"I got up, and I saw my sister-in-law live broadcast. ”
At 10 a.m. on Nov. 26, if you happen to click on @NBA's official Kuaishou account, you'll see that the Lakers legend and Kobe's perfect partner is greeting fans with Chinese. He still has the familiar smile on his face, and on the couch behind him is the number 16 jersey that Gasol officially retired on March 8 at halftime during the Lakers' game against the Grizzlies.
From commenting on the development of the Lakers this season, to telling about his daily life of indulging in golf, to expressing his full expectation of coming to China, in Gasol's Kuaishou live broadcast debut, he used wonderful and interesting sharing to bring the users in front of the screen back to the green years that accompanied him, those classes spent in the score anxiety, those actions Xi when throwing under the basket, are the common memories of all fans.
In addition to Gasol, more NBA stars will be broadcast on Kuaishou in the future, chatting about the past of the league and unlocking anecdotes about the game. In fact, since the start of the NBA 2023-24 season, there has been a resurgence on the basketball court. As the NBA's official short video platform and NBA video content creation community, Kuaishou has also created a content matrix with copyright events as the core, including original programs, star live broadcasts, and featured second creations, etc., to present users with a feast of events through rich content layout and interactive experience.
Entering the third year of "embracing" the NBA, some "changes and changes" are slowly showing on the content map of Kuaishou. They not only mean what Kuaishou has "done right" in the past, but also affect what Kuaishou will "do better" in the future.
To "play" with the copyright of top events, refined operation is the key
To a certain extent, in the field of sports event operation, for the platform, copyright is the starting point of all subsequent actions and a prerequisite for attracting users.
On October 18, 2021, Kuaishou entered into a long-term strategic partnership with NBA China, thus becoming the official short video platform of NBA China and the video content creation community of NBA China. The content platform attributes of the former and the large number of NBA event materials that come with the latter not only provide a unique field for a large number of users to communicate and interact with the event, but also allow the traffic promotion resources and commercialization opportunities that creators yearn for to flourish in the process.
The proof is in the data. In the 2021-22 and 2022-23 seasons, the total views of NBA-related works on Kuaishou were 64 billion and 65.7 billion, respectively, and the total interactions were 3.1 billion and 3.5 billion, respectively. Such a brilliant achievement not only depends on Kuaishou's exploration and attempt to "combine horizontal and vertical" on the basis of copyright, but also inseparable from the in-depth operation of fine, diversified, efficient and agile.
"One horizontal" refers to original content. In the past two seasons, Kuaishou has successively created self-made programs such as "Playing Friends", "Lao Tie High Energy Viewing Group", "Do You Know Football", "NBA Express", "Hundred Debates NBA" and other self-made programs, covering star live broadcasts, competitive variety shows, series of live broadcasts, interactive answering questions, information commentary and other dimensions, both professional and interesting, and strive to meet users' needs for watching, discussing, sharing, and playing event-related content in an all-round way.
Among them, "Playing Friends" extends outward around the "core" of NBA events, further integrates the official resources of the NBA and the resources of stars and talents on the station, so that professional sports and public entertainment are organically integrated, so as to show the charm of basketball to the fullest.
"Lao Tie High Energy Viewing Group" has attracted a lot of attention with its differentiated live broadcast content. The three live broadcast special sessions represented by NBA stars, Kuaishou native talents, and young reporters in front accurately matched users with different viewing Xi. Taking the live broadcast of Wizards star Bradley Beal as an example, he not only gave an accurate judgment of the Nuggets winning the NBA championship last season, but also interacted with former CBA player @MengduoDanny3, basketball commentator @Duan Ran Online, basketball expert @Xiaohu Basketball Say, and village BA player @Wei Pigeon Lianmai. Professionals and grassroots experts come and go, and you can enjoy the unforgettable moments that you have walked with basketball.
