How Cheddar is looking at local markets to build an audience

Max Willens of Digiday writes about how business news channel Cheddar is collaborating with local television stations to build its audience.

Willens writes, “The move raised eyebrows in some digital media circles: Why would a financial news network for millennials head for the hinterlands of local news? But for Cheddar, which claims to reach 1 million people daily with its live programming across numerous platforms, local TV broadcasts are a faster way to build its brand and its audience than OTT platforms.

“‘I think it’s a really smart way to build an audience,’ said TV industry analyst Alan Wolk. ‘If they get 5 percent of the [local news audience] doing that, then it’s a big win for them.’

“While local TV news audiences have slid in recent years, they remain far larger than the audiences available across all the OTT platforms that Cheddar has been colonizing. The combined average viewership of the evening newscasts for the four major broadcasters — ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox — exceeded 20 million, according to the Pew Research Center. By comparison, Sling TV, the largest OTT platform in the United States, has just 1.3 million subscribers, according to parent Dish Network.”

Read more here.