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All posts by snappytvblog
NCAA March Madness Most Social Moments – Powered by SnappyTV Social Volume
This was one of the most unpredictable NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournaments ever with UConn and Kentucky piling up the upsets to reach last night’s championship game. All of the unpredictability (and the big schools rising to the top) also contributed to make this the most social March Madness ever.
As we blogged about previously, the SnappyTV platform was tightly integrated into Turner Sports’ March Madness Live experience. One of the key components they leveraged was our Social Volume product, which provides real-time data and visualizations that marry event video with social activity happening across the web and then lets you match up videos, GIFs and photos with those visualizations.
Using this data and clips shared in real-time on Facebook and Twitter via SnappyTV, here’s a look at the Top 5 Most Social Moments from this year’s March Madness tournament.
#5 Dayton upsets Syracuse in thrilling fashion! – 16,342 tweets/min
The University of Dayton Flyers reached the Sweet Sixteen for the first time since 1984 by defeating powerhouse Syracuse. The Flyers would win one more game before bowing out in the Elite Eight.
HIGHLIGHT: @DaytonMBB upsets Syracuse in thrilling fashion. (by @CokeZero) #MarchMadness http://t.co/dLmTVFn6VA
— NCAA March Madness (@marchmadness) March 23, 2014
#4 Kentucky ends Wichita State’s perfect season in St. Louis! – 17,141 tweets/min
The Wichita St. Shockers were trying to become the first team to finish the season undefeated since the 1976 Indiana Hoosiers but fell prey to the Kentucky Wildcats’ Freshman-dominated team. The Shockers’ dreams of an undefeated season ended abruptly in the Third Round proving doubters, who cited their easy schedule, right.
HIGHLIGHT: Kentucky ends Wichita State’s perfect season in St. Louis! (by @InfinitiUSA) #MarchMadness http://t.co/x67Pih3NZQ
— NCAA March Madness (@marchmadness) March 23, 2014
#3 Kentucky punches its ticket to the Elite 8! – 17,528 tweets/min
One of the most anticipated games of the tournament pitted Kentucky against in-state rival, and defending champion, Louisville. The Cardinals, who had been the darling pick in brackets across the country, ran up against the rapidly maturing Wildcats and ultimately came up short.
HIGHLIGHT: Kentucky punches its ticket to the Elite 8! (by @CokeZero) #MarchMadness http://t.co/1pDN9ZlHwv
— NCAA March Madness (@marchmadness) March 29, 2014
#2 Kentucky drills a 3-pointer to take the lead with 2.6 seconds to go! – 18,112 tweets/min
One of the stars of the tournament was Kentucky’s Aaron Harrison who hit three last minute three pointers in tight games that ultimately tipped the tide for the Wildcats against Louisville, Michigan and Wisconsin. This cold-blooded three against Michigan sent Kentucky to the Final Four and sent the Wolverines home.
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#1 Mercer Dancing! – 56,887 tweets/min
The breakout star of the tournament was arguably a player who scored 0 points. How could that be you ask? Well Mercer’s Senior Guard, Kevin Canevari, created an internet sensation by performing the Nae Nae dance after the Bears’ stunning upset of Duke in the Second Round. His moment illustrates just why March Madness is one of the most popular sporting events – because it creates human moments that resonate with sports fans and casual viewers alike.
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SnappyTV Launches Native Playback
SNAPPYTV LAUNCHES NATIVE VIDEO PLAYBACK; BECOMES FIRST COMPANY TO ENABLE ONE-TAP PLAYBACK IN SOCIAL STREAMS
SnappyTV Allows for One-Tap Videos that See 5X More Engagement on Twitter and Facebook
LAS VEGAS – NAB Show, April 8, 2014 – SnappyTV, the leading cloud based content production and marketing platform, announced today that it is the first company to enable native, one-tap playback of videos in social streams including Twitter and Facebook. With SnappyTV’s native video playback, content owners can share content synchronized to TV including real time highlights from live events, photos, GIFs and more directly into their social streams. SnappyTV’s native video playback product is already being used by leading media companies including Fox Sports, HBO Sports and the NBA and has seen engagement rates up to five times higher than non-native videos across web and mobile.
