TEXAS PRESS ASSOCIATION CONFERENCE @DALEBLASINGAME NATIVE CONTENT ON SOCIAL: WHAT WORKS AND WHAT DOESN’T? A FEW QUESTIONS… “If we are not prepared to go and search for the audience wherever they live, we will lose.” – ISAAC LEE, PRESIDENT OF NEWS AND DIGITAL FOR UNIVISION AND CEO OF FUSION Photo: ISOJ HOW CAN NEWSROOMS MAKE MONEY DIRECTLY FROM SOCIAL? HOW CAN NEWSROOMS MAKE MONEY DIRECTLY FROM SOCIAL? HOW CAN NEWSROOMS MAKE MONEY DIRECTLY FROM SOCIAL? *but it is possible HOW CAN NEWSROOMS BENEFIT FROM SOCIAL? HOW CAN NEWSROOMS BENEFIT FROM SOCIAL? I’m going to show you five big ways. FACEBOOK INSTANT ARTICLES INSTANT ARTICLES • Now appearing in NewsFeed • 18 publishers: The New York Times, NBC News, The Atlantic, BuzzFeed, National Geographic, Cosmopolitan, Daily Mail, The Huffington Post, Slate, Vox Media, Mic, MTV News, The Washington Post, The Dodo, The Guardian, BBC News, Bild • Load 10x faster than standard web articles INSTANT ARTICLES • Let’s talk money… • 100% of ad revenue news orgs sell on their own • If Facebook sells the ads: It keeps 30 percent of revenue COMING SOON TO INSTANT ARTICLES Billboard, Billy Penn, The Blaze, Bleacher Report, Breitbart, Brit + Co, Business Insider, Bustle, CBS News, CBS Sports, CNET, Complex, Country Living, Cracked, Daily Dot, E! News, Elite Daily, Entertainment Weekly, Gannett, Good Housekeeping, Fox Sports, Harper’s Bazaar, Hollywood Life, Hollywood Reporter, IJ Review, Little Things, Mashable, Mental Floss, mindbodygreen, MLB, MoviePilot, NBA, NY Post, The Onion, Opposing Views, People, Pop Sugar, Rare, Refinery 29, Rolling Stone, Seventeen, TIME, Uproxx, US Magazine, USA Today, Variety, The Verge, The Weather Channel “The first thing we’re seeing is that people are more likely to share these articles, compared to articles on the mobile web, because Instant Articles load faster. We believe that sharing is the strongest signal that someone can give that it was a great experience.” – MICHAEL RECKHOW, FACEBOOK (COURTESY: HARVARD NIEMAN LAB) FACEBOOK NATIVE VIDEO FACEBOOK NATIVE VIDEO • Videos are uploaded directly to Facebook • Autoplay when scrolled across in News Feed • 8 billion daily views • 75% of views globally are on mobile • 53% of all video views come from shares 1. TRIBUNE BROADCASTING TRIBUNE BROADCASTING • Owns or operates 42 stations across the U.S. • 6.4 million combined likes on Facebook • 20 million+ combined Facebook video plays each month “What we’re doing is using either different pieces of content or subsets of that piece of content, and not in the form of a tease, but giving the meat. If there’s 15 amazing seconds of a 1:30 piece of video, that’s the 15 seconds that’s going on Facebook. Not the 15 seconds before it and saying ‘Click here to watch the good part.’” – STEVE BARON, TRIBUNE BROADCASTING VP OF DIGITAL TRIBUNE’S BIG PICTURE • As the number of native video views on Facebook has dramatically increased, the number of video views on the station websites has also dramatically increased • Baron: “There is no cannibalization.” • Also seeing jump in brand awareness STATION A: MEDIUM-SIZED MARKET, HAS NOT USED NATIVE VIDEO IN PAST 30 DAYS FACEBOOK INSIGHTS DATA PROVIDED BY TRIBUNE BROADCASTING STATION B: TOP-20 MARKET, USES NATIVE VIDEO, ISN’T ON POINT WITH STRATEGY FACEBOOK INSIGHTS DATA PROVIDED BY TRIBUNE BROADCASTING STATION C: LOVES NATIVE VIDEO AND FINDS IT IMPORTANT FACEBOOK INSIGHTS DATA PROVIDED BY TRIBUNE BROADCASTING 2. HLN’S THE DAILY SHARE HLN’S THE DAILY SHARE • Reversed the development pipeline • Social channels launched in September 2014 • TV show launched in January 2015 • Used social for brand development, audience development and content R&D in public HLN’S THE DAILY SHARE • Using social data to come up with daily TV rundowns • First six months on social: One billion video views • Inspirational stories tend to be best for native Facebook video NATIVE VIDEO POSTED TO THE DAILY SHARE AND HLN IN APRIL COMBINED 36.7 MILLION VIEWS Equivalent of a 13.2 national rating “The art of building an audience is being available to them where they are. The work we’re doing is creating stories worth watching and helping them get in front of people who will