With the proliferation of OTT and mobile devices, new emerging media channels are popping up every week. This week, that honor goes to GoPro and Snapchat.
Wearable camera-maker GoPro has always been a pro at content marketing, as evidence by their über-popular YouTube channel with over 2.7 million subscribers. Other existing distribution partners of GoPro include Microsoft Xbox, LG, and Virgin America. Now, GoPro is making another big step in becoming a media channel and content provider by launching its own Roku channel dedicated to sports and action videos shot with its cameras.
Meanwhile, messaging app Snapchat continues to make strides towards becoming a full-fledged media channel. Following its announcement that it is experimenting with original content last week, Snapchat scored the exclusive premiere of the newest music video from Madonna, the first established artist to debut content on the messaging app.
Any brand with a sizable audience can try their hands at becoming a media channel, either by partnering up with existing distributors, as is the case with GoPro, or building out on their own like Snapchat. But in the end, only the ones with great content will win out.
This month the Lab attended a kind of Facebook marketing boot camp, where members of the Facebook team guided us on best practices for integrating Facebook within brand marketing plans. The opportunity is much larger then capturing a portion of the 250 million Facebook users as customers; it’s also a prospect for new ways to be innovative in our marketing.