Why social media engagement and commerce are all about fandom — with BBC Studios' Jasmine Dawson

There’s a lot going on at the BBC at the moment. A pair of scandals relating to a Gaza documentary and former MasterChef presenter Gregg Wallace have caused a stir. And the timing isn’t great a year before negotiations on a new royal charter, especially as a further 300,000 households have reportedly stopped paying the licence fee.

But the Beeb’s commercial arm is in rude health, achieving record revenue and profit in its latest earnings report.

To thrive in the next era of media consumption, the BBC is adapting to reach audiences where they are and stave off competition from streaming rivals and social platforms. And it's turning to ecommerce to drive new revenue streams off the back of its most popular intellectual property.

Jasmine Dawson is BBC Studios’ senior vice-president of digital. She joins Jack Benjamin to discuss how the commercial arm is modernising its go-to-market strategy by cultivating fan communities and providing reliable measurement of engagement in a fragmented social environment.

Highlights:

3:06: Reaching "platform-agnostic" viewers to drive fandom

6:46: BBC Studios' new ecommerce play

11:53: Accurately measuring engagement – why views are "a false economy"

16:12: Challenges in working with platforms

22:41: Leveraging the creator economy and "acting like a creator"

Related articles:

Adapting to shifting media consumption habits – with TikTok, Spotify, Global and BBC

Twitch CEO Dan Clancy: Why brands should reach ‘entertainers who happen to game’

You wait weeks for BBC scandal reports to come along…

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