Are you missing out on a large portion of your target audience? If you're not using live streaming to interact with your audience, then you probably are.

Live video is a popular and growing way for content creators to connect with their viewers-in fact, by early 2021, 24% of the world's streaming video content is done through live platforms. The numbers behind live streaming are impressive, and if you haven't already, you should incorporate this medium into your mobile marketing success stories and strategy.

There are many reasons why live streaming has become the content format of choice, and academics say that viewers engage with live content because they connect with the anchor and provide a sense of social presence. 

What is live streaming?

Live streaming is a powerful way to connect with your target audience and personalize your message in a unique way. It's a simple process that can yield great results.

By leveraging your social media presence, you can stream live footage to a large audience and give your followers a unique insight into your company. The growth of live streaming is exponential, with the market growing from $30 billion in 2016 to $70 billion by 2021 and $184 billion by 2027.

That's a huge increase, and it's forcing marketers to sit up and take notice, with 28 percent of people starting to invest more in live streaming.

Gaming

According to Twitch Tracker, the site has an average of nearly 2.8 million viewers per day. Meanwhile, Nielsen SuperData reports that Twitch will have $2 billion in revenue by 2020. In fact, on all devices, the Twitch community watched more than 1 trillion minutes in 2020.

"The core components that make up Twitch - live streaming, real-time interaction and a strong sense of community - have driven our success over the past decade. We pioneered live streaming within the gaming community, built our expertise around creating immersive experiences, and now, our content spans gaming, entertainment, sports, music and more."


A growing number of gaming apps/platforms offer chat and messaging features for players. 41% of parents whose kids play video games say their kids chat or communicate with other gamers through streaming services like Twitch and YouTube Gaming. Gaming is a great way for young people to engage, socialize and be entertained. For young people, they can play games on consoles, apps or websites, cell phones, tablets, PCs or through smart speakers and virtual reality headsets.

Social apps

A new report from mobile data and analytics provider App Annie, "The Evolution of Social Media Apps," says the boom in live streaming has helped create a second-generation social economy. This year, consumers will spend 548 billion hours of live streaming time on top social apps.
Social apps will account for 740 billion hours of consumer time in the second quarter of 2021, equivalent to 44 percent of all mobile time. By 2021, the total time spent on the top 5 live-focused social apps on Android phones alone will exceed 5,000 hours outside of China, representing a 3-year CAGR of 25%. Live streaming is driving the current boom in social app engagement.

Live shopping

Live shopping has become a focus of social apps, with Instagram, Facebook and Pinterest all running their own live shopping streams with well-known creators in a bid to maximize their respective commercial potential. YouTube is also looking to get in, with a series of upcoming live holiday shopping streams that will allow viewers to interact with influencers and celebrities in real time, while also facilitate direct in-app shopping.

Live commerce combines instant purchase of featured products with viewer engagement through a chat feature or reaction button. In China, live commerce has transformed the retail industry and has become a major sales channel in less than five years. In a 2020 survey, two-thirds of Chinese consumers said they had purchased products via live streaming in the past year.2 While Western retailers are still lagging behind China in their pursuit of real-time commerce, first movers are beginning to make significant sales.

In fashion, Tommy Hilfiger recently expanded its live-streaming program to Europe and North America after its success in China, where a show reportedly attracted 14 million viewers and sold 1,300 hoodies in two minutes.3 In December 2020, Walmart piloted a live fashion event on TikTok that drew seven times more viewers than expected and led to an The campaign drew seven times more viewers than expected and increased its TikTok fan base by 25%.

How live streaming benefits your mobile app business?

Large audience

First, with a variety of different live streaming ideas, brands have the opportunity to reach people who have not yet heard of them. Instead of engaging a group of people through email marketing, live streaming can attract people you didn't even know might be interested.

The rise of smartphones

We all know that more people have smartphones than don't, right? Smartphones are so prevalent today that people can watch a live stream on their commute to work, on their lunch break, while waiting for an appointment or even just on the couch at home.

Better Engagement

People enjoy watching videos rather than reading lengthy descriptions. Viewers find reading boring; they prefer videos that keep them engaged. This is a great theme where the full message is compiled into a few minutes of video. Video captures the viewer's attention, which is the main advantage of video in the consumer space.

Streaming leads to higher conversion rates

Will live streaming attract ROI? It is interactive and usually attracts more viewers than traditional video. According to Facebook, live video is watched for three times longer than standard video. Real-time commerce is entertaining and immersive, allowing viewers to watch for longer periods of time. It can also shorten the customer decision process from awareness to purchase. Time-limited strategies such as one-time coupons can be used to create a sense of urgency. Companies report conversion rates approaching 30% - ten times higher than traditional e-commerce.

