Multichannel News has partnered with social video analytics company Tubular Labs to bring you regular deep dives into the social video strategy of U.S. media and entertainment publishers. Today, we’re shining a spotlight on The Walt Disney Company.
According to Tubular’s recently released 2020 year-in-review report, The Walt Disney Company tied with TheSoul Publishing (the Cyprus-based creator of 5-Minute Crafts and other viral-content channels) for global monthly average unique viewers (de-duplicated) across Facebook and YouTube, at 644 million. For the U.S.-only audience, The Walt Disney Company was No. 1 among broadcast and entertainment publishers, with 146 million average monthly unique viewers.
In January, the company took first place for unique viewers with 142.8 million, reaching an estimated 50.6% of the U.S. population over the age of 13 — the highest reach of any U.S. media and entertainment publisher for the month. Audiences watched a total of 3.9 billion minutes of Disney content in January, with unique viewers each watching an average of 27.2 minutes during the month.
Also Read: Disney Gets in Shouting Distance of Netflix with 146 Million OTT Subs
This domination isn’t necessarily surprising: Disney owns a lot of properties, including ABC, ESPN, Marvel, Pixar and more. Generally, Disney properties are uploading more videos to Facebook (156K in the last year) and Twitter (143K) than YouTube (98.9K), but looking at the most-watched videos, YouTube dominates.
Disney’s most-viewed video for January was a Spanish-language version of the WandaVision trailer, posted to the Disney Plus LA YouTube channel, with 80.9 million views, 50.6 million of which occurred within the first 30 days of posting, according to Tubular. And looking at most-watched videos from Walt Disney brands in the last year, that same YouTube channel owned the No. 1 video, a trailer for the latest season of The Mandalorian, with 354 million views.
The deep portfolio of Disney content, especially its family-friendly movies, is clearly a big draw for YouTube audiences. Of the top 15 most-watched YouTube videos from Disney’s global properties in the last year, eight are related to its movies, with six having “singalong” themes, featuring music from Aladdin, Frozen/Frozen 2 and Moana.
The Walt Disney Company is also using YouTube to promote its consumer entertainment packages, like this video about the Disney Plus/Hulu/ESPN Plus bundle that’s received 190.3 million views, making it Disney’s No. 3 most-watched YouTube video in the last year. The only video in the top 15 that isn’t related to a movie or TV show, or a promo for Disney’s other offerings, was a live YouTube stream of election coverage from ABC News, which had 83.6 million views.
