We’re only two months into 2016, but there have already been some BIG changes on the social video front.
Check out some of the most significant social video news updates below:
Facebook gets better social video metrics…
Responding to the needs of publishers, Facebook has redesigned and improved the video metrics it provides through Page Insights.
The new metrics include video views over ten seconds (Facebook normally counts a view after only 3 seconds), a breakdown of views with sound on and off, and the total number of minutes your videos has been watched.
All of this brings Facebook closer to YouTube, whose metrics have been focused on viewtime over viewcount for some time, to let you know how many people are actually watching your video.
… and pushes live video to the top of the news feed
Still dominated by Twitch, Facebook is putting a lot of weight behind their live video streaming feature.
Facebook considers live video a unique content type, separate from normal videos, and the ever-mysterious newsfeed algorithm is now favoring live streams and placing them at the top of our newsfeed.
Whether live video can perform well in Facebook’s increasingly feature-rich interface remains to be seen, but it’ll be interesting to see if this feature will be used more by large media outlets covering major events, or smaller outlets with more specialized coverage.
Twitter brings video capture into the app.
Twitter has introduced the ability to capture, edit, and share videos right from within the Twitter app, pitting it against Instagram and Vine as a first-destination for mobile video.
We know that native video already receives higher engagement on the platform – averaging twice as many replies and retweets as third-party video – and this move seems to confirm that Twitter is not content in being a mere feed for videos made elsewhere.
Instagram brings view counts to videos
Instagram has finally rolled out viewcounts for videos. Occupying the space below a video formerly reserved for likes, the new view counter can be tapped through to see likes.
As with Facebook, Instagram considers a view to be 3 seconds..
Alongside the feature, the company announced that video viewing on the platform has gone up 40%, and they see viewcounts as a way to highlight community engagement with video content.
It will be interesting to see certain content that is not very often “liked” (which can be seen in your friends’ activity feeds), nonetheless popularly viewed.
Have some video content of your own? Take 2 minutes to read our post “Facebook vs. YouTube: Where should you post Video Content” and find the best video destination for your video.