Build relationships

One of the great benefits of live streaming is a better relationship with consumers. Suddenly, your brand has a face and a voice to express their loyalty. Through different streams, you can show your personality, help consumers with common problems and position yourself as a brand that wants to help. Of course, you can also make a big splash and become a market leader.

Work with Influencers

Working with influencers is more difficult than ever. Instead of having influencers simply mention your name or product, we recommend keeping them actively involved. You guessed it, a great way to do this is through live streaming.
For example, many brands are starting to work with influencers when hosting events. With an influencer as the host, your audience is likely to tune in, in which case you'll automatically get more attention to your stream.

Major Live Streaming Platforms

With the popularity of live streaming, there has been an increase in the number of online sites and mobile apps where you can host live content. 

Youtube Live

Every day, 2 billion viewers watch 1 billion hours of video on YouTube. There's a lot you can do with live streaming on YouTube. 

Live content is as easy as clicking the "go live" button on your mobile app, which will ping your subscribers and let them know you're online. Some key things you should know about YouTube Live include:

• You need to enable live streaming before your scheduled broadcast, and you need at least 1,000 subscribers to be able to stream live through your mobile app.
• If you don't necessarily need to be mobile, you can even broadcast live via webcam or use an encoder, which is ideal for broadcasting screens, for example. 
• You can get powerful real-time analytics through the Live Control Room to see how many people are watching and participating. 
• Your fans can send money to you through your live chat, and the top 5 SuperChat earners in the U.S. earned a total of $363,371 in June 2021. 

Once you set up your live chat, you can embed it almost anywhere online - so it can be located on your website or other social media channels. 

Facebook Live

Facebook is the world's largest social network with 2,797,000 monthly active users as of the fourth quarter of 2020.  In 2019, the social network announced a shift in focus and prioritization of original and engaging video content. 

You can earn money from video content and live streaming using interstitial ad placements as long as you meet Facebook's eligibility criteria, which are:

• Live in a specific country in the world; there are 48 on the list so far.
• Be 18 years of age or older.
• Comply with partner monetization policies.
• Have more than 10,000 followers.
• Have at least five active videos on your page.
• Have 600,000 minutes of video views in the last 60 days; if you want to advertise on live content, 60,000 of those minutes are live videos.

Because Facebook is so popular worldwide, you are almost guaranteed to find your audience on the platform.

Instagram Live

As of June 2021, Instagram is no longer just square photos. Instagram head Adam Mosseri announced the move to video on July 1, 2021, acknowledging that TikTok and YouTube are now direct competitors to the platform.

To start a live stream on Instagram, simply slide over the Post, Story and Carousel buttons and click the button to go live immediately. Some useful features available to Instagrammers who live-stream are:

• The option to invite people to join your live feed via notifications upon launch.
• The ability to invite others into the live feed so you can connect with other content creators
• Filters and overlays on your videos so you can add VHS looks, celebrities or funny faces, etc. to your live feed.
• Your fans can purchase badges to get noticed in your comment section.

TikTok Live

TikTok is quickly becoming a dominant force in social media as it was downloaded to 850 million mobile devices in 2020 - and as we've seen before, it has pushed Insta into new territory. 

Videos on TikTok used to be limited to 15 seconds, then expanded to one minute, and starting in July 2021, the company began rolling out 3-minute videos to users. But if you have more than 1,000 followers and are 16 years old or older, you can actually live stream on TikTok and run your live video stream for a seemingly unlimited amount of time. 

In the U.S., only 48% of TikTok users are 29 years old or younger, and 40% of users have a household income of more than $100,000 - that's an audience you should be reaching. 

Other features TikTok offers to live streamers include:

• Picture-in-picture so that hosts don't easily lose their audience.
• Live together, which means you can have multiple people in one stream.
• Q&A sessions so users can ask you questions.
• A "Popular Streams" category, so your live content is easier to find.
• The option to add help or moderators to your live streams.
• Keyword filters to help review comments and prompt commenters to reconsider unkind words.

Twitch

At any given time in July 2021, an average of 2.6 million people are watching Twitch.

According to Alexa, this audience is made up primarily of people under the age of 34 - they make up 73 percent of all users, and nearly 27 percent of viewers are located in the United States.  While Twitch's audience is for real-time streaming games, it also has channels dedicated to art, music and lifestyle. 

If you want to stream gaming content or are interested in exploring all the frontiers of new Twitch content, here are the features you get:

• Comment on your stream in real time.
• Followers who can interact with your profile.
• Emoji slots to increase viewer interaction.
• Cheers that can boost your earnings.
• Subscriber badges for your fans.
• Scheduled events for your stream.