Rogers plans to offer more TV content over internet

Rogers Communications Inc.’s media branch plans to deliver more television over the internet to better compete for audiences with online streaming services, social network giants and other Canadian broadcasters.

Rogers Media executives emphasized the need to evolve as the TV industry grapples with stagnating advertising and subscription revenue at a media event Tuesday announcing the fall prime-time schedule.

“The great news is that television is not dead, television is in fact very strong,” Rogers Media president Rick Brace said, adding that 24 million Canadians watch TV weekly. “But we can’t sit on our hands, we can’t do nothing.”

Steps include making content on Citytv and FX available to stream online for subscribers, and a partnership with Twitter to play clips of hockey games on the social media network.

The online streaming services Citytv NOW and FX NOW will only be available to TV package subscribers, unlike Netflix, which allows anyone with internet to subscribe and access content.

At this point, Rogers has no plans to turn them into standalone subscription channels. (Two years ago it discontinued Shomi, a joint venture with Shaw that imitated the Netflix model.) Rather, the idea is to make content available whenever subscribers want it on whatever device they want to watch it on, Brace said.

It continues to compete with content, he added. Its approach is “forensic” when it decides what to buy to take on behemoths like Netflix, which plans to spend US$8 billion on content this year alone. This year’s big dramas will be A Million Little Things and Manifest.

Colette Watson, senior vice-president of television and broadcast, said the online services are another way to manage declines in traditional ad revenue, as ads will appear online.

“This is how consumers watch television,” Watson said.

Rogers also announced a new ad platform called Rogers Enabled Data (RED) that aggregates anonymous consumer data so companies can target specific segments.

Rogers’ media department pulls in about 15 per cent of the company’s total revenue, but accounts for just two per cent of its annual adjusted earnings due to tight margins and higher costs.