PRODUCTION AND POST
LIVING IN A VERTICAL WORLD Jenny Priestley speaks to the BBC’s Chris Lunn about the broadcaster’s use of vertical video in its News app
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n November 2016 the BBC announced the launch of its new daily vertical video news product. In the news app, the ‘videos of the day’ section hosts seven to ten vertical video stories chosen by BBC editors, updated throughout the day depending on the news cycle. Videos run for between 60 and 90 seconds with subtitles, so they can be watched without sound. The decision to launch a vertical video offering was taken after the BBC began to see a shift in their audience towards mobile. According to Chris Lunn, senior product manager for news, sport and syndication at BBC Global News Ltd, the Corporation was looking at its video offering across the board and realised they weren’t offering “as good a video experience on smartphones as we could.” “So we took it upon ourselves to go back to the drawing board and ask what was the experience like for a smartphone audience,” he explains. “One of the things that came out of that was around vertical video. So, we took that forward and looked at how our storytelling formats translate to the mobile screen.” Lunn says the BBC didn’t make a conscious effort to aim their vertical videos at a particular demographic. “Obviously smartphone adoption leans towards younger audiences but we were really targeting the smartphone user. For us, it was more about people consuming news on a smartphone and how did that experience feel and what did it look like?” Reaction to the vertical format has been extremely positive. In terms of interviews, Lunn says users have made comparisons to FaceTime saying content felt more personal in a vertical format which he says the team has found “really interesting.” “Since we’ve gone to market, we’ve seen some really strong numbers, it’s been really encouraging,” Lunn continues. “It has certainly met some of our aspirations but there is more that we want to do, as you’d expect from any kind of news publisher. As it stands, we’re really happy with how it’s been received and the general usage of the product itself.” Asked if there’s a particular genre that users have gravitated towards, Lunn says views tend to be driven by the news agenda. “Obviously in the case of a breaking news story then we’ll see those videos do very well. At the end of the day, we are trying to produce high quality video for a particular story and we rely on that to drive the numbers.” The app includes a curated playlist, compiled by the BBC’s editorial team. “It leans towards a more heavier, more current news story towards the top of the playlist with more ‘featurey’ content towards the end,” explains Lunn. “We do see a natural drop-off
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19/04/2018 11:15