BT Sport has claimed that tomorrow’s all-Spanish UEFA Champions League final will be the “most social sports broadcast ever”. The network will be introducing a live-stream of the game to social media, giving us an insight into the future of sports broadcasting…
Social media was always going to play a far more active part in the broadcasting of sports. How could it not? As more and more users turn to social media to view video content over traditional televisual media, broadcast media agencies have been well aware of the need to expand their distribution techniques in order to reach their audience where they are.
Social networking is the preferred method of media discovery and communication for millions of people across the globe. Now it seems that the broadcasting authorities have cottoned on to that fact. Finally a major sporting event will be livestreamed on social networking!
How BT Sport will be utilising social media
Tomorrow’s final between Real Madrid and Athletico Madrid will be broadcast live across a wide variety of media, including the BT Sport YouTube channel. The company made the decision in order to maximise the amount of people who could watch the game, and also as an effort to re engage younger people by meeting them where they are.
BT Sport will also be using a whole host of other social networks in a variety of different ways. For example they will be using Facebook Live for interactive interviews with Rio Ferdinand and Owen Hargreaves, Snapchat for behind the scenes footage, and also sharing live match action clips via Twitter.
Chief Executive of BT Consumer John Petter had this to say:
“We’ve always said we wanted to give top quality sport back to the people and making the UEFA Champions League and Europa League finals free to everyone in the UK does this in a big way… We’re also bringing BT Sport to a new generation of younger sports fans who view their entertainment online, through social media and on their mobile devices. We plan to make these finals the most social sports broadcast ever, with lots of exciting content in the buildup and on the night across YouTube, Snapchat, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Vine.”
The rise of video and live streaming on social media
Social networks have put a significant amount of time and effort into expanding their video ad capabilities over the past few years and it’s now obvious that these have seriously paid off. Social media experts have been saying all along that the future of social media in lies in video and in particular live video content. Now it could be that the future has arrived.
Sports is an incredibly lucrative industry that boasts huge fan bases, all with significant purchasing power. The fact that they are paving the way in utilising social for live broadcasting certainly suggests that the future is in social media! What are your thoughts? Get in touch via @GiraffeSM!
