A success that is being emulated. Since he started on Twitch, the presenter of “Questions for a champion” and journalist Samuel Étienne has seen his audience grow day after day. Its daily press review “The morning is yours” is followed by tens of thousands of users. And his account flirts with 300,000 subscribers.
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Is its success being emulated? In any case, he is not the only one to invest in new information channels. FranceInfo, for example, recently launched on TikTok with tailor-made programs on this platform where the videos are limited to one minute: inspiring personalities (“La force”), news in the offbeat sauce (“Serious ?!” ), version of the anti-disinformation magazine “Vrai ou Fake” …
The National Audiovisual Institute (Ina), already very active on social networks, moved there in turn in February, on an experimental basis, again by renewing its approach. “On other networks, we mainly offer videos reacting to the news. On TikTok, we started with a collection logic, with a first series of videos on new technologies over time. a little wink, it is closer to entertainment “, explains Antoine Bayet, head of digital editions at Ina.
For him, you have to find the right grade to interest this young but not naive audience. “We cannot land with a professorial tone, or on the contrary be falsely friends, we have to be more subtle”. In addition, TikTok does not allow any monetization of content, unlike, for example, Snapchat’s “Discover” service, a big handicap for the media. Even if it could evolve.
On the Twitch side, driven by the success of its journalist Samuel Étienne, the public group France Télévisions decided to take the plunge and published a live on vaccines which garnered no less than 170,000 views. Le Figaro has been present there occasionally since 2015, Arte and Challenges are expected there very soon and BFMTV has just launched last week by offering a chat on Covid-19 hosted by its health journalist Margaux de Frouville.
Why do the media choose to get started?
According to Médiamétrie, Twitch, a site dedicated to the distribution of video games, had 5 million monthly visitors in France last year (+ 40%), against 11 million for TikTok, this network with videos of 60 seconds maximum, which saw its number of users explode (+ 273%). A large audience, made up mainly of young adults and adolescents. What to encourage the editors to make their nest there.
But it is still necessary to know the codes of these formats, the technical constraints and the expectations of the members. “The mistake not to make is to reproduce what we do on TV. On Twitch or Facebook, we are in a much more direct relationship with people, and a much more relaxed tone,” suggests Julien Mielcarek, digital editorial director of BFMTV.
An interactivity which could make it possible to make known behind the scenes of the journalist’s profession and to fight mistrust before the traditional media.
But interactivity has its downside, as noted by Margaux de Frouville, who suffered a torrent of insulting comments during her first live. “We expected a hazing, but not in these proportions, with a trolling organized via forums to try to rot this chat, and violent and misogynistic comments,” says Julien Mielcarek.
However, the journalist was not let down and experience has shown its usefulness, he assures: “we received a lot of interesting questions, so that the chat, which was supposed to last 20 to 30 minutes, lasted more. of one hour.”
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