Break Media Lands in comScore's Top 10 Video Sites for August

Who says independent online video can't compete with the established media? Yesterday comScore released its August Video Metrix rankings and while Facebook moving into the #2 position (ahead of Yahoo) was noteworthy, even more eye-catching was male-focused 18-34 Break Media coming in at #6, ahead of big players like Microsoft, NBCU, Viacom and Turner Digital. It's only the second time Break has cracked comScore's top 10 video sites (June '10 was the other). Also worth noting is that Break's ad network achieved August reach of 65.7 million unique visitors, second only to Google/YouTube's 146.6 million.

Compared to June, Break recorded strong growth: 42.4 million total unique viewers (up 58% vs. 26.9 million in June) and 167 million viewing sessions (up 78% vs. 93.6 million in June). The only disappointment was that minutes per viewer slipped from 31.8 in June to 25.9 in August. Still, the results are pretty remarkable, and I caught up briefly with Andy Tu, Break's VP of Marketing to find out what's behind the growth.

Andy said that organic growth and user experience improvements across all of its properties are the primary reason for Break's success. In addition, Break has had a number of strong viral hits recently, including the "We Are LeBron" song. Break has a collection of young male sites across key topical areas. Andy pointed to FileFront, a gaming site that Break acquired earlier this year that's now getting 10 million unique visitors/mo. Break has also partnered with premium content providers in the past year like NBA, FEARNet, Babelgum and others (this morning it announced a deal with NFL), and has introduced branded entertainment series, most recently with Toyota. And it maintains a huge presence on YouTube.  

In addition to all of its content initiatives, Break has also moved aggressively to expand its ad network, recording the highest total potential reach among video ad networks in the U.S. of 46.4% of the U.S. Internet population according to comScore. By video ads viewed in August, Break reached 12.6% of the U.S. Internet population, or 204.4 million ads viewed.

There has been lots of discussion about whether independent online video sites have the chops to compete with those of established media. Through a combination of its own video productions, partnerships with others, building a robust video ad network and focusing tightly on its target audience, Break seems to be figuring out how to make it work.

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Categories: Indie Video

Topics: Break Media, comScore