Content Marketing and the Video Streaming Twist

© March Oyinki 2017

At the end of 2016, video content marketing gained momentum in the digital media marketing industry. The streaming of video content in social media channels increased tremendously, achieving a new high above photographs/illustrations which previously dominated digital content in the online marketing environment. In the close of the year 2016, industry experts predicted that video content will be the most used content type in 2017 and that video content is the future of content marketing. According to Cisco, video content will account for 69 percent of all consumer internet traffic in 2017, and video-on-demand traffic alone will almost trebled at the end of the year. In just the first quarter of the year, there are strong indications of the boisterous role video contents will play in digital media marketing circle.

Recent news by WSJ, reported that Facebook Inc. is stepping up efforts to acquire rights to stream professional sporting events, as video content becomes a key element of its business strategy. The social media giant recently signed a deal with Major League Soccer (MLS) and Spanish-language broadcaster Univision Communications Inc. that gives it exclusive, English-language rights to stream at least 22 regular-season soccer games in the U.S. starting March 18. It was reported that the games will appear on Univision Deportes’ Facebook page, while the live shows will stream on MLS’ Facebook page.

Dan Reed, Facebook’s head of global sports partnerships emphasizes the importance of posting photos and videos, including live sports broadcasts to its 1.86 billion monthly users; among which about 35% follow sports on its social network. According to Facebook, soccer is the most-followed sport among its users. Mr. Reed agreed live sports broadcast are a new and important territory, but the company is going ahead with plans to work towards acquiring more broadcast rights from other major sports leagues.

This move launches Facebook into Social TV, a significant thrust into video content marketing which is capable of triggering a spiraling trail of smaller industry players. The digital media marketing arena is poised for an explosion of video contents, and making it the leading content type on social media in 2017 and beyond. Video streaming has become a phenomenon across all social media platforms, and it is no longer in the exclusive domain of tradition video streaming channels such as YouTube. 

Facebook is however, not the first social media site to embark on live video streaming of a major sports league. In 2016, Twitter Inc. had signed a series of deals with the Major League Baseball, the National Hockey League, and the National Basketball Association, and edged out Facebook, Verizon Communications Inc., and Amazon Inc. with a $10 million deal for the rights to stream 10 National Football League’s Thursday night games, according to WSJ.

The three leading live streaming social media platforms are Periscope, owned by Twitter and have about 10 million active users; Facebook Live, a live video streaming site that is already enjoying remarkable popularity in the social media space, and it is expected that the company will try and do just about anything to get more users and generate more revenue; and YouTube Live, the birthplace of video, Google's flagship video streaming social media site with more than one billion users, was reported to have made over $9 billion in 2016, and paid out over $5bilion of that amount to content creators and right holders, according to Music business Worldwide.

With Facebook coming on stream with live video broadcast, we should be expecting an all time high in the revenue earnings of video contents in the digital media marketing industry. As for social media marketers and video content creators, it has become apparent that more attention and resources has to be directed towards generating better quality video contents, and this is particularly true in a market already flooded with all kinds of video contents. It will require tactfulness by marketers and video content creators to produce entertaining video contents, for their brands to stand out in the crowd.

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