appreciate them. Our business is to create good content – not just good television.” – LILA KING, HLN THE DAILY SHARE RATINGS • Since its launch, The Daily Share is outperforming MSNBC by +33% in 18-49 and +2% in 25-54 • The Daily Share is up +6% in 18-49 demo from previous HLN programming in its time slot a year ago Ratings information provided by HLN “Before you can monetize something, you have to build an audience. That’s the stage we’re in, and that’s what we’re focusing on right now.” – LILA KING, HLN BTW, SILENT VIDEO IS BACK Medium - June 4 “These stories have a very quick turnaround, from 30 minutes to a couple hours depending on the complexity of the story and the way in which we are telling it. We purposely have formatted these pieces to be very simple and easy to push out so our team can be dynamic and respond to news as it breaks.” – JIGAR MEHTA, ENGAGEMENT LEAD AT AJ+ CREATING A SILENT VIDEO • Hook them quickly: “This means a visually engaging first five seconds of the video” • Silent means…silent: “It is common knowledge that the majority of people on Facebook are watching these videos with the sound turned off” • …which means utilize captions, music beds and quality video: Many AJ+ videos have no narration - Quotes from Jigar Mehta FACEBOOK MENTIONS SNAPCHAT SNAPCHAT • ComScore: 45% of Snapchat users are 18-24 • The Verge looks to take users on an adventure (live events or cool moments) • Can see how many users opened a story and then opened the next “We do not approach Snapchat as a way to drive site traffic. Your core strategy can't be to get your fans to visit another platform, or they simply won't engage with you. You have to come to them on their own terms and create content for that platform, even if the audience development efforts can't be tied to short-term monetization.” – HELEN HAVLAK, ENGAGEMENT EDITOR AT THE VERGE CHALLENGES OF SNAPCHAT REPORTING • There’s usually no time for a video person to be involved. You just send your reporter out to do it. • There’s no way to save a snap and get it approved. You have to trust your people to use their best judgment. - According to Helen Havlak “If we want to go after those younger readers and get them invested in our brand, our writers and our content, Snapchat is where we need to be. But even beyond the business case, it's one of the places we can take risks with new types of video content and gauge how our followers react.” – HELEN HAVLAK, ENGAGEMENT EDITOR AT THE VERGE PERISCOPE, INSTAGRAM, PINTEREST AND OTHERS OTHER SOCIAL NETWORKS • Different networks = totally different audiences • Great places to experiment • Periscope: Live news conferences (lots of orgs), live product demos (The Verge) or live chats (Mashable) “Some of the failures have been not moving as quickly on some trends. Waiting to see what was going to happen. Doing competitive research instead of just getting in there and doing it.” .” – STACY MARTINET, MASHABLE Photo: NYU OTHER SOCIAL NETWORKS • Instagram: Beautiful pictures (lots of orgs), archive content (Chicago Sun-Times) or shorter videos (AJ+) with no links • Pinterest: Largely female audience “The auto community on Pinterest is actually huge — so content from our new transportation hub tends to be among our top-performing. Beyond that, we rely heavily on our science stories, original product photography, design profiles and entertainment coverage to drive Pinterest engagement and reach a more balanced audience.” – HELEN HAVLAK, ENGAGEMENT EDITOR AT THE VERGE NATIVE AD CONTENT 8.9 MILLION VIEWS ON YOUTUBE CONTENT PEOPLE WANT TO CONSUME/SHARE YOU KNOW…FOCUS ON THE AUDIENCE • Content delivered where they are • Not just any content - *unique* content • Unique content tailored to that particular platform • Doesn’t have to be puppies or kittens (I promise) BENEFITS OF UNIQUE CONTENT ON SOCIAL 1. More (younger) eyeballs on your work 2. Higher ratings/traffic 3. Brand awareness 4. More knowledge about your audience 5. Additional revenue “If we are not prepared to go and search for the audience wherever they live, we will lose.” – ISAAC LEE, PRESIDENT OF NEWS AND DIGITAL FOR UNIVISION AND CEO OF FUSION Photo: ISOJ THANK YOU. @DALEBLASINGAME.