Local social media to explore – VK in Russia
The internet in 2018 might look like a monolith at times, especially from an English-speaking perspective: Facebook, Netflix, the next iPhone release. However, there’s lots of life outside of this Western mainstream bubble.
So, if you’re planning to target new regions and reach broader global audiences with your video content, you might want to consider what other local solutions and platforms are available to you.
Interested in sports-related topics? Check out our other stories:
- Great sports personalities to follow at the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang.
- A quick guide to understanding esports and gaming fans.
Here, I would like to introduce you to VK – the main social network in Russia, the 9th most populated country in the world.
In touch with VK
Launched in 2006, VK (VKontakte, which translates as ‘in touch’) is an extremely successful social network. It’s very popular in Russia and some former soviet republics, like Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine, but also receives a noticeable amount of traffic from Germany[1].
VK is ranked as the 11th most popular website in the world, which means it’s more popular than Twitter, Amazon, Instagram or Wikipedia globally. Needless to say, it is number one in Russia and even more popular than the country’s two leading search engines – Russian Yandex and Google!
For lots of reasons, VK is often compared to Facebook. Its features are pretty similar to Mark Zuckerberg’s platform. The interface uses a blue colour that Facebook users will be familiar with and overall the functionality is comparable.
VK’s users can publish their thoughts, photos and videos on their profiles, connect with friends and follow communities (like FB groups or profiles). Users are known to consider the network as easier to use and more transparent than Facebook, and that’s probably one of the reasons why VK is more popular in Russia than Facebook.
Video hosting is central to VK
VK is widely used as a video hosting platform. Users make the most of VK’s features to share a wide selection of different video types.
Contrary to Facebook, VK also has a really neat search engine, which is a powerful tool that allows users to search for video content pretty easily, using convenient sets of parameters. Thanks to its search, VK is more akin to YouTube, as you can search through past and present video content with ease.
To picture how big and important the service is in Russia: VK has a bigger monthly audience than any Russian TV station, including the public service, Channel 1[3].
Social media in Russia = VK
VK is full of really strong communities (groups) created around or dedicated to different brands. These groups are created by users in praise of brands. However, the content published within each group is often not in tune with a brand’s own standards. To understand this better, let’s take a look at Nike[4].
Nike on VK
The biggest group dedicated to the brand has more than 1.6million users, while all three of the official Russian Nike profiles have around a third of that amount in total.
The unofficial groups are often used to share content that is interesting to its community and not content controlled by the brand. For example, the biggest VK group called ‘Nike’ is often dominated by game trailers or funny pictures, most unrelated to sports products. This throws up interesting questions about how you might connect with these groups, and influencers could play a vital role here.
The official Nike profiles tend to make use of numerous sets of VK tools to promote the Nike brand, including built-in e-commerce and sponsored content.
For other brands wanting to enter VK, don’t worry as the tools are already there for all to use, ready to help boost the visibility of your brand. Here at Tellyo, our cloud-based video production platform also integrates with VK, enabling you to easily publish video content to the social network.
Other brands on VK
Among other big sports brands present on VK, you can find FC Bayern Munich and Manchester City, but also the NBA, UEFA and dozens of video game titles. There are also many global fashion and beauty brands fighting for the attention of a Russian audience. If there is no official account of a global brand, there will be at least one or two groups dedicated to them.
What’s in it for you?
VK users are very receptive towards big, international brands. Brands can benefit remarkably from being present and active on this Russian social media network, where online communities play a huge role. So, if you’re thinking about developing a greater presence in Russia, then being on VK is a must and key to potential fans and customers noticing your content and brand. And we’re here to help, as our Tellyo platform integrates seamlessly with VK, meaning you can reach audiences on this social channel with real-time video content.
If you’d like to find our more, drop a message to contact@tellyo.com.
Local social media to explore – VK in Russia
The internet in 2018 might look like a monolith at times, especially from an English-speaking perspective: Facebook, Netflix, the next iPhone release. However, there’s lots of life outside of this Western mainstream bubble.
So, if you’re planning to target new regions and reach broader global audiences with your video content, you might want to consider what other local solutions and platforms are available to you.
Interested in sports-related topics? Check out our other stories:
- Great sports personalities to follow at the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang.
- A quick guide to understanding esports and gaming fans.
Here, I would like to introduce you to VK – the main social network in Russia, the 9th most populated country in the world.
