Available in English | Founder(s) R.J. Williams | |
Type of site Entertainment programming Founded April 6, 2007 (2007-04-06) (United States and Canada) Headquarters Los Angeles, California, United States Area served USA, Canada, Europe, Asia, and South America | ||
Young Hollywood is a privately held multimedia entertainment company founded in Los Angeles, California by R.J. Williams. Young Hollywood is a pioneer of web video, according to the Wall Street Journal,
Contents
The company licenses the “Young Hollywood” trademark domestically and internationally for a range of consumer products and services. In addition, they own a television network and are one of the world's largest producers and distributors of celebrity content in the digital space. Their content has received over 2 Billion views and they have created branded content for companies such as Coca-Cola, Subway, H&M, Electronic Arts, Samsung, and Unilever.
Television Network
What originally started off as a digital entertainment company turned into a next generation network. Young Hollywood owns and operates Young Hollywood TV, a 24/7 network that delivers premium long-form programming centered around celebrity and lifestyle topics.
Young Hollywood originally teamed up exclusively with Apple in the beginning of 2015 to launch the network with exclusive content that could only be found on their Apple TV platform. The channel premiered seven new original half-hour series and programming across multiple platforms including reality, scripted series, animation, and documentaries with a focus on topics such as entertainment, music, sports, fashion, and lifestyle.
At the end of 2015, the network expanded to include devices such as Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Samsung Blu-ray players, and Android tablets and phones.
The network airs over 500 hours of new programming content annually, including the music themed “Backstage Diaries” and "Food Feed”, as well as airing content from its library of more than 2500 hours of programming.
Programming
Young Hollywood content is known for not touching gossip and being anti-paparazzi. Their website, YoungHollywood.com, officially launched in 2007 and reached 3 million unique visitors per month.
Young Hollywood had become one of the largest producers of original celebrity online programming in Hollywood; forming partnerships with several leading online platforms, including Yahoo!, Hulu, AOL and YouTube. This hyper-distribution network reached upwards of 100 million viewers. Eventually Young Hollywood evolved from these content partnerships to its latest iteration - producing original content for over-the-top channels on the Apple TV and Roku platforms.
Young Hollywood has been compared to MTV, in that they both offer a full 360 degree approach to reach millennials. They both create original content, have a built in distribution network with a significant marketing arm to get eyeballs on their content, and have direct relationships with advertisers.
Young Hollywood created the first live streamed hit show on the live.ly platform which has a user base of over 95 million. The premiere episode of Young Hollywood’s series had nearly 600,000 live viewers. Other notable Live.ly users include Mark Cuban and Time inc.
YH grew their audience by creating a street team of fan ambassadors that promote Young Hollywood to their friends and fans
Their programming was the subject of a skit on a recent episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live
YouTube partnership
Young Hollywood teamed up with Google for their channel initiative to launch "The Young Hollywood Network" (YHN) in January 2012 on YouTube. Other brands included in the initiative included WWE and The Wall Street Journal YouTube is gambling $100 million that by seeding professional production firms such as Young Hollywood — whose slate of YouTube-only programming premiered Monday January 16, 2012— it will draw more eyeballs for longer viewing sessions The Young Hollywood channel on YouTube is ranked #12 on the "Top YouTube Original Channels of All-Time" list that is compiled by AdAge magazine. Young Hollywood has been featured in such publications as Forbes, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Los Angeles Times, The Hollywood Reporter, The Wrap, Adage, Variety and Fast Company and on such Broadcast outlets as ABC News, Fox news, Jimmy Kimmel, CNN, Entertainment Tonight, and BBC World News
Domestic expansion
In April 2010, Young Hollywood formed a strategic partnership with the Four Seasons Hotel Los Angeles at Beverly Hills to build a fiber-optic enabled, high-definition broadcast studio within the hotel property, from where it conducts scheduled celebrity interviews on a daily basis.
In August 2011, The Young Hollywood Salad was launched at the restaurant of the Four Seasons Hotel
International expansion
In 2013, Young Hollywood laid out plans to expand the brand Internationally. To kick off their International plans, they formed a joint venture with Momentum, a division of Interpublic; the world's 3rd largest advertising agency with over 44,000 employees and offices in over 100 countries The first initiative under this partnership would be surrounding the 2014 World Cup in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Young Hollywood also formed an exclusive international content distribution deal with Fremantle Media, the company behind American Idol, X Factor and America's Got Talent and one of the largest creators, producers and distributors of television brands in the world. The first two series under the agreement have sold to over 30 International territories