We have seen a huge increase in the use and buzz surrounding Periscope, Twitter’s new live streaming video application. I wrote about the implications and uses of Meerkat and how PR professionals (and professors) could utilize these applications for their work. Colleges, sports organizations and teams, brands, and others are flocking to both of these applications to explore, text, and share what they are doing online through streaming video.
PR Newswire created a good post sharing what are the implications for both of these platforms for PR professionals – there are always of course challenges and risks associated with any new platform, but if you are aware of these and plan ahead of time, then it will be all good.
With Periscope, there are several benefits and opportunities here for PR professionals (and professors). Here are some opportunities and activities for using Periscope in and out of your classroom:
- Broadcast final class presentations: What better way to showcase your student’s work for professionals to see and view remotely? This is what I will be doing for my final presentations in my social media class this semester.
- Share research presentations at conferences: Of course, like live tweeting, you have to get permission in order to do this, but this is what I did for my graduate student this past week in Greece with her presentation. She’s on the job market right now for a sports and social media position, and it was great to have her present her research on this topic and share this with the #SMSports community.
- Professor Virtual Office Hours & Q/A: What better way to engage with your students by hosting a virtual office hour through Periscope? I think this is a great idea – you can have this be around 20-30 minutes, but it allows people to ask you questions. You can also take attendance to see who was able to see the video in real-time, and who replayed the video as well. Plus, you are able to save your video as well. The professor could upload this video file directly to Blackboard or another online resource in case students missed the session.
- Ask the professor/professional Periscope series: We have seen the rise of AMAs (Ask me Anything) on Reddit, but what if you were able to have a regular session where you were able to share your thoughts about a current topic, trend, issue, or case study with others? Essentially, you are creating a livestream video blog to be shared and disseminated on Twitter for others to see here. What is great is the fact you are able to do this remotely and in various locations at any time.
- Livestreaming guests for classes: If you want to have a session that is not during class time and create a video chat session with a guest, you can host a Periscope Chat session. I think this would be a great way to engage audiences and allow people to ask questions while seeing the answers appear in a video rather than a tweet.
In summary, Periscope is going to be a topic we are going to continue hearing about in the industry as well as in our classes. It’s key for all of us to explore how to use these new tools and see if we can sustain these efforts over the long time.
Hope you all are having a great day!