In touch with VK
Launched in 2006, VK (VKontakte, which translates as ‘in touch’) is an extremely successful social network. It’s very popular in Russia and some former soviet republics, like Belarus, Kazakhstan and Ukraine, but also receives a noticeable amount of traffic from Germany[1].
VK is ranked as the 11th most popular website in the world, which means it’s more popular than Twitter, Amazon, Instagram or Wikipedia globally. Needless to say, it is number one in Russia and even more popular than the country’s two leading search engines – Russian Yandex and Google!
For lots of reasons, VK is often compared to Facebook. Its features are pretty similar to Mark Zuckerberg’s platform. The interface uses a blue colour that Facebook users will be familiar with and overall the functionality is comparable.
VK’s users can publish their thoughts, photos and videos on their profiles, connect with friends and follow communities (like FB groups or profiles). Users are known to consider the network as easier to use and more transparent than Facebook, and that’s probably one of the reasons why VK is more popular in Russia than Facebook.
Video hosting is central to VK
VK is widely used as a video hosting platform. Users make the most of VK’s features to share a wide selection of different video types.
Contrary to Facebook, VK also has a really neat search engine, which is a powerful tool that allows users to search for video content pretty easily, using convenient sets of parameters. Thanks to its search, VK is more akin to YouTube, as you can search through past and present video content with ease.
To picture how big and important the service is in Russia: VK has a bigger monthly audience than any Russian TV station, including the public service, Channel 1[3].
Social media in Russia = VK
VK is full of really strong communities (groups) created around or dedicated to different brands. These groups are created by users in praise of brands. However, the content published within each group is often not in tune with a brand’s own standards. To understand this better, let’s take a look at Nike[4].
Nike on VK
The biggest group dedicated to the brand has more than 1.6million users, while all three of the official Russian Nike profiles have around a third of that amount in total.
The unofficial groups are often used to share content that is interesting to its community and not content controlled by the brand. For example, the biggest VK group called ‘Nike’ is often dominated by game trailers or funny pictures, most unrelated to sports products. This throws up interesting questions about how you might connect with these groups, and influencers could play a vital role here.
The official Nike profiles tend to make use of numerous sets of VK tools to promote the Nike brand, including built-in e-commerce and sponsored content.
For other brands wanting to enter VK, don’t worry as the tools are already there for all to use, ready to help boost the visibility of your brand. Here at Tellyo, our cloud-based video production platform also integrates with VK, enabling you to easily publish video content to the social network.
Other brands on VK
Among other big sports brands present on VK, you can find FC Bayern Munich and Manchester City, but also the NBA, UEFA and dozens of video game titles. There are also many global fashion and beauty brands fighting for the attention of a Russian audience. If there is no official account of a global brand, there will be at least one or two groups dedicated to them.
What’s in it for you?
VK users are very receptive towards big, international brands. Brands can benefit remarkably from being present and active on this Russian social media network, where online communities play a huge role. So, if you’re thinking about developing a greater presence in Russia, then being on VK is a must and key to potential fans and customers noticing your content and brand. And we’re here to help, as our Tellyo platform integrates seamlessly with VK, meaning you can reach audiences on this social channel with real-time video content.
If you’d like to find our more, drop a message to contact@tellyo.com.
The new look Tellyo – More power to the user
Here at Tellyo, we take the time to listen to what users have to say and genuinely care about your needs. The new look Tellyo, which we will be gradually rolling out to our users, is the ultimate proof – a refreshed, user-friendly interface, packed with new features and enhancements.
Let’s take a closer look at what we’ve improved for you:
Reach your audiences even sooner
Online audiences value getting information instantly. That’s why we’ve improved the workflow for producing clips and sharing them to social media.
From now on, editing and sharing will happen on the same screen, making the process faster and more fluent.
Sharing a single clip of a key moment takes seconds. While producing an engaging video with branded overlays, bumpers and wipes, then simultaneously publishing it to multiple social media profiles takes less than one minute.
With such a fast workflow at your fingertips, you can reach your audience as soon as possible and maximise engagement.
Boost productivity with the new Projects feature
By listening to our customers we gained useful insights. We found that switching between tasks when working with live content, is something that users do a lot. When switching, users wanted certainty that their work would be saved.
To meet their needs, we’ve created the Projects feature. Each task now started in Tellyo will be automatically saved as a separate Project. This means that users can jump into other tasks and get back to saved work whenever they want. The clip, compilation or highlights will simply be waiting for them, just as they left it.
