Telemundo to Launch First English-Language Newscast on YouTube (EXCLUSIVE)
By Anna Marie de la Fuente
LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – NBCUniversal’s Hispanic broadcaster Telemundo is developing its first English-language newscast in collaboration with YouTube in a bid to tap the burgeoning U.S. Hispanic youth demographic.
Borne out of a YouTube grant aimed at awarding journalism projects that “elevate quality journalism, evolve business models to drive sustainable growth, and empower news organizations through technological innovation,” News’ still unbranded English-language newscast is slated to launch exclusively on YouTube in the 3rd quarter of 2019. This would be just in time for the 2020 general elections, especially critical for Latinos in the U.S., said Romina Rosado, Senior Vice President of Digital Media & Emerging Business, Telemundo Digital Enterprises.
Newscast will be the first Noticias Telemundo production to live outside a Telemundo-owned platform. The Telemundo YouTube channel has been running since 2007.
Telemundo will complement the Google News Innovation (GNI) YouTube grant with its own investment aside from promoting the newscast across its social networks and launching a co-branded marketing/communications campaign for target consumers and the trade community
“In today’s fast-paced world you need to reach out to your audience where it is, not where you want it to be, and U.S. Hispanics over-index in YouTube,” said Rosado who envisions a show that would be native to YouTube, with its choice of on-air talent, stories, cadence and packaged format.
The median age for U.S. Hispanic YouTube users is 27 compared to 42 for non-Hispanic Whites, according to Nielsen. U.S. Hispanics aged 18-49 over-index in YouTube, making it the ultimate platform to tap young Latinos.
“Our goal here is for Noticias Telemundo to reinvent the ‘traditional’ broadcast news for the LatinX generation– the multicultural, multiracial, mobile, millennials in the United States,” said Rosado who believes the estimated 20-minute newscast will grow organically, and be monetized not only via a revenue share pact with YouTube but through advertising and sponsorship pacts.
Newscast will be complemented by clips and possibly documentary shorts produced in-house. “Telemundo Noticias launched Telemundo Investiga, featuring more in-depth investigative pieces, which was conceived as a linear production but now we’re thinking of how we can extend this and integrate it digitally,” said Rosado.
In October, Telemundo, E! and Universo launched “Latinx Now!,” a 30-minute weekly entertainment and lifestyle news show produced in English and Spanish for bicultural audiences across the U.S. and Latin America.
