Keeping Watch on Facebook Watch
When Facebook Watch was announced the vision for it seemed to be a Facebook version of Netflix. High-quality, highly-produced content would make its way onto Facebook, and Facebook would emphasize destination content—content people would seek out and view.
Watch is an experiment, and as with any experiment, things change, and the first major changes to Watch appear to be underway.
Facebook is considering being less of a gatekeeper and opening up the platform to more individual creators. This would make Watch available to more content creators and fill Watch with more options. These creators would upload their content and then take a cut of revenue generated from ads running alongside their work, similar to YouTube.
Up until this point, Facebook has carefully curated the content on Watch by working with publishers on the shows they create. Facebook pays them to create the content and then recoups its investment by keeping the advertising revenue.
Facebook needs the Watch experiment to pay off. Its ad inventory is saturated, so it needs another place to generate ad impressions, and Watch’s timing couldn’t be better. YouTube is under heightened scrutiny right now based on brand safety concerns. Watch could capitalize on this moment of weakness and gain both advertiser and creator attention.
Watch is evolving, and if it does take this approach, it may evolve in some pretty fundamental ways:
- Quantity over quality. Expect a lot more options on Watch, but that content may not be of the Netflix-esque standards Watch has originally envisioned to have. Instead of content that falls into the realm of destination viewing, it may feel more like circumstantial viewing. You’ll watch it if it’s there, but you won’t seek it out.
- Lower barriers create more players. If Facebook removes the barriers, Watch will attract more content creators. This should be an invitation to advertisers to watch for rising stars and potential partnerships.
- Bring back the teens. YouTube gained its teen audience not by curating influencers, but by attracting talent that built an audience. Facebook could do the same. Open up the platform to creators and let them do what they do. Create content, attract an audience and become influencers. Facebook's user base is getting older, and that may be okay. That being said, if Watch could bring younger users into Facebook, Facebook wouldn’t turn that proposition down.
Outside of VR, Watch is the biggest bet Facebook has going. The fact that it’s changing isn’t much a surprise. It’s an experiement in need of a reboot