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The digital media company TMB, formerly Trusted Media Brands, is on pace to generate nearly $200 million in revenue in its most recent fiscal year, which ends in June, according to chief executive Bonnie Kintzer.
Though the company isn’t sharing financial specifics, the figure represents a single-digit decline in overall revenue compared to last year. Contributing factors include softness in the digital advertising market, shifting patterns in search traffic and flat streaming performance due to a drop in CPMs during the holiday season.
However, the company, which houses titles like FailArmy, Reader’s Digest and The Family Handyman, is strategically combating market headwinds by expanding its streaming and social video business across its broader portfolio.
“We are now primarily video-focused, which is a big change,” Kintzer said. “We are very diversified, so we can shift according to where the money is.”
TMB generates the bulk of its editorial content by acquiring the licenses to user-generated video content and monetizing that content across its social and video distribution channels. The model keeps the cost of content production low, but it also leaves the company subject to the shifting whims of social media algorithms.
Overall, 46% of TMB’s digital business comes from web advertising, 35% from streaming and social advertising and 19% from licensing, according to Kintzer.
But web revenues are wavering, and the company is committed to its video pivot.
Shifting focus
According to a 2024 IAB report, total digital video advertising spend, including CTV, social video and online video, is projected to grow 16% this year—nearly 80% faster than total media overall.
The company’s strategy of expanding video through connected TV (CTV) and YouTube offerings follows that shift in advertising demand, which is moving from the open web to walled gardens of premium video.
Amid the new strategy, TMB has worked to build out its social and streaming video businesses, which include its presence on FAST channels, revenue shares with Facebook and its growing footprint on YouTube.
The company currently has more than 100 shows across the FAST channels it appears on, which span providers including Samsung, the Roku Channel, Pluto and LG.
It recently launched a new channel, At Home With Family Handyman, and the company also has a partnership with Atmosphere, the digital-out-of-home network. Overall, streaming consumption across its portfolio has risen 16% year over year.