Facebook and 'Thursday Night Football': A perfect match?
As part of its ongoing campaign to fill the Facebook news feed with highly engaging video, the company now wants a crack at the millions of "Thursday Night Football" fans. It has appealed to the National Football League about buying digital rights to live-stream its next 18-game season, a deal that last month set NBC and CBS back by , and to stream them online.
If Facebook wins the deal over competing bidders 鈥� Amazon.com, Verizon and potentially Yahoo 鈥� it could package games with pre- or post-game video features, in the locker room or on the field itself, according to Variety.
鈥淭here鈥檚 a lot of interesting things we can do with sports,鈥� Dan Rose, Facebook鈥檚 vice president of partnerships told the magazine Monday. 鈥淚f you think about how people engage on Facebook today, it鈥檚 not really around watching three hours of video,鈥� he said.
But bite-size live video, buttressed by celebrity-studded content, could keep more viewers on Facebook longer, giving the company ample time to serve up advertising.
And the NFL is huge. The "Thursday Night Football" season debut last year on CBS and the NFL Network was the most-watched and highest-rated game in the broadcast's history, according to the NFL, . The league already has 13.5 million followers on Facebook.
According to Rose鈥檚 interview with Variety, Facebook users watch live broadcasts on the platform three times longer than recorded video, which already gets Facebook says. It is no wonder, then, that Facebook has been pushing live streaming aggressively since last summer when it introduced for celebrities, including actors, athletes, musicians, and politicians, , the company says.
鈥淥ur message to the industry, to the folks we partner with, is you now have a production studio in your pocket 鈥� and a way to reach an audience that鈥檚 new and different,鈥� Mr. Rose told Variety. 鈥淚t鈥檚 unscripted, it鈥檚 authentic and it鈥檚 interactive,鈥� he said.
The recently used the feature to show the host rehearsing his opening monologue. Rihanna, Chris Rock, Ted Cruz and Hillary Clinton鈥檚 staff have also used it.
Despite the impressive engagement numbers, advertisers couldn鈥檛 make money through video on the platform.
But in July, Facebook started to change that, introducing a plan to share ad revenue from mobile videos with video creators 鈥� 55 percent goes to the video creator and 45 percent to Facebook. The program started with a few partners so far, including Tastemade, NBA, Hearst, Funny or Die, and Fox Sports.