Snappy TV’s platform can be seamlessly integrated into a company’s existing workflows, allowing them to reach their followers with real-time video highlights that can be consumed directly within the Twitter environment. Consumers will see the videos play automatically and can tap or click the thumbnail to instantly load the video without being sent to a third party site. Not only can SnappyTV customers take advantage of Twitter’s native one-click player, they are also able to maintain the hooks into ad servers and metrics systems that they rely on. This approach allows customers to leverage their existing tools and infrastructure while driving more viewership and value for advertisers.
“It is a simple fact – video clips that are shared live, in the moment, have more engagement. This is something that until SnappyTV, has not been possible, on PC or on mobile,” said Mike Folgner, co-founder and CEO. “Our close relationship with both Twitter and Facebook as a developer partner has allowed us to improve the video sharing experience for content owners and the video consumption experience for users. We are already seeing these native videos are generating more engagement for media companies which translates into more monetization opportunities.”
“It is more important than ever for us to share big moments with our fans as they are happening live,” said Josh Baird, senior manager, social media at Fox Sports. “With SnappyTV’s native video player for Twitter and Facebook, we can streamline the process for fans by capturing exciting moments in sports and share them on social media instantly, when engagement is at its highest.”
Attendees of the NAB Show can visit SnappyTV in the South Hall, booth SU13203 at the Las Vegas Convention Center.
Why Posting Video on Facebook Matters (Hint: You'll Double Your User Engagement)
A recent study published by Quintly demonstrates that video is king when it comes to Facebook user engagement. According to the study, videos posted by Fan Pages received nearly twice the number of engagements as photos, the runner up in the study.
What’s more is that videos only comprise a paltry 3% of posts made by Fan Pages meaning there is a real dearth of video content being made available to social media managers for use in Facebook.
Another important nugget in the recently released study is that questions do not receive a good amount of engagement, so the old best practice about prompting user interaction by asking a question does not seem to hold water when put into practice.
Key Takeaways
With Facebook investing more in video playback with new features like video auto-play and larger thumbnails, video is only going to continue to become more popular amongst Facebook users. So the question becomes, how can I as a marketer or social media manager create more video inventory and ultimately drive more engagement amongst my fans?
Luckily SnappyTV can help with that. Using our new Facebook Export tool, customers have started to publish content using the native Facebook Player from the SnappyTV Platform. Here are some recent examples:
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Post by FOX Sports.
If you want to learn more about how SnappyTV can help with your video strategy on Facebook, get in touch with your SnappyTV account representative.
You can read more about this study here: http://www.quintly.com/blog/2014/03/data-analysis-which-facebook-post-type-rules-the-news-feed/
March Madness 2014 + SnappyTV = The Future of TV?
For the third consecutive year, SnappyTV has worked closely with Turner Sports on their March Madness social execution. This year, we are working with them on more fronts than ever including a deep in-app integration, social posts on Facebook and Twitter, and even helping their ad sales teams provide video affidavits to sponsors. What makes this app so unique is that the March Madness team has taken the best of the Second Screen experience and combined it with live streams to produce a single, unified experience that is like nothing seen before.
The feedback from users about the March Madness Live experience has been nothing short of phenomenal. Casual fans and tech industry luminaries alike are calling the experience the “Future of TV” and we can’t be more excited to be part of it. We also encourage you to experience this live throughout the remainder of the NCAA tournament so you can experience this first hand.
BTW, the March Madness app is the future of televised events. Very well executed.
— Rick Klau (@rklau) March 21, 2014
This #CBS tournament app is pretty sick. The moments at the bottom that show highlights is genius! @coke http://t.co/QhIuzBLET5
— Troy L (@EmTL4) March 22, 2014
Whoever designed the #MarchMadness app derserves a pat on the back. The live video, in-line highlights, & audio are pretty sweet.
— Ryan O'Bryan (@ryano106) March 21, 2014
In App Integration
SnappyTV’s technology has been deeply integrated into the March Madness Live app for iPhone, iPad, Android and Desktop. Users who watch games live (or even watching full game replays) have a SnappyTV generated Social Volume sound wave sitting below the main video player. Culled from live Twitter Data, we provide the app with live Twitter statistics through our Timeline API, and their app, in turn, displays it to end users.
What’s more is that in addition to showing the game’s Social Volume, the March Madness Live team is also using our LiveCut Editor to curate instant video highlights, images and Tweets that appear along the sound wave. As these assets are created (and approved by a social media manager) they appear instantly inside the experience where users can enjoy them and ultimately share them into social media.
Social Sharing to Twitter and Facebook
In addition to powering much of the social experience within the March Madness Live app, Turner Sports are also using us to post real-time highlights and our animated GIF-like Snap Reels to drive tune in and awareness of current tournament activity.
On Twitter, the team is using us as part of Twitter Amplify Campaigns with Infiniti and Coke bringing in new revenue by running these campaigns directly within Twitter as seen here:
HIGHLIGHT: @MercerMBB with a HUGE 3-point play to extend its lead to five over Duke. (by @CokeZero) #MarchMadness http://t.co/mvpDLTaVNX
— NCAA March Madness (@marchmadness) March 21, 2014
and here:
HIGHLIGHT: Kentucky ends Wichita State’s perfect season in St. Louis! (by @InfinitiUSA) #MarchMadness http://t.co/x67Pih3NZQ — NCAA March Madness (@marchmadness) March 23, 2014
The March Madness team is also using us to help drive tune in, using viral moments inside their Tweets and Facebook posts.
HALFTIME on CBS: @Vol_Hoops 41 – #UMass 22 http://t.co/0sKleCuNBR
— March Madness TV (@MarchMadnessTV) March 21, 2014
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When posting to Facebook, they are using our new Export to Facebook feature which allows you to publish MP4 files directly to your Fan Pages to take advantage of new Facebook Video features like auto-playing in the News Feed.
Bleacher Report – Live Game Coverage and Publishing to their Website
This year, we also started working with Bleacher Report, which is now a Turner Sports property. Using our LiveCut Editor, the B/R team was including real-time highlights into their extremely popular TeamStream App.
Bleacher Report is also using our Ooyala connector to quickly publish clips to their website for use in articles and in their video library.
(See this on Bleacher Report)
Ad Sales Affidavits
Another unexpected, but brilliant use that the Turner team has gotten out of our platform is that their Ad Sales team is using us to provide affidavits to sponsors that their ad spots were executed on air. Using SnappyTV for this has dramatically reduced the amount of time that their ad sales team has to spend on this activity so they can spend their time doing what they are best at – selling.
The Future is Here
We always love working with the Turner Sports team on March Madness. They fully understand all of the various ways that our platform can help drive tune in, provide new ad inventory, and provide rapid efficiencies in producing video and other media types. Moving video editing workflows into the cloud is what makes all of this possible because it results in huge gains in speed and opens up video editing, and the clips that are produced, to a much broader audience than what was ever possible before.
But what is more impressive is how the Turner Sports team has recognized that the line between the first screen and second screen has all but gone away. People want access to live video anywhere, anytime and on any device. And at the same time, they want to experience that video with all of the unique aspects that second screen apps have brought to the live TV watching experience. The March Madness team has proved that the future is here, and we’re just happy to be along for the ride.
SnappyTV – Powering the Next Generation of Twitter Amplify Experiences with One Tap Playback
The social conversation around live sporting events is reaching a fever pitch with premier events like NCAA March Madness and NBA Playoffs right around the corner. Today, SnappyTV is the first Twitter Amplify partner to give media companies the ability to reach their followers with real-time video highlights that can be consumed directly within the Twitter environment. SnappyTV’s Twitter Amplify content is now pre-expanded, which exposes a video’s thumbnail in the Twitter Timeline. Users are then able to watch highlights immediately with just one click on desktop or one tap on their mobile devices.
Joint Amplify customers of SnappyTV and Twitter can share highlights of live content as it’s happening or upload pre-produced content and watch engagement skyrocket through this unique, one-tap playback experience. The NBA went live this week with the first tweet using Twitter’s native video player, featuring highlights from the Knicks/Pacers game. We are already seeing incredible engagement around that content with hundreds of retweets and favorites.
Not only can SnappyTV customers take advantage of Twitter’s native “one-click” player, but they can also maintain the hooks into the ad servers and metrics systems that they rely on. This approach allows customers to leverage their existing tools and infrastructure while driving more viewership and value for Amplify sponsors.
