In May this year, The Straits Times (ST) YouTube channel reached a significant milestone when its subscriber count hit 500,000. 

But leading up to that, the ST Video team has already been busy behind the scenes developing a refreshed audience-first video strategy that fundamentally answers this question:  

“How can we make news interesting for our news-fatigued audiences, and reach new audiences on different platforms?”

To figure this out, the team constantly takes a data-informed approach to its video and social platform experiments. They observe which topics work on which platform, and how they are able to engage and retain their audience through their video storytelling, style and editing pace. While living and breathing the data, they continue to learn, tweak, experiment, and optimise. 

New shows and formats

Short-form videos

In case you’d missed it, ST has launched a new vertical video talk show called To The Point on YouTube and Instagram, which features experts, newsmakers and journalists.

This reflects the evolving audiences’ consumption habits of catching quick and punchy news on the go, analysed for them in just minutes. The topics range from hard-hitting current affairs, viral social posts, to sociocultural issues. 

Catch this episode on YouTube to see ST’s Senior Transport Correspondent Christopher Tan keeping it real with senior presenter-producer Hairianto Diman, as they talk about sky-high COE prices. Or if you want an even shorter version, the Instagram Reel — made for younger audiences watching on mobile phones — may be more up your alley.

The ST video team is also experimenting with more vertical short-form videos such as this Tiktok on Shanti Pereira slaying it with her 100m SEA Games gold effort, or this Instagram reel on the mad rush for Taylor Swift tickets. This is part of ST’s efforts to create platform-specific content that best meet our audience’s needs. 

As part of ST’s mobile-first video strategy, these vertical videos are now centrally located in a video carousel on the latest version of the ST app. The viewing experience in mobile phones has also been optimised to allow users to watch the videos vertically without having to rotate the screen or switch to full-screen mode.

Longer-form video

With our informative news packages and documentaries a content mainstay, ST Video has also launched a new interactive format for longform video stories. 

Designed by the Interactive team, these longform video stories are presented on the ST website with a visual template that provides users a completely different experience in terms of UX and UI.

Take a look here, at the 2nd part of our Goodbye, Golden Mile microdocumentary

Content trends

You may have noticed that ST has ramped up on both short- and long-form explainers, which are more evergreen. 

This is because ST has taken the results of Reuters Institute’s ‘Trends 2023’ survey of major publishers that showed key trends such as explanatory journalism, Q&A formats, inspirational/positive stories, and a broader notion of what news means, especially to younger audiences. In turn, this also means the definition of news has widened to include sociocultural issues.

Long-form explainers such as this personal finance video on ways to maximise your CPF before turning 55 keep viewers educated in a light-hearted yet informative way, whereas short-form explainers such as this clip on K-pop fans dancing outside the National Stadium to celebrate Blackpink’s concert focus more on highlighting pop-culture trends in a digestible format.

ST Video will continue to transform to tell visual stories creatively.

Expect to see even more exciting videos and formats that deliver interesting content that will not just grow our audience but also keep them coming back for more.