In its never-ending effort to try to reach younger news consumers, CNN has launched CNN Shorts — a new vertical video player on its website designed for smartphones.
CNN already produces vertical-video news briefs for platforms including TikTok, YouTube Shorts and Instagram Reels. Now it sees a growing opportunity for CNN Shorts on its owned-and-operated platforms — where it can directly sell its own advertising. CNN Digital’s vertical video experience launched in beta Oct. 25 at cnn/shorts/cnn-shorts.
The “vast majority” of CNN’s audience consumes its content on mobile, and specifically mobile web, said Athan Stephanopoulos, CNN EVP and chief digital officer. “This is a huge opportunity to not only bring a more native mobile video experience to our audience, but also our advertising partners,” he said.
Even without any real promotion, viewers have been finding CNN Shorts. Since launching on cnn, CNN Shorts video completion rates are up 36%; starts per video viewer are up 32%; and time spent per viewer up 17%, according to CNN. A new CNN Shorts section also is planned to be added to CNN’s mobile app in the near future. As on other short-form video platforms, users scroll through CNN Shorts in a vertical feed.
CNN Digital’s video team produces an average of 10 shorts per day, running anywhere from 15 seconds to up to about 60 seconds in length. “Rather than taking a package from linear video and repackaging that for vertical, we are increasingly taking content natively in vertical orientation and editing it,” Stephanopoulos said.
For the shorts, CNN’s production teams generally look for tighter shots, which are more compelling visually on mobile. “On your phone, the stories that resonate are more emotional, human-interest driven,” said Stephanopoulos. “They celebrate people doing amazing things.”
CNN is looking to expand its output of shorts and to produce them for other categories such as entertainment, travel and style. “We already know our audience is consuming content in vertical video,” Stephanopoulos said. “We want to take the reaction and signals we’re getting from the audience and absolutely doing more of that.”
Here are some examples Stephanopoulos cited of natively shot vertical content on CNN Digital:
Bill Weir “Inside Maui Relief Center”:
Nic Robertson“Taking Cover at Israeli Airport”:
Nic Robertson “CNN Team Surveys Aftermath of Fighting in Southern Israel”:
