The Challenge and the Opportunity
ABP Live, the digital arm of the Indian media conglomerate ABP Network, sought to amplify the reach and impact of its website-hosted video content. Launched in 2005, abplive.com boasts a vast library of videos spanning news, business, sports, entertainment, lifestyle, and more. While ABP Live was experiencing significant growth in its YouTube video views, it faced a growing challenge: maximizing the discoverability and engagement of its website-hosted videos. This challenge was compounded by the need to meet the evolving needs of advertisers, particularly by delivering high-quality users to them on native platforms to secure long-term revenue and partnerships. The company also sought to streamline the publishing of video content on social media to save time and resources. Furthermore, the rise of short-form video presented an opportunity to engage audiences in new ways, demanding a strategic response to capitalize on this emerging trend. This need for optimization was amplified by the approaching IPL 2024, T20 World Cup 2024, and the 2024 India General Elections, where maximizing viewership and engagement was paramount.
To tackle the challenges of discoverability, efficient publishing, and capitalizing on the short-form video trend, ABP Live took a four-pronged approach:
Modernizing Technology: To enhance the accessibility and appeal of its video content, ABP Live implemented a range of technical upgrades. These included improving search functionality across its website and app, launching ABP Shorts—a dedicated platform for mobile-friendly vertical videos—and adding capabilities to convert existing horizontal videos into this short-form format. Additionally, ABP Live enhanced its video player to seamlessly support both long-form and short-form content, ensuring a smooth viewing experience across all formats.
Improving Discoverability: ABP Live used special tags and descriptions to help search engines like Google understand and showcase their videos better. This made it easier for people to find ABP Live videos when searching online.
Simplifying Publishing: ABP Live streamlined its video publishing process by integrating its tech and product systems. They revamped their content management system (CMS) to enable one-click publishing to all their social media platforms. This streamlined approach allowed them to tailor each video with a unique title, description, and thumbnail, saving time and effort while ensuring their viewers had instant access to the latest news and updates across all online channels.
Promoting Short Videos: ABP Live knew that people love short videos, so they created sections and widgets on their website and apps to showcase ABP Shorts. They placed these widgets in prominent places such as across navigation, the home page, story listing pages, within individual stories, and other high-engagement spots to make sure people wouldn't miss them.
