Warner Bros Discovery’s (WBD) media subsidiary in Poland has launched a new shoppable experience within its streaming platform in the country.
The product, called Zoku, uses artificial intelligence to identify products in movies and TV scenes, then lists those products via shoppable links when a viewer pauses content.
Programs with shoppable items carry a Zoku logo. TVN WBD says the system analyzes the image and matches items with catalogues from partner retailers, showing either the exact product or a visually similar one.
At launch, Zoku.pl includes reality and lifestyle programming such as “Hotel Paradise,” “Zakup w ciemno,” “Top Model” and “Ostre cięcie.”
TVN WBD is not operating the retail storefront itself: Participating shops handle payments, inventory, delivery, returns and customer service. The company says the product selection will expand as more retailers join the platform, though it has not disclosed which shops are participating or how brands will be charged.
The launch gives TVN WBD a new advertising and commerce product at a time when broadcasters and streaming platforms are looking for ways to connect content, viewer engagement and retail activity. By using computer vision instead of manual product tagging, Zoku could make more items in a program shoppable without requiring products to be written into scripts or manually catalogued.
Zoku offers benefits for TVN WBD and advertisers alike: For product manufacturers and sellers, it creates another opportunity to showcase their goods to streaming viewers. TVN WBD benefits from the collection of interest and sales-related data, which strengthens its ability to pitch prospective ad buyers in the near future.
The launch of Zoku comes as other global streamers like Netflix, Amazon’s Prime Video and Disney Plus look at different ways to capitalize on attention through shoppable experiences of their own. Pause ads have become ubiquitous across streaming experiences, though few companies have the ability to offer native shopping experiences directly within their apps (Amazon being one notable exception).
Zoku still has some hurdles to overcome, including tough consumer protection laws in the European Union that will likely limit the type of data TVN WBD can collect and capitalize on. The EU also has remarkably tough protections concerning artificial intelligence, which TVN WBD will have to work through as it further develops Zoku.
