How Brands Can Leverage the Power of Twitch

In the world of interactive livestreaming platforms, there is a great need for unique, live, and unpredictable user experiences to enhance enjoyment and engagement. 

Twitch, launched in 2011, fills that need with casual gaming and world-class esports to anime marathons, music, and art streams.  Erin Joyce, Creative Strategy Lead, Americas, for Twitch’s Brand Partnership Studio and Stephanie Quan, Director of Program Management for Twitch’s Brand Partnership Studio are focused on offering advertisers the ability to leverage custom integrations on their platform that tap into native engagement opportunities that are tailored to each brand.

What Are Custom Brand Extensions

Breaking through the clutter, “Twitch offers premium media products, native site integrations, brand partnerships, and sponsorships that stand out in a crowded advertising landscape,” noted Joyce. “Advertisers capture the Twitch audience’s attention with unskippable ads that weave directly into live broadcasts as well as high-impact display units including the homepage carousel,” she added.

The unique aspect of this partnership is the ability of advertisers to be matched with talent. Joyce explained that, “Twitch Ads leverages its Brand Partnership Studio, a team of in-house gaming and livestreaming experts, to help brands activate on Twitch through custom advertising programs often starring Twitch creators as well as sponsorships with both Twitch’s owned and operated premium content and with various media partners that help align brands with livestreaming and gaming.”

Twitch’s Brand Partnership Studio matches clients to creatives who help integrate the brand within the Twitch environment for maximum impact.  “Our team of creatives, strategists and producers are fluent in creator culture and dedicated to helping your brand reach their campaign goals in an authentic way using gaming norms, insights, cultural trends and bold ideas,” she stated.

How Creative Ideation Works

Creative ideation offers a very clear process. “In most cases it starts with a brief and our client’s goals for the campaign,” she began and added, “From there, we work backwards to align the brand, its personae, function, and generally how it relates to Gen-Z or broader culture.  We will build upon your existing brand strategy to craft a narrative that complements your brand and suits the livestreaming space.”

The future, according to Joyce, looks bright for this space. “I personally am fascinated with creator culture and its impact on Gen Z.  As younger audiences continue to invest more time in personality-based content, and find more value in it, I get really excited about the doors this opens for advertisers.  For example, instead of having a creative agency of record, maybe someday a brand will have a dedicated ‘Creator House?’” she posited.

For Quan, the process also offers opportunities to custom fit to the brand. “The standard programming checklists still apply,” she noted, “but with the live environment, we face an extra set of considerations when bringing creative ideas to life on Twitch.” While there are still logistical considerations, she affirmed that, “Our execution centers around the Twitch creator. We depend on the creator to bring the creative idea to life and to connect it with their community’s values. Our team works closely with our network of creators to properly match them with the brands that resonate with them and their communities. Once we have casted our creator, we brief them on the creative concept, talking points and logistics. Because our creators are so accustomed to the intricacies of Twitch, we are able to build our program on a solid foundation!”

An Example of a Successful Campaign on Twitch

When asked about a successful example, both executives mentioned Procter & Gamble. “P&G has had many successful advertising campaigns on Twitch through their various brands,” explained Quan, “most recently they partnered with Twitch for Charmin to create a fun and engaging campaign through the creation of a mini game called the Deuce Destroyer.”

With this brand extension campaign, “Charmin was able to own the stream break by providing an interactive experience through the mini game and rewarding the community through Bits, Twitch’s virtual goods used to cheer on creators during livestreams. Fifteen Twitch streamers participated in the campaign, which exposed the brand and game to a wide assortment of communities across the service. Ultimately, this not only serviced the goals of the brand, but also was well received by the Twitch and media community where it was recognized as the winner of the Gamficiation category for the Shorty Awards,” noted Quan.

Conclusion

For advertisers to be able to truly engage with viewers, there is no better way than through interactive programming where the creatives help to fully integrate messaging. One way to achieve this is through custom branded extensions; live apps that empower creators to enhance their stream with an added layer of interactivity between themselves, their content, their audiences, and the brand at the center of these unique experiences. Twitch is at the core of such efforts and is leading the way to a more satisfying user and brand experience.

