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Six months after Seeso soft-launched, the subscription video-on-demand comedy channel has a slate of 23 originals up and running or in the works, said Evan Shapiro, NBCU executive VP of digital enterprises, at a Banff Festival panel.
The exec offered insights into how the channel came to be, with NBCU CEO Steve Burke telling Shapiro about his desire for what Shapiro called a “direct-to-consumer” product, similar to Netflix or Hulu.
Next was market research, with some 11,000 people polled about what they’d pay for in terms of a dedicated OTT channel. “Comedy was No. 1 by a long shot,” said Shapiro.
New content includes Morgan Spurlock’s documentary on women’s rec basketball, The Pistol Shrimps, and Dan Harmon’s HarmonQuest, an animated rendition of Harmon and his comedy friends playing Dungeons and Dragons.
Seeso does not share subscriber figures, but Shapiro did shed light on its economics. “We don’t need 5-6 million people watching for a show to be a hit,” he said. “We know when shows are driving subscriptions.”