We look forward to working closely with Twitter to power the next generation of Amplify experiences and helping our customers achieve maximum engagement around their content.
Introducing Scheduled Shares
On our journey to simplify and improve the way our customers create and share content, the SnappyTV team is launching our newest feature – Scheduled Shares. Now you’ll be able to designate when and where your content is shared, powering better social campaigns, opening new opportunities for non-live video, and connecting you to viewers on multiple platforms in an instant.
Automate Your Amplify Campaign
Streamline the workflow for Twitter Amplify and other social media marketing campaigns, scheduling Tweets and Posts in advance, then letting SnappyTV automate your distribution of VOD content. Program your entire week of Amplify content in less than an hour. Combine Scheduled Tweets with our Notifications feature to automatically alert sponsors of new Tweets to Amplify as they go live. Scheduled shares allow you to set your editorial calendar and move on to next item on your task list.
Share In Sync With Your Broadcast
Extend the reach of your pre-produced content by sharing key moments when fans are already buzzing – during your broadcast. Upload or edit your videos early, schedule Tweets or Posts to run throughout the show, and go about your business as your content becomes part of the social conversation.
Easily Comply with Rights Agreements
If you’re already using SnappyTV to edit from live content, you can use the Scheduled Shares feature to comply with rights agreements that prohibit social sharing while the event is airing live. Create clips in our LiveCut Editor, then publish to all of your social channels automatically by scheduling them to go live as soon as your broadcast is over.
Seamlessly Debut Content Across Social Channels
Use Scheduled Shares to simultaneously debut a single piece of content across Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr, each with its own unique messaging. Engage your fans and followers where and when they want it, all from a single platform.
Want to learn more about the Scheduled Shares feature? Check out our Knowledge Base article or contact your SnappyTV Account Manager. You can also reach out to our Customer Success team anytime at customersuccess@snappytv.com.
Record Breaking Hack Day @ SnappyTV – Record Fun For Sure
We had an amazing first hack day of the year. We saw range, we saw brilliance and we saw a lot of fixes to make this a better world. Congratulations to a team that has built so much to be proud of and also took the time to flex their creativity. High fives all around.
Catch All the Action from the NFL Combine
The NFL has been live tweeting highlights from the combine in Indianapolis this week with a huge social response. The clips showing players “racing” during their various 40 yard runs through some slick technology that superimposes two video clips together (from a company called Simulcam) has been drawing the biggest response. NFL Network’s Rich Eisen even got in on the action with hilarious results, even sending him into infamy by trending worldwide on Twitter.
Rich Eisen vs… Rich Eisen?!? See how @richeisen‘s 5.98 stacks up against his previous 40 runs. SIMULCAM RACE: http://t.co/fdQ2AqUe0R
— NFL Network (@nflnetwork) February 26, 2014
Take a look at some of the top highlights from the week – and take notes for your Fantasy Football draft coming up this fall.
NASCAR Launches New App with Instant Highlights
We have been working closely with the NASCAR team for the past three seasons. Last year we worked on a Twitter Amplify campaign with them:
WATCH: @KevinHarvick wins the #ToyotaOwners400 in a green-white checkered finish. #NASCAR – http://t.co/cx5YAHvJuX
— NASCAR (@NASCAR) April 28, 2013
This year they wanted to try something new – to provide Sprint customers who download the NASCAR Mobile app with a unique Race Day experience by providing instant highlights of important moments along side leaderboards, social feeds and other live data. Using the SnappyTV LiveCut Editor, the NASCAR social media team clips up moments as they happen. Then using our Timeline API, these highlights are immediately surfaced in their iOS, Android, and Windows Apps.
NASCAR is also making these same clips available on desktop (sponsored by FedEx) for post-race consumption which can be viewed here: http://snpy.tv/1fL0xuk
Finally, NASCAR is using our Brightcove Video Cloud connector to publish selected clips to their Video CMS to be populated across their web properties and syndicated out to syndication partners.
What’s most exciting about this is that the NASCAR team seems to have fully grasped the true power of our platform. That we can power social, mobile and web initiatives at the speed of real-time resulting in higher engagement rates and built in virality driven by social media.
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