Can a local church, radio station, or television station website become its own regional TV network? Can they grow to include custom content published via digital channels?
These will soon be more than conceptual questions, as a new generation of streaming video networks (SVN’s) get ready to put their TV-style syndication platforms into action.
The strategy is to use Software-as-Service (SaaS) and web syndication strategies to offer local organizations something similar to a traditional broadcast network and product, but at costs significantly lower than what starting a TV network ran in the pre-Internet days.
Loaded with media-rich features, SVN’s will offer a set of breakthrough high-impact practices to expand and support digital gospel programming.
SVN’s will give commercial and noncommercial broadcasters a shot at new channels of income to complement the existing ad schedules and donor development they rely on with their traditional platforms.
Churches, for the very first time, will have options to develop tasteful mission relevant advertising strategies quickly.
Audience growth
As audiences reduce time spent with traditional media and spend more time and money online, SVN’s will give organizations a way to encourage crossover and increase overall engagement. More importantly, SVN’s will provide tools to find, grow and maintain new target audiences.
The SVN cloud based video aggregation platforms will help content producers and local organizations curate multiple sources of video content into a TV-like experience for viewers – with web content management infrastructure and interconnectedness. Viewers will be invited to be a part of the experience via private conversations with trained coaches, innovative content sharing systems, and ultimately, face-to-face interaction with local hosts.
Aggregating and curating content
The medium is shifting, but initially the content will look familiar.
SVN’s will have channels of traditional teaching, preaching and talk. However, content producers and networks will cheer being released from the set-time limits of traditional TV. On SVN’s, videos can be published of any length, depending on the purpose of the channel, the video and who it’s for.
One network will offer a channel of evangelism videos with runtimes less than 10 minutes. Another will feature a diverse cast of contributors talking about their faith in the fast moving times of today’s teen culture. Movie channels, music video channels and children’s programming are planned.
Advertising support
SVN’s are not the only ones investing in online video. Our appetite for online videos — and the ads that accompany them — keeps growing.
Last week, we reported that an all-time high number of consumers are watching content online, including their favorite television shows and movies (comScore). Online video consumption isn’t limited to traditional PCs. Users are watching video on their TVs. Video consumption on tablets and smart phones is also showing significant growth.
Advantage for gospel media
Christian SVN’s will differentiate themselves from other online video offerings through content and purpose. Channel verticals and networks will be like taking a dive into the modern evangelical movement.
The ability for Streaming Video Networks to transform any organization’s website into a multi-channel video programming distribution system, with the first branded video players for the Christian market that can be embedded on multiple platforms, indicates that the most exciting days and years are ahead for gospel media.