One of the most powerful things about the web is the seemingly infinite archive of content. Want to see Doug Flutie’s hail mary pass on YouTube, you can. How about Janet Jackson’s wardrobe malfunction at the Superbowl? Yep, it’s all there on the web for anyone to view at anytime.

This weekend I saw Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. Starring opposite Harrison Ford is Cate Blanchett. Seeing her on-screen made me want to go online and look for some interviews. Oh yeah, we shot one for the Santa Barbara International Film Festival in January. It got me thinking - how many other people go back and look for this type of content?

I started to look at some of the stats from the nine episodes we did for this year’s SBIFF. Immediately following the festival, the viewership numbers were hovering around the 1.1 million mark. In the three and a half months since, we’ve done an additional 80,000 views. Keep in mind that is without any additional promotion of the work. Those additional numbers are strictly from people that either searched for that specific type of content or happened on it randomly.

It has become ingrained in us through traditional media to look at viewer numbers at the time of broadcast or publication, and determine reach and value based on those initial numbers. I think that is a mistake. I believe there is real value in the longtail that online content offers - including monetization opportunities.

Imagine adding a flash overlay to the SBIFF Cate Blanchett interview promoting the new Indiana Jones movie. You can generate instant, timely revenue using content that already exists. The same could be done with pre-roll and post-roll technology. Is money being left on the table? I think that content producers and advertisers alike need to get in a room and start looking at back catalog. The work has been done, all you have to do is pair it with a relevant advertising campaign.