Last week Google Africa announced what many YouTube content creators – in Nigeria, Ghana, Uganda and Senegal at least for now – will see as a opportunity to finally monetize their YouTube content. The opportunity is therefore particularly clear for makers of Nollywood movies in Nigeria as iROKO’s widely publicised success on the platform is proof enough huge money awaits. Now if movie producers (and third parties able to buy the movies) are able to partner YouTube to monetize the movies, iROKO is therefore likely to see a decline.
In a blog post yesterday, Jason Njoku, the iROKO founder however said the new YouTube program doesn’t bother them much as YouTube does not contribute much to their revenue anymore. He also says that much of the revenue doesn’t come from the YouTube advertising model but from other streams like licensing and monthly subscriptions.
“In H1 2013, iROKO saw a y-o-y increase in revenue of versus 2012 of ~270%. YouTube for the entire H1 2013 represented only 14.1% of that revenue,” writes Njoku in his post. The bulk of the iROKO revenue growth according to him actually comes from their premium subscription based iROKOtv PLUS. Njoku also writes that it’s not easy, even for YouTube, to bypass the monetisation strength they have built into iROKO.
His post goes into much detail on why YouTube is not on their radar as competition and how competing Nollywood movie channels on YouTube are not a new phenomenon. Making reference to the flood of “Alaba” poor quality movies as the dominant ones on YouTube, Njoku underscores that it’s not just about access to a movie but the experience of watching quality stuff and an integrated platform that helps users discover great movies.
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4 comments
Njorki should have partnered with Google or get bought by google to avoid this confrontation. Does he know what Microsoft used to do to small software companies, oops even bigger like Netscape? Google owns a whole ecosystem, they own a platform and that alone can make life much difficult for njorki. If you want to be powerful in any scheme, OWN THE PYRAMID….
Did you read Njoku’s blog were he addresses the very issue you bring up? If not I suggest you do so
Getting bought by Google doesn’t make you OWN THE PYRAMID. If they buy your company they can do whatever with it, even delete it from the face of the earth if they wish. There’s a high chance that if you were a founder of an acquired company you will actually cash in on your shares in like two years and start something new. He’s done well, Njoku, and has earned massive respect of his business models by VCs in the west.
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