has been very encouraging – double digits last year. I’m happy to say all the positive results show that we’re on the right tract.”
He added that through the collaboration, followers of Media Prima digital content, which cuts across multiple platforms can consume officially uploaded and high-quality videos from Media Prima Television Networks, Media Prima Radio Networks, The New Straits Times Press (Malaysia) Bhd and Media Prima Digital, on the YouTube platform.
Also present to witness the collaboration ceremony at the Google office in Bangsar were Managing Director of Google Malaysia, Vietnam, Philippines and New Emerging Markets, Sajith Sivanandan, and New Straits Times Press CEO Datuk Seri Abdul Jalil Hamid.
YouTube’s Play for Publishers was first launched in Europe in 2015 and is now being used by more than 100 publishers in 25 countries.
“At Google and YouTube, we’re big fans of local content and recognise we are truly part of the same ecosystem. More Malaysian content on YouTube means more inventory for advertisers to reach their audience and we’re thankful to Media Prima for helping supercharge the Malaysian YouTube scene,” said Sajith.
“Win-win is a term used all the time, but the partnership today is the true definition of that. It’s the two most frequently used platforms allowing Malaysians to watch whenever, wherever and however they want,” he added.
This collaboration follows Media Prima’s acquisition of a 52 per cent stake in Vocket Media Sdn Bhd, which owns VOCKET, a popular Malay-language social news portal targeted at urban Malay youths. Media Prima also recently announced a partnership with Grab to roll out the “In-Car Media Platform“, which includes various short-form content for in-transit viewing.
Media Prima’s financial performance for the three months ended March 31 2018 (1QFY18) saw the group record significantly higher digital advertising, digital content and commerce revenue.
Revenue from Media Prima’s digital segment increased by 98 per cent in 1QFY18 due to higher digital advertising earnings from Rev Asia Holdings, which contributed 47 per cent to Media Prima Digital’s revenue.
The positive results reflect the progress of Media Prima’s transformation efforts to increase revenue contribution from digital to eight per cent by year-end.