Dive Brief:
- As Twitter looks to bolster its live video presence, the social media platform is said to be close to announcing more live streaming deals, such as sports and political events, according to the Associated Press.
- "You'll see other announcements around premium content from us soon," Kayvon Beykpour, co-founder of Twitter-owned live streaming app Periscope, told the AP.
- Other deals for live events will be announced within weeks, according to Beykpour.
Dive Insight:
Like other social platforms, Twitter is making a play in live video. Twitter has been competing in the video space since acquiring Periscope after the emergence of live video streaming app Meerkat. Meerkat's success was short-lived after going head-to-head with the Twitter-owned app, but Twitter and Periscope may now face a similar challenge with Facebook's ambitious move into live video.
Facebook has been making an especially aggressive push into live video this year: The company recently announced it has signed deals with 140 media companies and celebrities to seed its new streaming video feature with content, while also suggesting that ads could be coming soon to the plaftorm.
Not to be overshadowed, Twitter has been making moves to bolster its live stream offerings. Most recently, Twitter announced its launch of a live video button in the app that will include embeddable Periscope feeds.
“For me, this is huge because this means we are totally breaking down the barrier [to] a live broadcast," Alex Khoshnevissan, head of business operations at Periscope, said about the embeddable videos. "You don’t have to have Periscope. You don’t have to know what Periscope is.”
The news follows Twitter's announcement of a deal to live stream 10 Thursday Night Football NFL games in April. A Twitter spokesperson said it has already sold around half of its NFL ad inventory long before the professional football season begins and it was hoping to sell the remainder last week at Cannes Lions. Anheuser-Busch InBev NV, Nestle SA's DiGiornio pizza and Sony Pictures Entertainment are among the first brands to buy NFL live streaming ad spots. After paying $10 million for the rights to stream the NFL games, Twitter is selling ads packages between $2 million and $8 million for the events.
Twitter has long functioned as a "second screen" where users can comment on live events as they unfold, but the push into live video indicates Twitter's ambitions to become a "first screen."
"We've always been a second screen for people to interact with when they are watching TV," Beykpour siad. "[Twitter] "should also be a first screen."
