Grouper has partnered with Sony Pictures Television series Rescue Me to launch "Firehouse," a sponsored channel streaming user-generated videos and Grouper-produced content.
The channel is in part a way for Sony and FX to leverage the Grouper community for marketing purposes, as well as a way to provide an ongoing stream of content for fans of Rescue Me. As Grouper is owned by Sony, this is a good way for it to target the online video community. The incorporation of user-generated content is a way to further engage fans of the show and other users. Twenty-second promotional ads for Rescue Me will show at the onset of each episode played on this channel for the first two weeks of the new season of the FX show. These clips so far have been directly correlated with the content of the Grouper-produced episode that shows on the Firehouse channel. Ads on the Rescue Me homepage will also dive traffic to Grouper.
It's an interesting and not too pervasive way of marketing to a niche audience within a larger community. Branded channels is something YouTube is involved in quite frequently, with companies such as National Geographic and Bollywood creating online channels for their own marketing purposes.