Projects can also accelerate the process of creating different types of highlights and can improve collaboration among users with access to the same content in Tellyo. You will be able to automate some of your frequent activities helping you to keep your content more consistent and faster to produce.
Publish smarter on social media
Effective distribution of content to social media can be difficult at times, especially when collaborating with external partners, like freelancers or agencies. This is something we’ve addressed and simplified with the new look Tellyo.
Via Tellyo, you can now safely give limited access to your social media profiles to chosen users – such as trusted, independent freelancers.
You can allow them to publish and stream content on your social media channels through Tellyo, but without giving them actual, wider access to your social media accounts.
This way, we keep your social accounts safe but operational for users you choose.
Design suited to your needs
We were surprised to see that our customers use Tellyo on such a wide range of screen sizes and that they often work in resized browsers. To make it easier and efficient, we’ve redesigned our platform and made it more responsive.
You can now work more effectively in Tellyo when on smaller laptop screens or in resized browsers.
Learn how to use Tellyo with our new Guide
Every Tellyo customer will now gain access to our knowledge base – the Tellyo Guide. This puts how-to guidance at our customers’ fingertips and will help to answer the most common questions related to Tellyo features.
You can search through the Guide’s topics or categories – it’s up to you. If you’re unable to find a satisfactory answer, simply let us know. We’re always keen to get to know your point of view and help you.
If you’re already a Tellyo user – simply click here to login to the Guide. If you wish to become a customer, please contact us.
When will the upgrades be available for users?
We are rolling out the upgrades gradually and will contact each of our partners individually to make this process as comfortable as possible.
Not the final word!
We’re proud of Tellyo’s brand-new UI. But we’re not going to stop here. All improvements are the result of continuous dialogue with our users.
The new design also allows us to efficiently develop the platform further, so stay tuned.
If you have any suggestions about new features that could be added to Tellyo, we would be more than happy for you to reach out to us via contact@tellyo.com.
Going social with your broadcasts: the basics
Back in the day, when Facebook was on the rise, every business owner wanted to be there ‘because everyone’s there’. The social network was soon flooded with aesthetically poor and awkwardly positioned business profiles, most of which were instantly forgotten.
The lesson we can all take from back then, at the beginning of the Facebook hype, is that it’s not enough to just be in the right place. In order to gain social media results, you need to remember why it’s good to be there and how to do things right.
So, let’s start with some basics, so you can ensure your video presence on social media is professional, striking and memorable.
Social media broadcasting is dialogue
Many organisations deciding to make the leap to social media often forget one basic principle: social media is all about dialogue between brands and fans.
So, when you start posting your videos to social media, don’t be surprised by the amount of feedback you receive. It’s not enough to simply stream great content, you must be prepared to handle the reactions of your community – positive or negative.
Prepare your social media team to expect the unexpected, such as difficult questions, spammy comments and harsh language, much of which you’re likely to encounter.
Roll with it… it’s not a such a bad thing
A traditional broadcast is controlled by a TV station, while video on social media can develop a life of its own even after being broadcast to a social channel. Once transmitted to the web it could be re-shared thousands of times, rippling out to more and more fans in the process.
What this does raise are questions about how to ensure your branding remains while your content extends its reach. The good news is that there are many useful things you can do to protect and secure branding on your content, such watermarks and bumpers.
Protect your rights by branding your content with watermarks, overlays, wipes and bumpers. Tellyo can help you to do this.
Broadcast is dead, long live the broadcast!
In the world of social media, a broadcast is not a singular event. From broadcasted content, you can create multiple, independent video clips for different social channels, different time zones, and in different languages for different audiences. You can recycle content by creating clips, highlights and compilations.
Thanks to Tellyo, you can even create cool clips during a stream; while also being able to create longer video compilations by joining clips from your live stream with older content created from other sources.
Let your social media folks get creative and play with content. Bring it to life one more time!
Timing is everything (duh!)
In professional broadcasting, especially in sports, timing is crucial. Being able to clip and share a replay to Facebook and YouTube is everything. You can be sure that the first brand to replay a goal or a golden moment will build more reach and grab new viewers within seconds.
If you can automate content production to gain speed, don’t hesitate to do it. In Tellyo, for example, you can ensure branded bumpers are immediately added to all content as part of your workflow.
One more thing…
There’s no simple or perfect recipe for success. Just be prepared and open minded.
If you’re looking for a tool that will help you quickly move beyond the basics and reach new heights with social media, check out Tellyo’s features and our case studies.
