In a further display of video’s increasing importance among news organizations, Vox Media on Wednesday announced it’s creating a standalone studio devoted to creating content for the messaging app Snapchat.
The studio, which will comprise an as-yet undetermined number of staffers, will develop content for Snapchat’s Discover channel, according to a news release from Vox Media. Each Vox Media property — including Eater, SB Nation, The Verge and Racked — will share the Snapchat Discover channel currently allotted to Vox.com.
There are a finite number of Discover channels (currently 20), which makes Snapchat rarefied territory for news organizations seeking to reach the app’s users, which reportedly number in the hundreds of millions.
Higher advertising rates accorded to video, increasing video consumption and the rise of streaming platforms like Facebook Live and Periscope have pushed news organizations like Vox Media to make big bets on audiovisual storytelling in recent years.
Video was a major theme of Vox Media’s announcements Wednesday. In addition to the Snapchat Discover studio, the digital publisher announced several other video-based initiatives:
- A partnership between Spanish-language broadcaster Telemundo and sports site SB Nation to “create the first-ever mobile, bi-lingual sports property to reach Hispanic millennial sports fans.”
- A joint initiative from SB Nation and NBC Sports aimed at creating “the most comprehensive Sunday Night Football coverage, including a slate of original digital video series created by SB Nation and NBC Sports…”
- A video collaboration between Curbed, Vox Media’s real estate site, and Bravo: “Curbed will curate a new home-themed section on BravoTV.com, focused around Curbed’s recently relaunched vision ‘Love Where You Live.'”
- “Prefabulous,” Vox Media’s first attempt at television. The real estate show is a project from Vox Entertainment and a division of A+E Networks.
The announcements fell on the same two-week period that other digitally minded news organizations were participating in New Fronts, an annual advertising showcase.
