Twitch is taking a step toward competing with social media giants like Instagram and TikTok. After launching photo and text stories last year, Twitch is now rolling out video stories. With this new feature, streamers can upload videos from their camera roll or make 60-second clips right within the Twitch mobile app.
Why video stories?
Twitch launched video stories to give streamers more possibilities for interaction with their fans. Streamers can now mention people, offer highlights or clips from recent streams, make polls and provide behind-the-scenes content.
This feature aims to make the viewer experience more engaging in addition to providing them with updates. As one Twitch representative put it, “Stories can be a powerful way to engage your community.”
Keeping up with the competition
Video stories are not a new idea; Snapchat popularized them more than ten years ago, but they have worked well for sites like Instagram, YouTube and TikTok. By providing its streamers all the resources they require to retain their following on Twitch rather than losing them to other social media platforms, Twitch intends to replicate this success. Top creators depend on these other channels for a wider audience. Therefore, it’s unlikely that they will completely give them up and instead use Twitch stories in addition to the other channels.
The fact that video stories on Twitch are now viewable through the web app in addition to mobile is one of the biggest upgrades. This change was made after realizing that many viewers still prefer to browse Twitch on their PCs. Stories can now be seen on the following page, the left navigation bar or the avatar of any streamer on their channel page.
Image courtesy: Twitch