"One vertical" refers to the spontaneous creation of content generated by users such as secondary creation and interactive gameplay, with diverse types, wide dissemination and large output scale. Many users still have fresh memories of athlete Zhang Guowei predicting that the Nuggets will win the championship with two soda bottles, and he is just one of Kuaishou's huge group of second creators. In order to stimulate creators' enthusiasm for content production, Kuaishou has successively launched creative incentive programs such as the "Basketball Rookie Cold Start Tour" for new authors, benchmark account support for top creators, and the NBA Creation Camp "Bounty Program" that benefits creators in all basketball fields. During this period, creators such as @篮球诗人, @猫篮球, and @新政的篮球梦 all increased their fans rapidly, and creators such as @勇士内容网, @NBA events, and @NBA Fan Center achieved an average weekly income of more than 10,000.
In addition, in the "NBA Home Team Dress Up Show Challenge", users can use specific magic expressions to shoot short videos to cheer for the team, and the launch of the "NBA National Heart" magic expression has also greatly lowered the threshold for creation. In other words, under the background of Kuaishou's "horizontal and vertical integration" operation, the NBA is no longer just a top game to be watched, but a basketball feast that everyone perceives, experiences, and participates in.
Capture the love of "people" and emphasize connecting with each other
After all, in the operation of the event, the most important thing is the connection of "people".
Whether it is the players running on the court, the spectators in the audience, the commentators who analyze the score situation off the court, the basketball experts who express and explain their opinions, or even the ordinary users who shout and cheer in the barrage, everyone is gathered together because of their attention to the game, their love for basketball, and their pursuit of competitive sports. Events are the glue that binds people together and also waits for people to be connected.
Therefore, in the 2023-24 season, Kuaishou has further strengthened the connection with "people" in the operation of NBA events. In terms of original content, in addition to the continuation of some existing IPs, some new plans have begun to emerge, such as the grassroots basketball event "Dunk Jianghu" and the "Upward Plan" to meet the wishes of fans to watch the game.
Specifically, the protagonist of the former is a domestic and foreign basketball dunk with unique skills, and every championship game is a competition field after they step into the rivers and lakes. It is reported that "Dunk Jianghu" plans to adopt the "basketball + rap" model to convey the charm of basketball with cross-border gameplay, and then incubate basketball grassroots stars with Kuaishou characteristics, so that every ordinary person can be seen. As for the latter, "upward" is an opportunity to improve oneself. When grassroots players come to the Upward Plan training camp, what awaits them is a "Upward Force" selection that requires focus, hard work, struggle, and hard work. Only the best campers have the opportunity to watch the NBA All-Star game live, and for that, they have to keep moving.
If the content of events such as Star Live and NBA Express is to connect this event with a relatively professional and always concerned user group through a small number of "people" who are close to the NBA. Then whether it is "Playing Ball, Friends", "Slam Dunk", "Upward Plan", or even the popular Kuaishou Village BA and FIBA Open 3×3, they are all further expanding outward on the basis of NBA events, forming a pan-crowd circle-breaking effect.
Xue Su, vice president of operations of Kuaishou Technology and head of sports business, once revealed that the number of sports content consumers in Kuaishou has exceeded 520 million, and the core interest in sports has reached more than 120 million. Kuaishou is undoubtedly a stage that cannot be ignored in popular sports, and all ordinary users who love basketball are expected to realize their self-worth here and reach their dreams that they have been running for a long time. This is actually a win-win consideration, for the grassroots players who grew up in Kuaishou, basketball is the fulcrum of their lives, and they have seized the ticket to the wider world, and for Kuaishou, which operates NBA events, it is closely related to the cultivation of content ecology and the layout of the popular sports field. The grassroots players in the station are not only the beneficiaries of the platform's sports ecology, but also one of the driving forces to promote the progress and development of the latter in the future, and the two are inseparable and mutually successful.
This is also reflected in the rights and interests allocated by Kuaishou for the content of the second creation. In addition to maintaining the original booster coupon support, cash incentives, and physical prizes, in order to ensure the basic rights and interests of each creator, Kuaishou lowered the threshold for posting articles for the second creation activity, and set up a separate prize pool for creators with different levels of fans. At the same time, the new season of the NBA Creation Camp has added three theme creation tracks - NBA Burning Moments, NBA Voices on the Court, and NBA Storytellers, and authors of different content types can sign up for the competition according to their own conditions. The weekly list selection mechanism and the shortening of the settlement cycle to once a week are also conducive to the improvement of creators' enthusiasm, so as to form healthy competition within the company and promote the stable and sustainable development of a positive cycle of content production.
