BuzzFeed is still launching new social brands

BuzzFeed’s new travel
brand Bring Me
BuzzFeed

• Like most digital publishers, BuzzFeed has had to
  grapple with Facebook’s recent algorithm change, which has made
  it harder to reach readers.
• Despite that, BuzzFeed seems to have a breakout media
  brand in Bring Me, which focuses on unique and accessible
  travel experiences.
• Since debuting as an experimental brand in February of
  2017, Bring Me has racked up 2 billion views and has nabbed
  sponsors such as Pepsi. 

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Despite the recent algorithm tweak that
rocked web publishing, BuzzFeed apparently still knows how to
work Facebook’s news feed.

And with its budding travel brand
Bring Me, the digital publisher is betting it has found its
next Tasty.

Starting in February of 2017, a group within BuzzFeed that
focuses on experimental content projects started posting travel
videos to Facebook under the Bring Me banner. 

Since then, Bring Me videos have generated over 2 billion views,
BuzzFeed says. These days, the average Bring Me travel clip
delivers 4 million views, and overall the property averages
nearly 200 million a month — despite algo-geddon.

The bet, said Richard Alan Reid, head of Bring Me and BuzzFeed’s
international executive creative director, was to create content
that resembles what an average person visiting these places might
produce using their phone — rather than try to emulate the
perfect travel magazine shoot.

And unlike classic travel media, the idea was to focus on
undiscovered, and quirky locales across the globe (like taking
selfies atop the real Dracula’s castle in Transylvania), as well
as very accessible activities in the US,
like a Florida sub shop in a grocery store.

And like Tasty’s famous eye-popping food prep clips, the short
Bring Me videos were deliberately designed to stop people when
scrolling through their news feeds.

“We wanted to show people
enjoying themselves in these places,” Reid told Business Insider.
“They are m
uch more shot
like we had gone with our friends. No
beautiful beaches from an angle you can never
get to, or a shot of the Taj Mahal at 4:00 am when no one is
there.”

Plus, following the BuzzFeed
playbook, Bring Me has created travel videos that aim to tap into
people’s identities, such a trips for sushi lovers or
Harry Potter fans. Think 6 Delicious Destinations for Vegans.

Recently, Bring Me became a full fledged channel on BuzzFeed.com,
with both text articles and video, and is also building a sizable
audience on Instagram and YouTube.

But it’s on Facebook where it’s amassed over 4 million fans by
pushing striking visuals into people’s news feeds. That’s solid
growth these days — though it pales in comparison to Tasty’s 94
million Facebook fans — most of which were accumulated in the pre
algorithm-tweak era.

Facebook has adjusted its algorithm to priorities content from
people’s friends and family. It seemed that perhaps the ‘born-on
Facebook’ publisher era might
be over. Indeed, a few years BuzzFeed had roughly 20 brands
on Facebook.

For every mass hit like Tasty, there were other brands like
BuzzFeed Food or Nifty that were eventually rebranded or combined
with other channels. Since then, BuzzFeed has also
reorganized its media team.

And Bring Me has emerged despite all the changes.

“We feel like we’ve really cracked [what works on Facebook],”
said Reid.

Take this video of an Airbnb
house in Florida that features rooms themed around various
board games like Clue and Monopoly. It’s resulted in 70 million
views, sellouts, and the owners are planning to open another
location.

Like many in digital publishing,
BuzzFeed missed revenue targets and
let go of some staffers following a brutally competitive
2017. But in a recent Digiday podcast CEO Jonah Peretti said that
the company was enjoying strong growth this year thanks to deals
like a licensing pact between
Tasty and Walmart.

Bring Me should help. The company has created videos on behalf of
paying sponsors such as Pepsi and Tourism Australia.