Discovery Draws Eyeballs with Mobile Channels

Discovery Communications is seeking to pump up viewership with new mobile portals for its channels.

Discovery Channel, TLC, Animal Planet, Discovery Health and Planet Green now all offer mobile access through their respective Web site addresses and through discoverymobile.com. Wireless users can check TV listings, sign up for reminders on when particular shows air, download ring tones, wallpapers and video and access practical information.

The objective is to bring new viewers to the cable networks.

“We believe there’s a lot of overlap with the current Discovery viewers, but we think mobile is a great platform to tap into the next generation of discovery viewers,” said Douglas Craig, Discovery senior vice president of mobile media operations.

Discovery’s audience currently skews toward male viewers ages 18 to 45.

Craig said the initiative to expand Discovery’s existing mobile content is an effort to broaden viewers’ experience of the Discovery brand: “We look at mobile as the missing piece to be able to reach consumers at every touchpoint.”

Discovery also has been doing that in the form of mobile versions of its network available on a subscription basis through video channels on Sprint, Alltel and MobiTV.

Later this year, Craig said Discovery plans to introduce short-form video clips on the Web sites of all of its channels.

Discovery also will introduce clickable banner ads to the new content offerings on discoverymobile.com. The new platform was built for discovery by Crisp Wireless.