Twitter’s new feature shows sport fans are still the main target group

This week, Twitter announced the launch of a new feature at the top of the platform’s timeline: ‘Happening Now’.

This novelty will highlight events in real-time and allow users to figure out what’s happening at a glance. For now, only NFL, NBA and MLB games will be referenced in the US on iOS and Android apps. But it could well be rolled out further.

The process is simple. Happening Now looks like thumbnails related to live sporting events. After clicking on the media, users can see a live scoreboard following by fans’ tweets related the the game as well as a Trending Topic.

Happening Now should strengthen Twitter’s position as a news platform. New topics such as politics, music, or celebrities could join sport at the party in the future, of course, and users would be able to select which kind of events they are interested in so that the app can improve suggestions from the Happening Now section.

But reflecting the special place sport has in Twitter’s real-time importance, the social media platform has decided to launch this new initiative featuring only sporting events. And that’s not surprising: sports fans represent an important part of the social platform audience. After announcing, last May, a live-streaming partnership with the MLB, WNBA and PGA Tour, Happening Now is a new way for the social media giant to be one of the first sporting news and content providers and to propose a new service to satisfy sports fans.

Twitter’s strategy is to offer the most interesing content possible to its users, and to help new users to get comfortable with the platform. To ensure the success of Happening Now, sporting events were certainly the best choice as the sport fans community is already engaged and active on Twitter. For new or inactive users, a live game highlighted on Happening Now should be easy to use as the layout just looks like a live commentary.

We don’t know yet when Happening Now will be rolled out in Europe. I’m looking forward to testing it out and to following a game via this feature when I’m not on my sofa!

About author

Adrien Danjou
Adrien Danjou 140 posts

Adrien is a Digital Marketing Manager in France and a Digital Sport lover. Follow him on Twitter: @Adrien_DH

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