 Artwork by Charlene Weisler

This article first appeared in www.MediaVillage.com

 

Human By Design- A Conference on Augmentation

Courageous, a brand building studio providing cross platform native content for CNN, HLN and Great Big Story, hosted a conference this past week called Human By Design in conjunction with client Square Enix whose video game Deus Ex features human augmentation. “Mankind becomes divided between those who are augmented and improved with technology and others who are in an unadulterated state. Conflict ensues. These issues are bubbling up today,” stated Otto Bell, VP & Group Creative Director, Courageous. 

Expanding on the issues raised in the game, the Human By Design conference focused on a more detailed appraisal of augmentation - The moral questions behind it, the possibilities, pitfalls, legalities and current and future global and individual applications. What we have historically thought of as augmentation is shifting. With advancing technology, augmentation is more than what porn stars may do to enhance their appearance. Augmentation now includes all forms of technology and biogenics ranging from chips, medical devices, bionics and genetic modification, for example.

What is Augmentation?

Some define augmentation as improving what is already good and healthy in our bodies. "Wearing eyeglasses to improve your vision is reparative," explained Dr. Arthur Caplan, Director of Medical Ethics at NYU School of Medicine who added, "Augmentation adds capabilities to currently well-functioning areas like lasik surgery that improves ones eyesight to 20/10 - beyond the normal range."

But others disagree on that fine distinction. "Augmentation is catapulting us into a new era of humanity," exclaimed Erica Orange, EVP and COO Future Hunters, "It is giving us superhero powers, making us stronger, faster or gives us a pill to extend our lifespan. We have already been living augmented lives with prosthetics for example. And it has accelerated in recent years with programmable microbes and symbiosis."

Ethics of Augmentation

It is staggering to think about how augmentation can and will impact our lives … and how quickly it will happen. We are only limited by our imagination and we are currently experiencing an exponential rate of change that is outpacing our human understanding of it. According to Orange, "We now have modular biology- self defined, manufactured and unique - where we will be able to mix and match our own biology. There will be plant-able memories, restarting active memory, transplantation - organic and genetic transplants, synthetic DNA. We will see a head transplant in 2017, mind controlled skeletons, age reversal pills, virtual immortality. But there are privacy, ethical and moral implications,” she warned.

What are the moral implications of augmentation? One might argue that genetically modifying a person is against nature. But what if we are able to modify genes to prevent ALS or other deadly diseases? We find ways to extend life but just because we can, should we? Will we become a society of haves and have nots as the costs for augmentation may be too high for many deserving people. Will some of this augmentation be used for nefarious or malicious purposes? What happens when it gets into the wrong hands? There was a consensus that it was important to create a meaningful dialogue around these issues.

The issue of individual vs societal rights can become cloudy when it comes to augmentation. “In one sense we shouldn't abridge individual rights, but there are no truly individualistic decisions. Our decisions impact others as members of a community. It has social implications. However, there is not a lot of controversy in therapeutic aspects of augmentation,” posits E. Christian Brugger, Cardinal Stafford Professor of Christian Ethics at John Vianney Major Seminary. But in fact, even therapeutic aspects of augmentation have their controversies and detractors as in stem cell research.

Applications for Media

One of the highlights of the conference was the impact that media can have on the acceptance and adoption of augmentation for consumers. For example, gaming that includes characters with bionic features creates a “cool factor” for young people who may need prosthetics. Jonathan Jacques-Belletete, Executive Art Director for the game, Deus Ex creates prosthetics for his characters that look like art. These designs are then adapted for actual use at Open Bionics, a company that builds prosthetics, to manufacture actual prosthetics from these gaming designs. Cathrine Disney, a college student born with a congenital amputation, faced a lifetime of poorly designed prosthetics, like hooks, that were not only difficult to use but also unsightly. She is now the first woman to wear the bionic Titan arm which was created by Eidos-Montreal and Open Bionics. “It is like a piece of art and it is very easy to use. I like to show it off,” she explained.

I believe that augmentation may even offer a possible opportunity for the industry through the Internet of Things. Our cars and home appliances will be all connected, so why not some types of augmentation? Some may offer unique data streams can be captured and added to our growing knowledge of consumer behavior. How scary is that?

The conference, which was live streamed on the gaming community Twitch, will live on as added content for Courageous, if you are interested in learning more. As the opening video stated at the conference, “Augmentation is about looking to the future and it is not a question of should we or shouldn't we. It is coming.” Indeed.

This article first appeared in www.MediaBizBloggers.com