Behind the operation of "games" and the connection of "people" is the methodology precipitated by Kuaishou in the two years of cooperation with the NBA, and it is also the experience of its operation of international events including the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games and the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics. Professional sports and popular sports are two concentric circles, and it is necessary to cultivate the former and lay out the latter. As more and more ordinary users learn about basketball and join basketball through the NBA arena, the popular sports ecology will also radiate a different vitality.
Create a new paradigm of integration of quality and efficiency, and push up the ceiling of commercialization
Especially at the level of business value. In the past two years, the NBA, a top national event IP, has joined forces with Kuaishou to create a new paradigm of sports marketing that integrates quality and efficiency. Many brands in the automobile, game, apparel, food and other industries have launched commercial cooperation with Kuaishou, through rich gameplay such as match point linkage, short video packaging, program implantation, and talent creation, as well as a variety of conversion and efficiency improvement tools in Kuaishou's short video and live broadcast state, to achieve multiple marketing demands such as brand and product promotion, accurate reach of target groups, and rapid increase in sales conversion, and the exposure of many brands has exceeded 100 million levels, with remarkable results.
It can be said that the continuous layout of NBA event content is also pushing up the ceiling of Kuaishou's commercialization step by step. Kuaishou's partnership with sports brand PUMA is a striking example.
In the past two seasons, with NBA copyright content as the core, focusing on the wonderful performance of spokesperson LaMelo Ball during the event, combined with the marketing node of the Chinese Year of the Rabbit, PUMA has launched a series of customized pan-NBA content, involving the event copyright short video packaging, precise directional opening screen advertising, content cooperation with in-station influencers, creative videos, etc., to reach core consumers, complete the promotion of new products and planting grass, and the total exposure rate of copyright short videos exceeded 100 million.
For users, brand awareness is already being built while browsing NBA-related content. In this process, the feasibility of Kuaishou's "copyright + people + key nodes" marketing model has been fully confirmed - with copyright as the content of the event as the core, the brand spokesperson is the star, and the important time node is combined, so that the brand image and mind can be transmitted and infiltrated to users "silently", and the three "stars, sneakers, and fans" are all located on the communication chain, and the quality and effect are integrated and deeply integrated.
The direct result of rich content categories is the increase in scenarios, the improvement of users, and the abundance of traffic, which are often linked to consumption decisions and are opportunities that brands do not want to miss. For the latter, it is the introduction and the key in content-based marketing planning.
As the official NBA ball, Wilson's products are designed to be related to the NBA's 30 teams. Therefore, through the program content implantation of the Kuaishou daily micro-variety show "NBA Evening Xi", Wilson vividly laid out the brand concept, growth details, and connotation stories behind the product design in front of users. This not only helps it win the attention of users and the love of the team's fans, but also guides users to jump to the official store to purchase with one click through the conversion component "Little Bell" in the Kuaishou live broadcast room, so as to achieve the two major needs of product promotion and sales. According to the data, the cumulative number of cooperative programs has exceeded 2.6 million.
Not only basketball, but also other sports events have a similar path to commercialization. In fact, copyright is the sharpest arrow, "people" is tantamount to a powerful boost, and the grasp of marketing nodes requires unremitting exploration of the best time. Under the combined effect of the right time, place and people, we can hit the hearts of users and create a refreshing marketing effect. In the short video playback again and again, the user's impression of the brand continues to deepen, and the influence of the event is also continuously amplified in the process of "arrowing", so as to truly achieve "both communication and conversion".
From Kuaishou's point of view, this is an extension of the ecological value of content. Starting from the copyright of professional sports events, we will expand the audience with original content and secondary creations, and connect professional sports with the public sports ecology, so as to give full play to the commercialization potential of the content itself, and the energy generated by commercialization will be fed back to the creators. Users "watch interesting NBA on Kuaishou", more ordinary people who love basketball are discovered, the brand achieves its marketing goals, and the platform expands its own ecology - an effort, a win-win situation for all parties.